Shloka 68
इन्द्रद्युम्नोपाख्यानम्
Indradyumna Upākhyāna: On Kīrti, Smṛti, and Restoration
भविष्यति युगे क्षीणे तद् युगान्तस्य लक्षणम् । यदा रौद्रा धर्महीना मांसादा: पानपास्तथा
bhaviṣyati yuge kṣīṇe tad yugāntasya lakṣaṇam | yadā raudrā dharmahīnā māṃsādāḥ pānapās tathā
ਜਦੋਂ ਯੁਗ ਘਟਣ ਲੱਗੇਗਾ, ਤਦ ਯੁਗਾਂਤ ਦੇ ਇਹ ਲੱਛਣ ਹੋਣਗੇ—ਲੋਕ ਕਠੋਰ ਹੋ ਜਾਣਗੇ, ਧਰਮ ਤੋਂ ਰਹਿਤ ਹੋਣਗੇ, ਮਾਸਾਹਾਰ ਵਿੱਚ ਲੀਨ ਹੋਣਗੇ ਅਤੇ ਮਦਿਰਾਪਾਨ ਵੱਲ ਵੀ ਝੁਕਣਗੇ।
मार्कण्डेय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse frames the end of an age (yugānta) as a moral and social collapse: dharma weakens, and people become harsh and driven by coarse appetites. Ethical order is presented as the true measure of a yuga’s health.
Mārkaṇḍeya is describing prophetic signs of the yuga’s exhaustion, listing behavioral markers—cruelty, loss of dharma, and indulgence in meat and drink—as indicators that the world has entered a terminal phase of the age.