Shloka 31
“मैंने माताके दूधका, मधु और घीका, अच्छी तरह तैयार किये हुए मधूक-पुष्पनिर्मित पेय पदार्थका, दिव्य जलके रसका, दूध और दहीसे बिलोये हुए ताजे माखनका भी पान या रसास्वादन किया है; इन सबसे तथा इनके अतिरिक्त भी संसारमें जो अमृतके समान स्वादिष्ट पीनेयोग्य पदार्थ हैं, उन सबसे भी मेरे इस शत्रुके रक्तका स्वाद अधिक है
sañjaya uvāca — mayā mātur dugdhasya, madhunaḥ ghṛtasya ca, suparipakvaṃ madhūka-puṣpa-nirmitaṃ pānīyaṃ, divya-jala-rasaṃ, dugdha-dadhi-manthitaṃ nava-nītaṃ ca pītaṃ rasāsvāditaṃ ca; etebhyaḥ sarvebhyaḥ, etebhyaś ca anyebhyaḥ api loke amṛta-sadṛśa-svādiṣṭa-pānīyebhyaḥ, mama asya śatroḥ raktasya svādaḥ adhikaḥ.
Sanjaya said: “I have tasted my mother’s milk, honey and ghee; I have drunk a well-prepared beverage made from madhūka blossoms; I have savored the essence of celestial waters; and I have also tasted fresh butter churned from milk and curds. Yet, beyond all these—and beyond every other drink in the world praised as nectar-like—nothing is as sweet to me as the taste of this enemy’s blood.”
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights how hatred and vengeance can corrupt discernment: even life-sustaining and sacred tastes (milk, honey, ghee, nectar-like drinks) are declared inferior to the relish of an enemy’s blood. Ethically, it functions as a warning about the dehumanizing intoxication of violence and the fall into adharma when cruelty becomes ‘sweet.’
In the midst of the Karna Parva battle context, a speaker (reported by Sanjaya) expresses extreme bloodlust, comparing many prized drinks to the ‘taste’ of an enemy’s blood and declaring the latter superior. The statement intensifies the atmosphere of ferocity and personal enmity driving the combat.