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Hi Geeta, many thanks for your assessment. Re the Bhagavdgita, just from flying over it, the famous verse 2,37 about ks.atriya ethics "only" speaks of more concrete goals like svarga (the heavenly [lit.: bright] Ganga, aka the Milky Way) and enjoying the mahī ([great] World, i.e. the Earth), which comes as sort of a "no loss situation" (as antithesis to a no win situation). A bit earlier (2,31-33) reference is made, however, to to his [personal] svadharma (the violation of which is labeled a sin [pāpa]). How to free himself from karmic bonds (karmabandha) is addressed in 2,39, so I don't think, at least from this narrower context, karma acquires an outspoken sense of "duty" (also not via more immediate implications at least, as liberation not so easily can be said to be a necessity or an automatic functioning, like say Providence), while, in a sense, very well both are "work" (dharma as that which keeps/"holds" the world -- which again speaks against an automatic functioning). All the best, Heike