Shloka 16
Draupadī’s Grief at Seeing the Heroes in Disguise (द्रौपदी-विषादः / वेष-परिभव-वर्णनम्)
जिनके कहीं यात्रा करते समय दस हजार हाथी और सोनेकी मालाएँ पहने हुए सहस्रों घोड़े पीछे-पीछे चलते थे, वे ही महाराज यहाँ जूएसे जीविका चलाते हैं ।।
rathāḥ śata-sahasrāṇi nṛpāṇām amita-ojasām | upāsanta mahārājam indraprasthe yudhiṣṭhiram ||
Vaiśampāyana said: In Indraprastha, hundreds of thousands of chariots belonging to kings of immeasurable might once attended upon King Yudhiṣṭhira. Yet now that same royal grandeur has been overturned by fate: the lord who was served by mighty rulers is seen here sustaining life through the dice-game—an ethical lament on how prosperity and power, when bound to gambling and misjudgment, can collapse into humiliation and dependence.
वैशम्पायन उवाच
Educational Q&A
Royal power and prosperity are unstable when dharma is compromised; the verse underscores the moral warning that attachment to gambling and poor judgment can reduce even a universally honored king to disgrace and dependence.
The narrator recalls Yudhiṣṭhira’s former imperial splendor at Indraprastha—countless chariots of powerful kings attending him—contrasting it with his present diminished condition after the dice-game, heightening the sense of reversal and pathos.