Gita- Chapter 1

Chapter 1 of Gita begins with the blind old king Drithrashta, asking his assistant Sanjaya, to tell him about the latest happenings in the battlefield of Krukshetra. Sanjaya, had been blessed by the sage Vyasa, with divine vision. With this divine vision he could know the latest happenings of the battle of Kurukshetra, while sitting in the comfort of the palace.Since the king Drithrashtra was blind, he was assigned the duty of narrating the latest events to the king.


Sanjay begins by telling him, that in the battlefield the Kauravas, the sons of Dhrithrashtra had assembled along with great warriors on one side, and the sons of the king's brother Pandu had assembled on the other side.

In the battlefield of Kurukshetra,Duryodhan, the eldest of the Kauravas begins by telling his teacher Dronacharya, that his army is majestic, and has the mightiest warriors and he was confident of winning this war.Hearing this, Duryodhana’s grandfather Bhishma tries to further raise the morale of the soldiers, and blows his conch. Soon the other warriors and commanders do the same on the side of the Kauravas, thus declaring the war.

On the other side, Arjuna and his charioteer, Lord Krishna blow their own conch declaring the war, followed by whole army of Pandavas.Arjuna, raises his bow, and is about to shoot the first arrow, but at that very moment, he decides, that he would like to have closer look at his enemy, before going into a battle with them. So he asks his friend and charioteer, Lord Krishna, to take the chariot close to the enemy lines, as he wanted to survey them.



Sri Krishna, took the chariot to the middle of the battlefield, from where, Arjuna could safely survey the army of the Kauravas. Arjuna, sees, his cousins, uncles, grandfather, and teachers, standing armed to the teeth, ready to fight the battle.

Looking at this, he starts feeling a sense of pity, and tells his friend Krishna, that he is feeling nervous, shaky and he doesn’t feel like fighting this war.He says that he could not kill his kith and kin, and says that he is finding the war pointless. He says, even if they wanted to kill him, he wasn’t willing to fight with them, and it was better to be beggar, than becoming a king, by killing all these people.

He says, this war is wrong, and if we go through this war it will be a bad example for the society. The society would get disintegrated.Saying this he drops his bow and arrow and sits down , asking Krishna to help him.

All this while, Krishna is silent, listening to his friend…………..

Thus Gita begins in the calamitous situation of a battlefield, with a dilemma of a great hero.