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Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa 3.31.5
Araṇya Kāṇḍa, sarga 31: Śūrpaṇakhā rebukes Rāvaṇa. She exposes his ignorance of Janasthāna’s destruction and warns that pleasure, failed intelligence and neglect will cost him his Kingdom
In the sequence: she argues that a ruler who neglects business, intelligence, and the protection of his territory will lose both authority and Kingdom
3.31.5
ayuktacāraṃ durdarśam asvādhīnaṃ narādhipam
varjayanti narā dūrān nadīpaṅkam iva dvipāḥ
A king whose espionage is ill-managed, who is hard to approach and not his own master, men shun from afar, as elephants avoid the mud of a river.
Words: ayuktacāraṃ — one whose espionage is not deployed; durdarśam — hard to see, hard to approach; asvādhīnaṃ — not his own master; narādhipam — the king (lord of men); varjayanti — avoid, shun; narā — men; dūrān — from afar; nadīpaṅkam — the mud of a river; iva — like; dvipāḥ — elephants
Composed by Maharṣi Vālmīki, the ādikavi of the ādikāvya: the first poet of the first poem. Sanskrit: The Vālmīki-Rāmāyaṇa: Critical Edition, Oriental Institute, Baroda, 1960–1975 (gen. eds. G. H. Bhatt, U. P. Shah); IAST from GRETIL (Göttingen). Translation and word glosses: Claude Opus 4.6–4.7; summaries and sequences: ChatGPT Astra (machine-made). Numbering follows the Critical Edition, not the vulgate (e.g. Gita Press, valmikiramayan.net), so sarga and verse numbers can differ from those editions.