Shloka 12
प्रावर्तत महावेगा नदी रुधिरवाहिनी । मातड्ाड्रशिला रौद्रा मांसशोणितकर्दमा,रणक्षेत्रमें बड़े वेगसे रक्तकी नदी बह चली, जो देखनेमें बड़ी भयानक थी। हाथियोंके शरीर उसके भीतर शिलाखण्डोंके समान जान पड़ते थे। खून और मांस कीचड़के समान प्रतीत होते थे। बड़े-बड़े हाथी, घोड़े और मनुष्योंके शरीरोंसे ही वह नदी निकली थी और परलोकरूपी समुद्रकी ओर प्रवाहित हो रही थी। वह रक्त-मांसकी नदी गीधों और गीदड़ोंको आनन्द प्रदान करनेवाली थी
sañjaya uvāca | prāvartata mahāvegā nadī rudhiravāhinī | mātaṅga-śilā raudrā māṃsa-śoṇita-kardamā ||
Sañjaya said: A river of blood began to flow with tremendous force. Terrifying to behold, it seemed strewn with boulder-like elephant bodies, and its mire was flesh and clotted blood. Born from the fallen bodies of elephants, horses, and men, it surged onward as though toward the ocean of the next world—an appalling image of war’s moral cost, where slaughter becomes a feast for scavengers rather than a field of honor.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse uses stark battlefield imagery to underline the ethical gravity of war: when violence is unleashed, it dehumanizes all sides, turning bodies into debris and blood into a ‘river.’ It implicitly warns that even ‘heroic’ conflict carries karmic and moral consequences, and that death reduces worldly pride to impermanence.
Sañjaya reports to Dhṛtarāṣṭra the horrific scene on the battlefield: a fast-flowing ‘river’ of blood forms, with elephant bodies appearing like boulders and the ground becoming a mire of flesh and blood—an intensified description of the carnage as the battle rages.