In the previous episode, we had witnessed the continuation of the proceedings on Day Eighteen at Kurukshetra, wherein Sahadeva and Sahuni engage themselves in a huge verbal banter with each other. Initially, there was a round of sword-fight between the two, wherein Sahadeva’s attention suddenly turned towards Sahuni’s son, Ulooka and killed him. As this happens right in front of Sahuni’s eyes, Sahuni lets out a huge cry of frustration and grief and at this moment, Sahadeva taunts Sahuni with all the past events, right from his coming into Hastinapura after Gaandhaari (Sahuni’s sister) got married to King Dhritarashtra. With all this frustration, an intense war ensues between the duo and at the end, Sahadeva manages to get the better of Sahuni on the battlefield. With this, the kingpin of the entire Hastinapura conspiracy was killed during the Eighteenth Day of the war!
Now moving on further, even as Duryodhana could know the news that Sahuni (his uncle) is no more, on the other side of the battlefield, something important unfolds! This Day Eighteen of the war makes a move rather extremely quick, as compared to the other seventeen previous days. King Shalya is busy fighting the Paandava army and at one point, Yudishtra intercepts him. Both of them are veterans in fighting with the “Spear” (Somewhat equivalent to today’s Javelin). In the whole war episodes, readers can observe that each one of them are proficient in several aspects of warfare. For instance, Bheemasena is a veteran in using the “Gadha” weapon. Arjuna, as we know, is an expert in the archery (bow and arrow) technique with his famed “Gaandeepa” bow. Similarly here, Yudishtra is a veteran in fighting with the spear in hand. Similar is the case with King Shalya too on the other side. Thus, as Yudishtra and King Shalya come face to face with each other, the fight initially begins with archery, as both of them exchange arrows from their respective bows. However, that does not yield any result. Thus, both of them look to their strengths to back themselves up, which gives the thought that the spear should be employed. Yudishtra and King Shalya – Both have several spears in their arsenal and they start attacking each other with them, one after the other! Several spears are being thrown at each other from both the sides. Initially, Yudishtra gets hit very badly by one of King Shalya’s sharp spears. This makes Yudishtra to collapse in his chariot itself for a few moments.
It should be remembered that Yudishtra was already in an injured state. During the previous day of war, we’ve seen that Yudishtra had got hurt very badly and he had to leave the battlefield abruptly in the middle of the battle. Now, he has got better on the next day and as he is up on his feet to fight, King Shalya hits him! However, with the situation and intensity on the ground, Yudishtra manages to compose himself once again. Now it is Yudishtra’s turn to show his prowess with his set of spears. He thus takes one spear in his hand, aims exactly at King Shalya’s chest portion and makes a decisive throw. It is a “now or never” situation for Yudishtra, as King Shalya is emerging powerful by the moment! However, with Bhagawan Krishna’s divine “Anugraha”, the spear goes and hits King Shalya’s chest, which blows him up into several pieces instantly! Thus, unable to bear the intensity of Yudishtra’s spear, King Shalya falls on the ground, dead!
Thus with this, yet another “Senapati” of the Kaurava army breathes his last! Initially we’ve seen the same fate happening to Bhishmachaarya, Guru Dhronachaarya and Karna. Now it is the turn of King Shalya to bite the dust in a disastrous manner! Even though King Shalya was a man of “Dharma”, we’ve seen earlier that he was forced to team-up with Duryodhana at the last moment. Because of this, King Shalya has to sacrifice his life on the battlefield. Thus, when the “Senapati” is killed yet again, the Kaurava army runs on all directions without any command. A majority of the foot soldiers and warriors who are on top of elephants and horses run away from the battlefield, fearing their lives! This is quite normal as there is nobody to motivate and bring the army together to continue the fight further.
Meanwhile, as King Shalya and Sahuni are dead, the news reaches Duryodhana! Upon hearing this, Duryodhana faints on his chariot itself, yet again, unable to bear the pain. At this time, Bheemasena also kills Sudarshana, who was Duryodhana’s lone surviving brother. Thus, all these three simultaneous deaths rock Duryodhana to such an extent that he doesn’t know what to do next on the battlefield! With this, we come to the end of the “Shalya-Vadha-Parva”, which is the first “Upa-Parva” of the main “Shalya Parva”. So for today, let us understand up to this point, and we shall continue this discussion in the next episode as well to get into the next “Upa-Parva”. Stay tuned!
The Indian Dharma 