Valmiki Ramayana

  The eight rākṣasas were pleased with the praises showered upon them and were eager to perform the task ahead of them. They left Lankā together immediately, without being seen.

  And Rāvaṇa, now that he had captured Sītā and purchased Rāma’s enmity along with that, was full of joy, delighting in his folly.

  Rāvaṇa believed that he had achieved his life’s goal. Helpless with love, his mind turned again to Sītā and he went back to his apartments eagerly, to see her. The king of the rākṣasas entered the palace and there, surrounded by rākṣasīs, he saw the grieving Sītā. Her face was stained with tears and the weight of her sorrows made her pathetic. Utterly helpless, she was like a tiny boat on the open seas, tossed about by storm winds. She hung her head, like a doe that has strayed from the herd and is surrounded by hunting hounds.

  Rāvaṇa forced her, vulnerable and unwilling, to see his palace, which was like the abode of the gods. Its huge buildings were studded with gems of all kinds and inhabited by thousands of women and many types of beautiful birds. It had pillars of gold and silver and crystal which were inlaid with diamonds and lapis and dazzled the eye. Rāvaṇa climbed a flight of stairs made of beaten gold with Sītā, and they resounded with each footstep like celestial drums. Its arches were decorated with exquisite silver and ivory lattices. Rāvaṇa pointed out the floors inset with pearls and showed Sītā the lotus pools surrounded by flowering trees.

  ‘There are thirty-two million rākṣasas here, not including the sick, the old and children,’ he boasted, after he had shown Sītā the entire palace. ‘Each and every one of them is fierce and terrible. Sītā, I am the lord and master of all these forbidding creatures. I have one thousand of them just to wait on me personally! I give you my kingdom and all this, large-eyed lady, because you are dearer to me than my life! You can do what you want with it.

  ‘Ah beloved! Become my wife and mistress of the thousands of women in my harem. Listen to me, for I mean well. What will you gain by doing otherwise? I burn with desire for you, submit to me! Lankā is one hundred yojanās long and is surrounded on all sides by the ocean. Not even the gods led by Indra can beseige it or capture it!

  ‘There is no one in the three worlds who is my equal in strength and courage. What are you doing with that mortal Rāma? He has little power and no kingdom. He lives the life of an ascetic and will soon die! Give yourself to me, Sītā, I am a worthy husband for you! The days of our youth are short, enjoy them with me while you can!

  ‘Do not be ashamed, thinking that this is a violation of dharma. Our union is destined and it has the sanction of

  the ṛṣis. Look, I lay my ten heads at your delicate feet. I am your slave. Be gracious to me! Rāvaṇa has never ever placed his heads at the feet of a woman! I have never debased myself like this before, these humble words arise from my anguish.’ As he spoke and placed his heads within the noose of death, Rāvaṇa thought triumphantly to himself, ‘She is mine!’

  Vulnerable and anguished, Sītā placed a blade of grass between herself and Rāvaṇa. ‘King Daśaratha upheld dharma and everyone knew him as an honourable man. Rāma is his righteous son and his glory has spread throughout the three worlds,’ she said to Rāvaṇa. ‘That powerful man with large eyes is my husband, he is like a god to me. Born in the line of the Ikṣvākus, he is brave and has shoulders as mighty as a lion’s. He and his brother Lakṣmaṇa will surely kill you!

  ‘If you had tried to abduct me in his presence, you would now be lying dead in Janasthāna, just like Khara! You may be invulnerable to the gods and the asuras, Rāvaṇa, but now that you have sought Rāma’s enmity, you will not escape alive. Rāma will take what remains of your life. You have as much chance of survival as a sacrificial animal tied to a stake!

  ‘Just as a caṇḍāla cannot touch the sanctified pots and ladles and the fire-altar for the sacrifice, so, too, you cannot touch me, you base rākṣasa! I am Rāma’s lawful and virtuous wife! You can imprison and injure this corporeal body of mine. I have no desire to protect my body or my life. What I cannot bear is the shame that has been heaped upon me!’ she said angrily.

  ‘Listen to me, Sītā!’ said Rāvaṇa, trying to intimidate her. ‘If you do not submit to me in the next twelve months, my cooks will chop you up for my breakfast!’

  Rāvaṇa turned to the rākṣasīs. ‘You fierce and deformed creatures who live on flesh and blood must crush her pride!’ he said. The rākṣasīs joined their palms and gathered around Sītā. Stamping his feet as if he would smash the earth to pieces, Rāvaṇa said, ‘Take Sītā to the aśoka grove and guard her zealously, safe from prying eyes. Threaten her and cajole her alternately, the way wild elephants are tamed. Convince her that she must accede to my wishes!’

  The rākṣasīs surrounded Sītā and took her to the aśoka grove. The grove was filled with trees which bore every kind of fruit and flower and were visited by birds all the year round. But in the hands of the rākṣasīs, Sītā was like a doe surrounded by tigers. Overwhelmed with grief and terrified by those ugly creatures, she found no peace in the aśoka grove. Her mind was constantly on her god-like husband.

  Seven

  Meanwhile, Rāma had killed the form-changing rākṣasa Mārīca who had been wandering around as a deer, and was hurrying back to his settlement. As he was returning, anxious to see Sītā, a jackal howled behind him. Rāma recognized that hair-raising sound and grew worried. ‘This is terrible! The cry of a jackal is a bad omen! I hope all is well with Sītā and that the rākṣasas have not been harassing her. If Lakṣmaṇa heard Mārīca cry out in my voice while he was disguised as a deer, he will have left Sītā alone, on her insistence, and come after me. I just hope they are both all right without me. I have earned the enmity of the rākṣasas after the incident at Janasthāna. Oh dear! I see more and more bad omens!’

  Worrying about the omens and the fact that he had been drawn away, Rāma reached Janasthāna, full of anxiety. Birds and animals saw the agitated Rāma coming and they ran around him, calling out in harsh voices. Rāma considered that a bad omen too. Before long, he saw Lakṣmaṇa, downcast and miserable. Soon, they were face to face, both of them anxious and upset.

  The older brother berated the younger one for leaving Sītā alone in a forest overrun with rākṣasas. ‘Ah Lakṣmaṇa! You should not have left Sītā alone and come here!’ said Rāma as he took Lakṣmaṇa by the right hand. But his strong words were softened by the gentleness with which they were uttered. ‘Will we find everything all right when we reach home? I feel certain that Sītā has been either devoured or abducted by the rākṣasas that wander through this forest. I see evil omens all around me. I can only hope that Sītā is safe and sound!

  ‘That deer which led me far away was actually a rākṣasa that deceived me. It was only when I killed him that he revealed his true form. My left eye twitches, my mind is uneasy. Lakṣmaṇa, I fear that we shall find Sītā either missing or dead!

  ‘If I go back to our settlement and Sītā is not there to welcome me with her sweet smile and her gentle words, I shall kill myself,’ continued Rāma. ‘Tell me, Lakṣmaṇa, is she alive? Or has she been eaten by rākṣasas because of your carelessness? She is young and not used to these hardships. She must have been frightened and lonely while I was gone. Even you must have been frightened when that wicked rākṣasa called your name in my voice!

  ‘I have a feeling Sītā was frightened when she heard that voice, so like mine, and she sent you out to look for me. But whatever it was, you should not have left her alone, giving the rākṣasas a chance to take revenge on me! The rākṣasas are incensed over the killing of Khara. I am sure that they have eaten Sītā.’

  Hurrying on with his brother, Rāma was pale and out of breath, tired, hungry and thirsty. He reached the settlement and found no one there. He went straight to the hut and then to all the places in which he and Sītā had enjoyed themselves and been so happy. He grew more and more agitated as he saw that they were all empty.


  ‘I did not leave Sītā alone because I wanted to,’ said Lakṣmaṇa miserably. ‘I came to look for you because she goaded me with her sharp words. When that voice that sounded like yours called out to us, I told her not to panic, as weak-minded women are wont to do. “There is no creature in the three worlds, born or unborn, who can defeat Rāma in combat,” I said to her. But she became angry and began to cry and, in her confusion, she said to me, “You have improper feelings towards me. You want to have me when your brother is dead, but that will never happen! Since you do not go after him it means that you are hatching a plot with Bharata. You followed Rāma into the forest because of me and you are delighting in his misfortunes!”

  ‘I was very angry when she spoke to me thus. My lips trembled and I stalked out of the settlement.’

  ‘You did wrong, dear brother,’ insisted Rāma. ‘You knew that I was capable of defeating the rākṣasas and still you left her, just because of her angry words. It does not please me that you came away just because an angry woman spoke to you harshly!’

  Rāma looked all over the settlement. Without Sītā, the trees there seemed to weep, the birds and animals appeared downcast. It was as if the forest deities had abandoned the area. Deerskins and reed mats had been scattered and kuśa grass lay everywhere. Rāma called out to Sītā again and again. ‘She has been abducted! She is dead! She has been eaten! Or, perhaps, the poor, frightened thing went and hid in the forest! Maybe she went out to collect roots and fruits! Or to the lotus pond, or to the river!’

  But though he searched high and low, Rāma could not find his beloved in the forest. His eyes red from weeping, he seemed like a madman as he ran from tree to tree, from the mountains to the river, weeping more and more as he plunged deeper and deeper into an ocean of grief.

  ‘O kadamba tree, have you seen my beloved who loved your fruit so? Tell me if you know where that lovely woman is! Bilva tree, where is she, the woman whose breasts are like your fruits, who is as delicate as your new shoots in her yellow silks? O palm tree, take pity on me and tell me if you have seen that beautiful woman! Rose-apple tree, my beloved’s complexion has the hues of your fruit. You must have seen her. Tell me where she is!

  ‘Little deer, you must know where the doe-eyed Sītā is! Is she with you in the forest? O best of elephants, Sītā had thighs like your trunk, you must know where she is! O Lakṣmaṇa, have you seen my beloved anywhere? Oh Sītā! My darling Sītā, where have you gone?’ he cried over and over again.

  Rāma called out as he ran hither and thither in the forest. He leapt and jumped and spun around as if he were crazy. He could not stand still for a moment, so he ran through the forest, over the mountains and down to the streams and rivers. But though he searched every corner of that forest, he found no trace of his beloved. Still, he would not give up and renewed his efforts to find her.

  Utterly miserable, Rāma said wretchedly to Lakṣmaṇa, ‘Go to the river Godāvarī quickly and see if Sītā went there to gather lotuses.’ When Lakṣmaṇa did not find her, Rāma went there himself.

  Equally upset, the two brothers walked along. Suddenly, they saw a trail of flowers on the ground. ‘I recognize these flowers, Lakṣmaṇa,’ said Rāma when he saw them. ‘I gave them to Sītā in the forest and she braided them into her hair!’ Looking further, Rāma found the huge foot print of a rākṣasa. His heart hammering in his chest, Rāma called out to his brother. ‘Look, Lakṣmaṇa, there are all kinds of flowers scattered here and little bits of gold from Sītā’s broken ornaments! The ground is covered with drops of blood that gleam like gold. Sītā must have been torn to pieces by form-changing rākṣasas, or she must have been eaten by them!’

  ‘These signs suggest that there was a great battle here between two mighty rākṣasas over Sītā. Look at this broken bow, this shattered armour and royal umbrella, these dead donkeys with piśāca faces, this wrecked chariot and scattered arrows!

  ‘My hostility towards the rākṣasas has now multiplied a hundred times. I shall kill all these form-changing rākṣasas! If Sītā has been devoured or abducted, Lakṣmaṇa, there is no one in all the worlds who would dare challenge me! Perhaps the gods think I am a weakling because I am gentle and compassionate and devoted to the well-being of all creatures! Even this virtue has become a flaw in my character! But today I will show the rākṣasas and all the other creatures my true powers!

  ‘The yakṣas, the gandharvas, the piśācas or rākṣasas, the kinnaras and mortals shall not have a moment’s happiness, Lakṣmaṇa! I shall fill the sky with my arrows and missiles, making it impassable for all those who travel through the three worlds. I shall stop the planets in their orbits, obstruct the course of the moon, destroy the fire and the wind, eclipse the radiance of the sun. I shall smash the mountain peaks, dry up the lakes, uproot trees and creepers and bushes and stir up the waters of the ocean!

  ‘If the gods do not deliver Sītā to me unharmed, they will see the kind of destruction I can wreak in a single hour! There will not be a single god, dānava, daitya, piśāca or rākṣasa left when I have finished destroying the three worlds in my anger. Even as old age, sickness, death and fate cannot be escaped, so, too, I cannot be diverted from my purpose! If the gods do not return Sītā to me, sweet and smiling as she was before, I will destroy the universe along with the gods, gandharvas, mortals and serpents!’

  Lakṣmaṇa had never seen Rāma so angry before. His mouth dry with fear, he joined his palms and said, ‘Rāma, you have always been gentle and compassionate and devoted to the welfare of all creatures. Do not let your anger control you and make you act against your natural disposition.

  ‘I do not know whose chariot this is that lies here, smashed to bits. I have no idea who used it and for what purpose. The earth has been gouged by chariot wheels and hooves and the ground is splattered with blood. Clearly, a battle was fought here. But I think there was only one chariot and not two.

  ‘You cannot destroy the worlds because of the crimes of a single person. Great kings mete out punishments judiciously and dispassionately. Armed with your bow and arrow and with me by your side, we can find out what happened to Sītā with the help of the ṛṣis. We shall scour the oceans, the mountains and the forests, the caves, the rivers and the woods. We shall search through the worlds of the gods and the gandharvas without rest until we find your wife’s abductor!

  ‘And after all that, if the gods do not restore your wife to you, then, O king of Kosalā, it will be time for you to take action! If you cannot get Sītā back through diplomacy and conciliation, then you can achieve your ends through a rain of gold-tipped arrows that fall like Indra’s thunderbolt!’

  Even though he was the older brother, Rāma took Lakṣmaṇa’s wise and judicious advice seriously. He controlled his anger and leaning on his great bow, he said, ‘What shall we do now, Lakṣmaṇa? Where shall we go next? Think about how we can find Sītā.’

  ‘We should first look carefully here in Janasthāna which is full of trees and teeming with rākṣasas. There are many mountainous places here that are hard to reach, as well as clefts and hollows in the rocks and caves that are homes of fierce wild animals,’ said Lakṣmaṇa. Rāma and Lakṣmaṇa searched the entire forest. Rāma was still angry and he carried his great bow fitted with a sharp and deadly arrow.

  Suddenly, they came upon the bird Jaṭāyu, huge as a mountain, lying on the ground, drenched in blood. ‘I am sure Sītā has been devoured by this thing here!’ said Rāma when he saw that enormous creature. ‘This is a rākṣasa who has taken the form of a vulture to wander through these forests. He has eaten large-eyed Sītā and now he lies here resting! I shall kill him with my fiery arrows!’

  Rāma fitted the arrows into his bow and approached the bird with a tread that would have stirred up the ocean. But the bird addressed the sorrowing Rāma, vomiting frothy blood as he spoke. ‘The woman you search for like a rare herb in the forest has been carried away by Rāvaṇa who has taken my life as well! I saw her being abdu
cted against her will while you and Lakṣmaṇa were gone. I rushed to her rescue and fought with Rāvaṇa. I destroyed his chariot which lies there on the ground. Rāvaṇa cut off my wings with his sword when I grew tired and flew into the sky with Sītā. You don’t have to shoot me, the rākṣasa has already killed me!’

  When Rāma heard this news about his wife, he embraced the bird along with Lakṣmaṇa and began to weep. He was deeply distressed to see Jaṭāyu lying on a narrow path, having difficulty breathing. Rāma and Lakṣmaṇa caressed the dying, wingless, bloodied bird with affection, as if he were their child. ‘Where shall I find Sītā?’ cried Rāma and threw himself upon the ground.

  Then he turned and spoke to Lakṣmaṇa. ‘This bird made such a tremendous effort for my sake and was struck down in battle. Now he has to give up his life, which most creatures cling to. His voice quavers and he sees but dimly. There is still some life in his body but he is weak and feeble. Jaṭāyu, if you can still speak, tell me about Sītā and how you were wounded.

  ‘Why did Rāvaṇa take Sītā away? What harm have I ever done him that he should abduct my beloved? What does he look like? How strong is he? What can he do? Where does he live? Answer these questions if you can, dear bird!’

  Jaṭāyu told Rāma in great detail how he had been struck down. ‘Do not grieve for Sītā!’ he continued. ‘It won’t be long before you kill this rākṣasa in battle and enjoy the pleasures of Sītā’s company once again,’ said the dying bird whose mind was still lucid. Then he vomited more blood and bits of flesh. ‘The son of Viśravas and the brother of Kubera,’ began the bird, but his breath left him and he died.

  ‘Tell me, tell me!’ begged Rāma with his palms joined but the bird’s soul had left his body and gone to heaven. His head fell to the ground, his legs sprawled forward and his body jerked violently.