Shamika

While hunting, King Parikshit pursues a wounded deer deep into a forest until he is tired and thirsty. He encounters a sage under a vow of silence and, angered by the lack of reply to his question, places a dead snake around the sage's neck with his bow. The act of insult is impulsive, and his remorse is immediate—but the consequence is already set in motion.

Shringi, the sage's son, hears a shocking rumor: his father is carrying a corpse. He demands the truth from his friend Krisha. Krisha narrates the incident—how a tired, frustrated King Parikshit placed a dead snake on the silent sage's shoulders.

Hearing how the king humiliated his silent father, Shringi’s rage ignites. He touches water and pronounces a fatal curse: within seven days, the serpent-king Takshaka will bite Parikshit dead. His father rebukes the rash act, but the words are already spoken, setting an irrevocable fate in motion.

Driven by compassion, the sage Shamika sends his disciple Gouramukha to warn King Parikshit: he has been cursed and will die in seven days by Takshaka's bite. The king is struck not by fear of death, but by profound remorse for his insult to the silent ascetic.

Shringi's father expresses displeasure at his son's rash curse on the king. Shringi declares his words, even spoken in anger, can never be false. Shamika, acknowledging his son's power, accepts the curse is irrevocable but decides to warn the king out of compassion.

Shringi, the formidable son of an insulted sage, returns home to learn a king hung a dead snake on his meditating father. His instant, blazing anger crystallizes into a curse: death by snakebite in seven days.

King Janamejaya's ministers recount the full, terrible story of his father's death: a king's insult, a sage's curse, a snake's bribery, and a final, fatal bite. They urge the young king to decide what must be done.