What is "radha"

n. 1 (context Hinduism English) The beloved of the Hindu avatar Krishna. 2 (given name female from=Sanskrit) used in India.

Radha ( IAST: Rādhā, Hindi: राधा ), also called Radhika, Radharani, and Radhe, is a Hindu goddess who is almost always depicted alongside Krishna and features prominently within the theology of Vaishnava traditions, which regards Radha as the original Goddess or Shakti. Radha is also the principal god of worship in the Nimbarka Sampradaya, as Nimbarka, the founder of the tradition, declared that Radha and Krishna together constitute the absolute truth. Radha is the most important gopi in Raas (sacred dance) with Lord Krishna. Radha is often referred to as Rādhārānī or "Rādhikā" in speech, prefixed with the respectful term 'Srimati'.

Udaya Chandrika, better known by her screen name Radha (born 3 June 1965), is an Indian actress popular in the 80s and early 90s. She has acted in numerous movies with top actors of the South Indian cinema such as Dr.Vishnuvardhan, Ravichandran, Chiranjeevi, Kamal Haasan, Sivaji Ganesan, Balakrishna, Rajinikanth, Mohanlal, Venkatesh, Prabhu, Vijayakanth, Karthik Muthuraman, Karthik, Krishna and Sathyaraj . She has acted in over 200 movies in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi. Not only that, She is currently a Judge in STAR Vijay Jodi Number One Season 6 Reality Dance program.

Radha or Radhika may refer to:

In religion:

• Radha, consort of Krishna, Hindu deity
• Radha Krishna, deity forms of Radha and Krishna worshiped in Krishnaism

In the Mahabharata:

• Radha (Mahābhārata), the foster mother of Karna

In film and television:

• Radha (actress) (b. 1965), a former lead Indian film actress
• Radha Mitchell, an Australian film actress
• Radha Bharadwaj, an Indian filmmaker, producer and screenwriter
• Raadhika Sarathkumar, a South Indian actress, producer and entrepreneur
• Radhika Pandit, a Kannada film actress
• Radhika Chaudhari, a former South Indian actress and director
• Radhika Kumaraswamy, widely credited as Kutty Radhika, a former Kannada film actress
• Radhika Apte (b. 1985), an Indian film actress
• Radhika (Malayalam actress), a Malayalam film actress
• Radhika, the main character of the Zee TV serial Choti Bahu

In politics:

• V. Radhika Selvi, a Minister of State for home affairs and Member of 14th Lok Sabha from Tuticorin
• Radhika Ranjan Gupta (d. 1988), a former Chief Minister of Tripura, India
• Radhika Balakrishnan, a Women's right activist
• Radhika Coomaraswamy, a Sri Lankan activist

In music:

• Radha Cuadrado, former singer from the group Kulay whose now a solo singer in the Philippines
• Radha Jayalakshmi, an Indian Carnatic music vocalist duo and playback singers
• Radhika Mohan Maitra (1917-1981), an Indian sarod player

Other people:

• Radhika Ramana Dasa, a notable Vaishnava scholar
• Radhika Roy, an Indian media baron and Co-chairperson and Managing Director of NDTV

Other:

• Raḍha, a historical region of the Indian subcontinent, in present-day Bengal region

Radha was the foster mother of Karna,one of the central characters in the Hindu epic the Mahābhārata. She is not connected with goddess Radha. She was the wife of Adhiratha, chief charioteer of King Dhritrashtra. Kunti, an unwed mother had abandoned her son, she placed the baby in a basket and set him afloat a river. The child later known as Karna was found and adopted by the couple. Adiratha and Radha became his foster parents. Karna as an adult express loyalty towards his foster mother as opposed to his royal birth mother Kunti who had abandoned him soon after birth. Hence, he is sometimes called Radheya, meaning Radha's son. She was also the mother of Shon. It was Guru Dronacharya who gave him the name karna.

Category:Characters in the Mahabharata

Radha is an Indian film actress who has appeared in the Tamil film industry. The actress won critical acclaim for her performance in Sundhara Travels (2002) and later appeared in other Tamil and Malayalam language films.

Radha (Nepali: राधा) is a 2005 novel written by Krishna Dharabasi and winner of Madan Puraskar.

It's been over a decade since Krishna Dharabasi wrote Radha, an extraordinary novel, and yet, the novel is still relatively unknown among Nepali speaking literature and the general public. Radha is a strong example of a novelist challenging traditional mores by presenting mythical texts in a different light. Inspired by Jacques Derrida's Theory of Deconstruction, he has completely changed the characters of Radha and Krishna as we have come to know them. Ved Vyas' and the Mahabharat's Radha is a minor character, whose only purpose seems to be Krishna's plaything. But Dharabasi's Radha is brave, dignified and can also be seen as a revolutionary. He keeps focusing on the importance of women, which too can be seen as a challenge to formal traditions.