Shloka 2
तस्मिन् हते हता हि स्यु: सर्वे पाण्डवसृञ्जया: । एकवीरवथधे कस्माद् युद्धे न जयमादथे,अर्जुनके मारे जानेपर समस्त सृंजय और पाण्डव अपने-आप नष्ट हो जाते। अत: एक वीर अर्जुनका ही वध करके उसने युद्धमें क्यों नहीं विजय प्राप्त की?
tasmin hate hatā hi syuḥ sarve pāṇḍava-sṛñjayāḥ | eka-vīra-vadhe kasmād yuddhe na jayam ādadhe ||
Vāyu said: “If he (Arjuna) had been slain, then indeed all the Pāṇḍavas and the Sṛñjayas would have been as good as destroyed. Why, then, did he not secure victory in the war simply by killing that one hero?”
श्रीवायुदेव उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights the decisive moral and strategic weight carried by a single dharmic champion in a collective struggle: removing the central protector (Arjuna) would collapse the allied force. It also implicitly raises an ethical question about why victory is not achieved merely through targeting one key person—suggesting that dharma, destiny, and the constraints of righteous warfare complicate purely tactical calculations.
Vāyudeva speaks while reflecting on the war’s turning points. He argues that if Arjuna had been killed, the Pāṇḍavas and their Sṛñjaya allies would effectively have perished, and therefore asks why the opposing side did not win simply by killing Arjuna—the ‘one hero’ whose fall would have decided the battle.