Shloka 57
शकुनिवधः — Sahadeva’s Slaying of Śakuni
with Ulūka’s fall
तावकानां च समरे पाण्डवेयैर्युयुत्सताम् । शत्रुओंके साथ जूझनेवाले पाण्डवोंका और पाण्डवोंके साथ युद्धकी इच्छा रखनेवाले आपके सैनिकोंका सारा सैन्यदल समरांगणमें परस्पर मिलकर एक-सा हो गया ।। तत्र योधास्तदा पेतु: परस्परसमाहता: । उभयो: सेनयो राजन् संशोचन्त: सम बान्धवान्,राजन! उस समय वहाँ एक-दूसरेकी मार खाकर दोनों दलोंके योद्धा अपने भाई- बन्धुओंके लिये शोक करते हुए धराशायी हो जाते थे
sañjaya uvāca | tāvakānāṃ ca samare pāṇḍaveyair yuyutsatām | sarvaṃ sainyaṃ samāgamya samaraṅgaṇe parasparam ekaṃ rūpam ivābhavat || tatra yodhās tadā petuḥ paraspara-samāhatāḥ | ubhayoḥ senayor rājan saṃśocantaḥ sva-bāndhavān ||
Sañjaya said: In that battle, your warriors who longed to fight the sons of Pāṇḍu, and the Pāṇḍavas who were locked in combat with your men—when the armies met upon the field, the whole host became as one indistinguishable mass, mingled together in the press of war. There, O King, warriors of both sides, struck down by one another, fell to the earth—lamenting their own kinsmen even as the conflict raged, revealing the tragic moral cost of fratricidal war.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
Even amid justified martial duty, war—especially among kin—produces moral anguish: fighters become indistinguishable in the chaos, and victory is shadowed by grief for one’s own relatives. The verse underscores the ethical tragedy of internecine conflict and the human cost that dharma cannot erase.
Sañjaya reports to King Dhṛtarāṣṭra that the Kaurava and Pāṇḍava armies have closed in so tightly that they appear as one mass on the battlefield. Warriors on both sides strike each other down and fall, while simultaneously mourning their own kinsmen caught and killed in the same struggle.