Shloka 26
Nakula’s Adaptive Counsel to Kṛṣṇa in the Kuru Assembly (उद्योगपर्व, अध्याय ७८)
ऋते वर्षान्न कौन्तेय जातु निर्वर्तयेत् फलम् । अर्जुन! इसमें संदेह नहीं कि शान्ति और युद्ध--इन दोनों कार्योमेंसे किसी एकको हितकर समझकर अपनानेका सारा दायित्व मेरे हाथमें आ गया है; तथापि (इसमें प्रारब्धकी अनुकूलता अपेक्षित है) कुन्तीनन्दन! जुताई और सिंचाई करके कितना ही शुद्ध और सरस बनाया हुआ खेत क्यों न हो
ṛte varṣān na kaunteya jātu nirvartayet phalam |
Arjuna said: “O son of Kuntī, without rain no undertaking ever truly yields its fruit. The responsibility has come into my hands to choose what is beneficial—peace or war—yet even when effort is complete, success still depends on the season of fate, just as a well-ploughed and well-watered field may still fail to produce a good harvest if the rains do not come.”
अर्जुन उवाच
Educational Q&A
Human effort and right choice are necessary, but results are not fully controllable; success also depends on enabling conditions beyond one’s power (symbolized by rain), so one should act responsibly without assuming guaranteed outcomes.
In the Udyoga Parva’s deliberations before the great war, Arjuna speaks to a ‘Kaunteya’ (a son of Kuntī), reflecting on the heavy duty of deciding between peace and war and using the field-and-rain image to show that even well-executed plans may fail without favorable circumstances.