Arjuna’s doubts on the battlefield resulted in the Bhagavad Gita. But the Lord had everyone in mind, when He gave His advice through the Gita. It was His quality of mercy that made Him give us guidance through the Gita. In the same way, it was Vedanta Desika’s quality of compassion that made him pen the drama Sankalpa Suryodhaya. It may be argued that since he had proved himself to be a master of all forms of literature, he wanted to show that he could write drama, too. But this is not a right assessment and does not do justice to the intention of Desika, said Valayapet Ramachariar, in a discourse.
If proving his ability as a dramatist was all that mattered, he could have written a play with characters from the Itihasas. But in Sankalpa Suryodhaya, his characters are of various qualities. So, he did not write this drama to reveal his capabilities to the world. It may then be argued that it was written just to refute the Advaitic work Prabodha Chandrodaya of Krishna Misra. This, too, is not right, for nowhere in his work does Desika say his work is intended as refutation of Prabodha Chandrodaya. So, he wrote the drama out of his concern for us. His intention was to use the medium of drama also to establish Ramanuja’s siddhanta.
Desika, in his Adikaranasaravali, says he has been conferred the title of Vedantacharya by Lord Ranaganatha of Srirrangam, and he wants to live up to that name. Desika also had the title kavitarkika simha, but he had a quality that other poets do not have. Poets may have command of the language and the ability to write beautiful verses. But can we assert that they have daya? This is where Desika differed from other poets. His works were motivated by his daya for those in need of instruction on the path to follow.