Shloka 4
Gāndhārī’s Lament and the Identification of Duḥśāsana (स्त्रीपर्व, अध्याय १८)
कृच्छादुत्सारयन्ति सम गृध्रगोमायुवायसान् । दुःखेनार्ता विघूर्णन्त्यो मत्ता इव चरन्त्युत,ये दुःखसे आतुर हो पगली स्त्रियोंके समान झूमती हुई सब ओर विचरती हैं तथा बड़ी कठिनाईसे गीधों, गीदड़ों और कौओंको लाशोंके पाससे दूर हटा रही हैं
kṛcchād utsārayanti sma gṛdhragomāyuvāyasān | duḥkhenārtā vighūrṇantyo mattā iva caranty uta ||
Vaiśaṃpāyana said: Stricken by grief, they wandered about like women driven mad with sorrow, and with great difficulty kept driving away the vultures, jackals, and crows from the corpses—an image of the battlefield’s aftermath where human dignity and last rites are threatened by scavengers and despair.
वैशम्पायन उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights the moral horror of war’s aftermath: grief can unmoor the mind, and yet dharma persists as the living struggle to protect the dead from indignity, implying the ethical weight of safeguarding funeral rites and human respect even amid devastation.
In the wake of the great slaughter, grief-stricken women (or mourners) stagger about the field and, with difficulty, drive away scavenging birds and animals from the bodies, portraying the chaos and sorrow that follow the battle.