Shloka 21
Dasyu-maryādā and Buddhi-guided Rāja-nīti (दस्युमर्यादा तथा बुद्धिप्रधान-राजनीति)
ऐसा कहकर पूजनीने अपने दोनों पंजोंसे राजकुमारकी दोनों आँखें फोड़ डालीं। फोड़कर वह आकाशमें स्थिर हो गयी और इस प्रकार बोली-- ।।
icchayehā kṛtaṃ pāpaṃ sadyas taṃ copasarpati | kṛtaṃ pratikṛtaṃ yeṣāṃ na naśyati śubhāśubham ||
इच्छयेह कृतं पापं सद्यस्तं चोपसर्पति। कृतं प्रतिकृतं येषां न नश्यति शुभाशुभम्॥
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Voluntary wrongdoing carries an immediate karmic recoil: the consequence ‘overtakes’ the agent without delay. Even when a wrong is repaid or requited, that does not cancel one’s broader store of past merit and demerit; karmic accounts are not wiped clean merely because a particular act meets a counteraction.
In Bhishma’s discourse on dharma and moral causality, this verse states a principle of karmic immediacy and accountability: intentional sin quickly returns to its author, and the experience of retribution does not erase the residue of earlier good or bad actions.