Shloka 2
अध्याय ८० — मध्यंदिन-रणवृत्तान्तः
Yudhiṣṭhira–Śrutāyu encounter; Cekitāna–Gautama clash; Abhimanyu pressure; Arjuna’s redeployment
यानि त्वं दृष्टवान् राजन् धर्मसंकरकारिते । तव दोषात् पुरा वृत्तं द्यूतमेव विशाम्पते
yāni tvaṁ dṛṣṭavān rājan dharmasaṅkarakārite | tava doṣāt purā vṛttaṁ dyūtam eva viśāmpate ||
Sañjaya said: “O King, the very things you once witnessed—those deeds that brought about a confusion and corruption of dharma—arose earlier from your own fault: it was that gambling match, O lord of the people.”
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse stresses moral accountability: the present collapse into dharma-saṅkara (ethical and social disorder) is traced back to a specific earlier wrongdoing—allowing and participating in the dice-game—so the king must recognize causality and personal responsibility rather than treating events as fate alone.
Within the Bhīṣma Parva frame-dialogue, Sañjaya addresses Dhṛtarāṣṭra and reminds him that the chain of calamities he now hears/foresees was set in motion by Dhṛtarāṣṭra’s own earlier lapse connected to the dyūta episode, which became the seed of the wider conflict and disorder.