Shloka 11
Strategy and Survival — Chanakya Niti
प्रातर्द्यूतप्रसङ्गेन मध्याह्ने स्त्रीप्रसङ्गतः । रात्रौ चौरप्रसङ्गेन कालो गच्छन्ति धीमताम् ॥
prātar dyūta-prasaṅgena madhyāhne strī-prasaṅgataḥ | rātrau caura-prasaṅgena kālo gacchanti dhīmatām ||
Morning is spent on gambling, midday on women, and night on thieves—thus time is consumed even for the intelligent.
FAQs
Within the Nītiśāstra tradition, such verses commonly catalogue activities viewed as socially disruptive or administratively risky (e.g., gambling, illicit company, criminality). The triadic day-division (morning–midday–night) reflects a didactic framing used in pre-modern Sanskrit literature to present a complete cycle of daily life and its potential diversions, rather than a literal schedule.
The formulation “kālaḥ … gacchanti” presents time as something that “goes away” through repeated prasaṅga (involvement/entanglement). The verse frames loss of time as a consequence of attachment and social proximity to certain pursuits or groups, emphasizing distraction and vulnerability rather than offering procedural instruction.
The repeated compound “X-prasaṅga” (dyūta-prasaṅga, strī-prasaṅga, caura-prasaṅga) uses prasaṅga to denote entanglement or habitual association. The day-part parallelism (prātar / madhyāhne / rātrau) functions as a rhetorical device of totality, suggesting comprehensive erosion of one’s time across the entire day. The genitive plural “dhīmatām” heightens the contrast by implying that even those regarded as intelligent are not immune to such entanglements.