Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.68.41
Blended reading (Sanskrit + English inline)
-
lāṅgala - agreṇa
—
with the tip of His plough
Lāṅgala-agra — the cutting edge of a plough. Not the whole instrument; only the tip. The Lord exerts the slightest portion of His power and a capital city begins to slide.
-
udvidārya
—
tearing up
Ud-vi-dṝ = tear up by the roots. The same verb used for uprooting trees. The city is treated as a weed in a farmer's field.
-
gajāhvayam
—
Hastināpura
Again named with its 'elephant'-derived name. There is grim humor in the elephant-city being lifted by a plough as if it were no heavier than a clod.
-
gaṅgāyām prahariṣyan
—
about to cast it into the Ganges
Pra-hṛ = to hurl. He intends to throw Hastināpura into Mother Ganges. The implicit threat is also a mercy — even at His most wrathful, He aims to send the city to a tīrtha.
Śrīla Prabhupāda writes as follows: “Lord Balarāma seemed so furious that He looked as if He could burn the whole cosmic creation to ashes. He stood up steadily and, taking His plow in His hand, began striking the earth with it. In this way the whole city of Hastināpura was separated from the earth. Lord Balarāma then began to drag the city toward the flowing water of the river Ganges. Because of this, there was a great tremor throughout Hastināpura, as if there had been an earthquake, and it seemed that the whole city would be dismantled.” Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī states that by the Lord’s desire His plow had increased in size, and that as Balarāma began dragging Hastināpura toward the water, He ordered the Ganges, “Except for Sāmba, you should attack and kill everyone in the city with your water.” Thus He would fulfill His promise to rid the earth of the Kauravas while making sure that nothing would happen to Sāmba.
With the tip of his plow, which had increased in size by his desire, pulling up the city by digging at the base of the southern wall, he began dragging it with force towards the water. Why? To throw it in the Ganga. He ordered the Ganga, "Except for Samba, kill everyone by attacking the whole city except Samba with water." This was to fulfill his previous promise that he would rid the earth of the Kauravas. Though the whole city would be submerged, Samba would be safe.
He began to pull the city to the Gaṅgā forcibly in order to destroy the city. Or he dragged the city to make if fall into the Gaṅgā. By his will, his plough became very long.
- What foundation of pride in my life would I want the Lord to drag toward the Ganges?
- Where am I willing to feel my world shake for the sake of purification?
A cowherd at the field's edge slides His plough-tip beneath a clod of earth and pulls it up to break the soil — Balarāma does the same to Hastināpura, lifting the city like an over-grown sod and dragging it toward Mother Ganges to wash it clean of pride.
Verse 54 will note that Hastināpura's southern side is still visibly tilted along the Ganges in Śukadeva's own day — a permanent geographical witness to Balarāma's plough.
The Bhāgavatam offers this as physical evidence: the līlā is not myth but topography. Even centuries later the city bears the slant. The Lord's pastimes leave marks the land remembers.
My note
Source: vedabase.io