Arjuna turns to Krishna and says: O Keshava, I see inauspicious signs all around me. And I cannot see any good coming from killing my own people in this war. His grief has moved beyond the trembling hands and dry mouth of the previous verses. Now it strikes at something deeper — a moral question.
In ancient times, warriors would read omens before battle — the flight of birds, the direction of the wind, the behaviour of animals. Arjuna sees bad omens everywhere. Whether these are real signs or reflections of his own inner turmoil, the Gita does not say. But when the mind is weighed down with sorrow, everything around starts to look dark.
Then comes the real question: what good can come from killing our own? This is not battlefield cowardice. It is a sincere, painful reckoning. What victory is worth celebrating when the people you would celebrate with are gone?