Shloka 526
तथासीत् पृथिवी सर्वा शोणितेन परिप्लुता । जैसे इन्द्रके वर्षा करते समय ऊँचे-नीचे स्थलका भान नहीं होता है, उसी प्रकार वहाँकी सारी पृथ्वी रक्तकी धारामें डूबकर समतल-सी जान पड़ती थी
tathāsīt pṛthivī sarvā śoṇitena pariplutā |
Sañjaya said: Thus the entire earth was flooded with blood. As, when Indra pours down rain, one cannot distinguish high ground from low, so there the whole land—submerged in streams of blood—appeared as though levelled.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse conveys the ethical cost of adharma-driven warfare: slaughter on such a scale that the very earth is imagined as drowned in blood, erasing the normal contours of the world. It functions as a moral indictment of unchecked violence and a reminder that victory purchased by mass killing deforms the natural and moral order.
Sañjaya reports to Dhṛtarāṣṭra the aftermath of intense fighting: the battlefield is so saturated with blood that the ground looks uniformly level, like land during Indra’s heavy rains when one cannot tell what is high or low.