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Shloka 24

भीष्मरथाभिमुख्यं — Arjuna’s advance with Śikhaṇḍin; Duḥśāsana’s interception

दन्तिनश्न नरश्रेष्ठ हीना: परमसादिभि: । मृद्नन्तः स्वान्यनीकानि निपेतु: सर्वशब्दगा:

dantinaś ca naraśreṣṭha hīnāḥ paramasādibhiḥ | mṛdnantaḥ svāny anīkāni nipetuḥ sarvaśabdagāḥ ||

သဉ္ဇယက ပြောသည်– “လူတို့တွင် အကောင်းဆုံးသူရေ၊ အကောင်းဆုံးစီးနင်းသူများမရှိတော့သော ဆင်များ အများအပြားသည် ရူးသွပ်သကဲ့သို့ ဖြစ်လာကာ ကိုယ့်တပ်ဖွဲ့ကိုယ် ပြန်လည်နင်းချေကြ၏။ အသံတိုင်းကို ထိတ်လန့်ကာ ဟိုဒီပြေးလွှားပြီး ရှုပ်ထွေးစွာ လဲကျကြသဖြင့် စစ်မြေပြင်တစ်လျှောက် ကြောက်ရွံ့မှုကို ပြန့်နှံ့စေ၏။”

दन्तिनःelephants
दन्तिनः:
Karta
TypeNoun
Rootदन्तिन्
FormMasculine, Nominative, Plural
नरश्रेष्ठO best of men
नरश्रेष्ठ:
TypeNoun
Rootनरश्रेष्ठ
FormMasculine, Vocative, Singular
हीनाःdeprived, bereft
हीनाः:
Karta
TypeAdjective
Rootहीन
FormMasculine, Nominative, Plural
परमसादिभिःby (their) excellent riders/mahouts
परमसादिभिः:
Karana
TypeNoun
Rootपरमसादिन्
FormMasculine, Instrumental, Plural
मृद्नन्तःcrushing, trampling
मृद्नन्तः:
Karta
TypeVerb
Rootमृद्
Formशतृ (present active participle), Masculine, Nominative, Plural
स्वानिtheir own
स्वानि:
Karma
TypeAdjective
Rootस्व
FormNeuter, Accusative, Plural
अनीकानिtroops, divisions (of the army)
अनीकानि:
Karma
TypeNoun
Rootअनीक
FormNeuter, Accusative, Plural
निपेतुःfell down / rushed headlong
निपेतुः:
TypeVerb
Rootपत्
FormPerfect (लिट्), Third, Plural, Parasmaipada
सर्वशब्दगाःgoing after every sound
सर्वशब्दगाः:
Karta
TypeAdjective
Rootसर्वशब्दग
FormMasculine, Nominative, Plural

संजय उवाच

S
Sañjaya
E
elephants
R
riders/mahouts (elephant-mounted warriors)
B
battle formations (anīka)

Educational Q&A

The verse highlights how, in war, loss of skilled guidance and the spread of fear can turn strength into self-destruction: powerful forces (elephants) without proper control become a danger to their own side, illustrating the ethical cost and instability inherent in violent conflict.

Sañjaya describes battlefield disorder: elephants whose expert riders have been removed or slain panic at noises, charge unpredictably, trample their own troops, and collapse into confusion, worsening the rout within their own army.