Canto 1: CreationChapter 13: Dhritarashtra Quits Home

Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Srimad Bhagavatam 1.13.33

amba ca hata-putrarta

pitrivyah kva gatah suhrit

api mayy akrita-prajne

hata-bandhuh sa bharyaya

asamsamanah samalam

gangayam duhkhito 'patat

SYNONYMS

amba -- mother aunt; ca -- and; hata-putra -- who had lost all her sons; arta -- in a sorry plight; pitrivyah -- uncle Vidura; kva -- where; gatah -- gone; suhrit -- well-wisher; api -- whether; mayi -- unto me; akrita-prajne -- ungrateful; hata-bandhuh -- one who has lost all his sons; sah -- Dhritarashtra; bharyaya -- with his wife; asamsamanah -- in doubtful mind; samalam -- offenses; gangayam -- in the Ganges water; duhkhitah -- in distressed mind; apatat -- fell down.

TRANSLATION

Where is my well-wisher, uncle Vidura, and mother Gandhari, who is very afflicted due to all her sons' demise? My uncle Dhritarashtra was also very mortified due to the death of all his sons and grandsons. Undoubtedly I am very ungrateful. Did he, therefore, take my offenses very seriously and, along with his wife, drown himself in the Ganges?

PURPORT

The Pandavas, especially Maharaja Yudhishthira and Arjuna, anticipated the aftereffects of the Battle of Kurukshetra, and therefore Arjuna declined to execute the fighting. The fight was executed by the will of the Lord, but the effects of family aggrievement, as they had thought of it before, had come to be true. Maharaja Yudhishthira was always conscious of the great plight of his uncle Dhritarashtra and aunt Gandhari, and therefore he took all possible care of them in their old age and aggrieved conditions. When, therefore, he could not find his uncle and aunt in the palace, naturally his doubts arose, and he conjectured that they had gone down to the water of the Ganges. He thought himself ungrateful because when the Pandavas were fatherless, Maharaja Dhritarashtra had given them all royal facilities to live, and in return he had killed all Dhritarashtra's sons in the Battle of Kurukshetra. As a pious man, Maharaja Yudhishthira took into account all his unavoidable misdeeds, and he never thought of the misdeeds of his uncle and company. Dhritarashtra had suffered the effects of his own misdeeds by the will of the Lord, but Maharaja Yudhishthira was thinking only of his own unavoidable misdeeds. That is the nature of a good man and devotee of the Lord. A devotee never finds fault with others, but tries to find his own and thus rectify them as far as possible.

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His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Founder Acarya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness