Shloka 57
ययाति–देवयानी संवादः
Yayāti–Devayānī Dialogue and Śukra’s Consent
देवयान्युवाच द्ौ मां शोकावग्निकल्पौ दहेतां कचस्य नाशस्तव चैवोपघात: । कचस्य नाशे मम नास्ति शर्म तवोपघाते जीवितुं नास्मि शक्ता,देवयानीने कहा--पिताजी! कचका नाश और आपका वध--ये दोनों ही शोक अग्निके समान मुझे जला देंगे। कचके नष्ट होनेपर मुझे शान्ति नहीं मिलेगी और आपका वध हो जानेपर मैं जीवित नहीं रह सकूँगी
devayāny uvāca—dau māṃ śokāgnikalpau dahetāṃ kacasya nāśas tava caivopaghātaḥ | kacasya nāśe mama nāsti śarma tavopaghāte jīvituṃ nāsmi śaktā ||
Devayānī said: “Two calamities, like fires of grief, will burn me—Kaca’s destruction and your own death. If Kaca is lost, I will find no peace; and if you are slain, I will not be able to go on living.”
शुक्र उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights the ethical tension between personal love and filial duty: Devayānī frames both Kaca’s loss and her father’s death as equally unbearable, underscoring how dharma is often experienced through competing loyalties and the human cost of violence.
In the Kaca–Devayānī episode, Devayānī pleads emotionally, saying that two outcomes—Kaca’s destruction and harm to her father Śukra—would consume her with grief; she declares she cannot find peace without Kaca and cannot live if her father is killed.