Shloka 5
Chapter 10: Survivors Console the Royal Couple and Disperse (धृतराष्ट्र–गान्धारी प्रति निवेदनम्)
ता: समासाद्य राजानं भृशं॑ शोकसमन्विता: । आमन्त्रयान्योन्यमीयु: सम भृशमुच्चुक्रुशुस्तत:
tāḥ samāsādya rājānaṁ bhṛśaṁ śokasamanvitāḥ | āmanttrayānyonyam īyuḥ sama bhṛśam uccukruśus tataḥ ||
Overwhelmed by intense grief, they approached the king. After addressing one another, they moved together, and then they cried out loudly—an outpouring of sorrow that marks the moral aftermath of war, where victory yields only lamentation and the duties of kinship are strained by irreparable loss.
वैशम्पायन उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse underscores the ethical cost of war: even in a royal setting, power and victory cannot shield anyone from the collective suffering that follows mass violence. It points toward compassion and sober reflection as necessary responses to catastrophe.
A group of grief-stricken women approach the king; after speaking among themselves, they proceed together and then break into loud wailing, signaling the beginning or continuation of communal mourning in the Strī Parva context.