Shloka 15
न मया ब्रह्माहत्येयं कृतेत्याह पुन: पुन: । उच्चमानो<5सकृप्प्रेष्यैर््रह्मह॒ज्निति भारत,लोमशजी कहते हैं--प्रजानाथ! परावसुकी यह बात सुनते ही राजाने अपने सेवकोंको यह आज्ञा दी कि “अर्वावसुको भीतर न आने दो।” राजन्! उस समय सेवकोंद्वारा हटाये जानेपर अर्वावसुने बार-बार यह कहा कि -मैंने ब्रह्महत्या नहीं की है।' भारत! तो भी राजाके सेवक उन्हें ब्रह्महत्यारा कहकर ही सम्बोधित करते थे
na mayā brahmahatyeyaṁ kṛtety āha punaḥ punaḥ | uccamāno 'sakṛt preṣyair brahmahajñ iti bhārata ||
Lomaśa said: “Again and again he kept declaring, ‘I have not committed this brahmin-slaying.’ Yet, O Bhārata, as the king’s attendants repeatedly drove him away, they continued to address him as ‘brahmahantā’—a killer of a Brāhmaṇa.” The passage highlights the ethical tension between a person’s insistence on innocence and society’s (or authority’s) stigmatizing label, showing how public accusation can persist even without accepted proof.
लोगश उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse underscores how moral judgment in society can harden into a label: even when someone repeatedly asserts innocence, public authority and social speech may continue to brand them as guilty. It invites reflection on dharma in judgment—truth, due inquiry, and the harm caused by stigma.
Lomaśa narrates that a man is being pushed away by the king’s attendants. Though he keeps insisting, ‘I did not commit brahmahatyā,’ the attendants repeatedly call him ‘brahmahantā,’ treating him as a condemned offender despite his protest.