Shloka 33
Vāmadeva’s Rājadharma: Norm-Setting, Counsel, and the Prevention of Rāṣṭra-Vināśa (वामदेव-प्रोक्तं राजधर्मम्)
जो प्रधान मन्त्रियोंका त्याग करके निम्नश्रेणीके मनुष्योंको अपना प्रिय बनाता है, वह संकटके घोर समुद्रमें पड़कर पीड़ित हो कहीं आश्रय नहीं पाता है ।।
yo pradhāna-mantriṇāṃ tyāgaṃ kṛtvā nīmaśreṇī-manuṣyān ātmanaḥ priyān karoti, sa saṅkaṭasya ghore samudre patitvā pīḍitaḥ kvacid āśrayaṃ na vindati. yaḥ kalyāṇa-guṇān jñātīn pradveṣān na bubhūṣati, adṛḍhātmā dṛḍha-krodhaḥ sa mṛtyor vasaty antike.
Vāmadeva teaches that a ruler who abandons his chief ministers and instead makes low and unfit persons his intimates, falls into a dreadful ocean of calamity; when afflicted there, he finds no refuge anywhere. Likewise, one who, out of hatred, refuses to honor his own kinsmen endowed with wholesome virtues—whose mind lacks steadiness and who clings firmly to anger—lives perpetually near death, for such conduct destroys the very supports that preserve life, order, and dharma.
वामदेव उवाच
Educational Q&A
A leader must rely on worthy counsel and uphold respect for virtuous kin; abandoning competent ministers for unfit favorites and nurturing hatred and anger destroys one’s supports and brings ruin—symbolized as living close to death.
In Śānti Parva’s rājadharma instruction, Vāmadeva delivers a warning about statecraft and personal conduct: poor choice of associates and hostility toward one’s own virtuous relatives lead to isolation in crisis and continual peril.