Arjuna Vishaada Yoga
Chapter 1, Verses 17-18
kāśyaśca parameṣ-vasaḥ
śikhandi ca mahārathah
dhṛṣṭadyumno virāṭaśca sātyakiś-cāparājitaḥ
drupado draupadeyāśca
sarvaśaḥ prthivi-pate
saubhadraśca mahā-bāhuḥ
śankhan dadhmuḥ pṛthak pṛthak
And the King of Kashi the supreme archer, Shikandhi the mighty warrior, Dhrshtadyumna and Virat; and Satyaki the invincible; Drupada and the sons of Draupadi, and the strong-armed son of Subhadra-all, O King, blew their various conches again and again.
The mighty warrior Shikandhi: you know the story I told earlier, how she had been transformed from a woman into a man and went to fight. The entity who had transformed Shikandhini through a sex change said to her, "You will have only one day." Of course, one day was not enough. Meanwhile Kubera had cursed this entity. When this entity got the body of a woman, he wanted to tempt Kubera to get all his wealth. Kubera got angry and cursed him saying, "From now on, you'll stay a woman forever!" Because of that curse, from that moment on Shikhandini stayed a man. He remained Shikhandi. And you know very well how he killed Bhishma. So each great archer, each great warrior-"Dhrshtadyumna, Virat, Satyaki the invincible, Drupada and the sons of Draupadi" - all of them blew their conches. "All, O King, blew their various conches again and again." In this part, Abhimanyu, the son of Subhadra, is described as 'the strong-armed son. Do you know how Abhimanyu was killed? You know. Please, tell the story!
Mayuran: The Kauravas had Dronacharya as the head of all the armies, as a commander and so he arranged the whole Kauravas' army into a chakra formation, and very few people knew how to fully penetrate this chakra formation and also come out of the chakra formation alive. One of those people who did know, from the Pandavas side, was Arjuna, but unfortunately Arjuna had been challenged to fight somewhere else. So he left to go to a different part of the battlefield to fight his own battle over there.
So as a result, Yudhishtir and the Pandavas were in a lot of panic and a lot of distress because this chakra formation seemed impenetrable to them; they couldn't find a way to get in, and this chakra formation was coming closer and closer. And so they begun talking amongst themselves as how they would deal with this situation and it was at this point that Abhimanyu, who was Arjuna's son, said that he knew how to get in the chakra formation. Once, when he was in the womb of his mother, he overheard Arjuna discussing with Krishna the idea of the chakra formation, how to get into the chakra, and how to breach it. But he never quite heard the end of the conversation, he never knew how to get out of the chakra formation. So his knowledge was not fully complete.
So he told this to Yudhishtir at that time, and after some thought they realised that all they needed was just to get into the chakra formation; once Abhimanyu had gone into the chakra formation, they would be right behind him and he would be supported by all the Pandavas. And so this is what they did. So Abhimanyu led the attack and he knew exactly how to get into the chakra formation. But he didn't know how to get out.
But as he got in, immediately another warrior from the Kauravas's army called Jayadratha managed to seal off the chakra formation. So Abhimanyu managed to get in, but the Pandavas couldn't follow him because of this warrior called Jayadratha. Because Jayadratha had been gifted with this great boon that on this special day he would be able to withstand an attack from the Pandavas for a whole day. So the Pandavas couldn't break into the chakra formation and that meant that Abhimanyu was left on his own.
As a result he fought very valiantly, he destroyed many enemies, but everybody was - Dronacharya, Karna, all of them were suffering because of Abhimanyu's skill, and as a result they all grouped together, all at once. They attacked him at once, from behind, from front, they surrounded him and Abhimanyu was unarmed.
They kept on firing arrows and sending different warriors to attack him, and eventually Abhimanyu was slain. But the whole situation was completely adharmic and against everything they had agreed to beforehand about how the war would go ahead. So it was a very tragic ending to Abhimanyu's life.
Bhagavad Gita
