Shloka 44
तावकानां जये भीष्मो ग्लह आसीद् विशाम्पते । तत्र हि द्यूतमासक्तं विजयायेतराय वा,प्रजानाथ! उस युद्धरूपी जूएमें आपके पुत्रोंकी ओरसे विजयके लिये भीष्मको ही दाँवपर लगाया था। इस प्रकार वहाँ विजय अथवा पराजयके लिये रणद्यूत उपस्थित हो गया
tāvakānāṁ jaye bhīṣmo glaha āsīd viśāmpate | tatra hi dyūtam āsaktaṁ vijayāyetarāya vā, prajānātha |
Sanjaya said: O lord of the people, in the matter of victory for your sons, Bhishma stood as the stake in that wager. For there, as in a game of dice, the contest had become fixed upon either triumph or defeat—war itself taking the form of gambling, with a great life and duty risked for the hope of winning.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse frames war as a form of gambling: leaders may treat human lives and moral duty as stakes for victory. It implicitly critiques the ethical blindness of pursuing triumph through reckless wagering—especially when the ‘stake’ is a venerable protector like Bhishma and, by extension, the lives of many.
Sanjaya reports to Dhritarashtra that, on the Kaurava side, Bhishma was effectively ‘put up as the wager’ for winning the war. The battlefield is portrayed as a dice-game where the outcome is either victory or defeat, highlighting the perilous, gamble-like nature of the conflict.