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Ayodhya was drowning in festival. The great road had been watered against the dust, lotuses and water lilies lay scattered along it, and from door to door costly banners and pennants swayed in the air. The smell of sandal water hung over the streets, and the crowds, freshly bathed, filled every lane. The chanting of the Vedas rolled through the city, instruments sounded, elephants and horses trumpeted and stamped, cattle lowed, and all of it turned on a single piece of news: tomorrow, under the star Pushya, Rama would be consecrated as Prince Regent. Onto the roof of one tall white palace, bright as the moon, a hunchbacked maidservant happened to climb. Her name was Manthara, born a servant in the house of Kaikeyi’s father, who had come to Ayodhya with the queen when she was married. The joy spread out below astonished her, and in that instant a crooked question woke in her mind. From that moment the ashes of two old boons began to smolder again, and the future of a whole court turned over.
The hunchback on the rooftop, and a nurse’s answer
Manthara looked out from the palace roof over all of Ayodhya, and what she saw filled her with wonder. She did not know the reason for the festival. Close by stood Rama’s old nurse, dressed in white silk, her eyes blooming with joy. Manthara put her question to her. “Rama’s mother, Kausalya, is fond enough of her wealth. Why then is she showering the brahmins with riches today? What is the cause of all this excessive joy in the crowd? Tell me. And what is the delighted king, Dasaratha, about to have done?”
The nurse brimmed over with happiness, and with the greatest delight told the hunchbacked maid the news of Rama’s coming glory. “Tomorrow, under the star Pushya, King Dasaratha will consecrate as Prince Regent the sinless Rama, who has conquered his own anger.”
The moment she heard it, Manthara was seized with rage. She climbed down at once from that palace that rose like a peak of Mount Kailasa. Inwardly she was burning, and in this turn of events she saw only treachery, for she was one who read evil into everything. She went to the bedchamber where Kaikeyi lay at her ease and said, “Get up, you foolish woman. How can you lie there? Peril stands in front of you with its mouth open, and you do not even see the flood of misery climbing toward you. This good fortune of yours is as thin as a river’s current in the heat of summer, and still you preen on your beauty, when in your husband’s heart there is no longer any place for you.”
These hard words filled Kaikeyi with deep unease. Even so, in a sweet voice she asked, “Manthara, is all well? Why is your face so downcast and unhappy?” Manthara, a mistress of speech, grew only more sour at the gentle question. Posing as a well-wisher, filling Kaikeyi’s mind with dread and turning her away from Rama, she answered, “My queen, a great and irreparable work of your undoing has already begun. King Dasaratha is about to consecrate Rama as Prince Regent.”
The gist: from the roof, watching Ayodhya drown in festival, Manthara heard from the nurse the news of the coronation and came down burning with rage. Into the mind of a Kaikeyi who had only asked her a kind question, she planted the first seed of fear, that this consecration was the beginning of Kaikeyi’s ruin.
Manthara’s first poisoned words
Manthara pressed on. “I have come here plunged in a bottomless sea of fear for you, burning as though on fire, carrying this news for your own good. Kaikeyi, your sorrow will be my great sorrow, and your rise my rise; of that there is no doubt. You were born of a royal line and you are the king’s beloved queen. How then do you not grasp how hard the law of kings can be? Your husband speaks of dharma, yet he is a deceiver; he speaks sweetly, yet his heart is cruel. You take him for a simple-hearted man, and by that very trust you are being cheated.”
“Look. Standing right beside you, speaking words that are sweet and empty, your husband is this very day handing all the sovereignty to Kausalya. He has sent Bharata away to your kinsfolk’s country, cleared every thorn from the path, and tomorrow morning he will set Rama on the throne. An enemy stands close to you under the name of husband. As a girl might cherish a venomous serpent against her own body, so you have held this enemy to your heart.”
“Along with Bharata, Dasaratha has cast you aside today as one throws off a slighted enemy or a snake. You who have always wanted comfort, you inexperienced girl, this king of false sweet speech has set Rama on the throne and so destroyed you together with your kinsmen and friends. Therefore, Kaikeyi, do quickly whatever the moment demands, and save your son, and yourself, and me as well, O woman of wonderful understanding.”
When she heard Manthara’s news, the lovely-faced Kaikeyi was filled with joy, and rose from her bed like the full moon of an autumn night. Delighted and full of wonder, she gave the hunchback a bright, heavenly ornament. Having given the gift, she said, still glad, “Manthara, you have brought me the dearest of news, and for me this is cause for joy. What more shall I do for you? Between Rama and Bharata I see no difference at all. So I am pleased that the king is setting Rama on the throne. You have brought me words as sweet as nectar, and for that I grant you another, finer boon. Ask whatever you wish.”
The gist: Manthara sowed in Kaikeyi’s mind fear for Bharata and enmity toward Rama, but Kaikeyi, seeing no difference between Rama and Bharata, showed only joy at the coronation and rewarded the maid with a jewel.
Manthara’s second stroke: thorns and snakes
When she heard this answer, Manthara flung down the ornament she had been given and, filled with rage and grief, said, “You foolish girl. Where there is no cause for joy, why do you rejoice? Can you not see that you are ringed by an ocean of sorrow? In my own heart I laugh at you, that even in the face of so great a calamity you are glad where you ought to mourn.”
“Rama has reason to fear Bharata alone, for Bharata too has an equal claim to the kingdom. Lakshmana is wholly with Rama, and just as Lakshmana follows Rama, so Shatrughna follows Bharata. By the order of birth as well, the claim on the throne is Bharata’s; Lakshmana and Shatrughna are younger than he. Rama is learned, skilled in the conduct of a warrior, and quick to act when the moment comes; and when I think of what your son has to fear from him, I tremble.”
“Blessed is that Kausalya, whose son will be consecrated Prince Regent tomorrow under Pushya. And you, with folded hands, like a maidservant, will wait upon that Kausalya, who by then will have beaten down her two enemies, Bharata and you, and won the lordship of the earth. So you will become her servant along with the rest of us, and your son the servant of Rama. The women of Rama’s house will be glad, and your daughter-in-law and her companions unhappy at Bharata’s fall.”
Yet even seeing Manthara speak with such cruelty, the noble Kaikeyi only praised Rama’s virtues; so the tradition tells it. She said, “Rama knows what is right; he is full of good qualities, master of his senses, grateful, truthful, pure, and the eldest of the king’s sons. He is therefore worthy of the office of Prince Regent. Long-lived Rama will care for his younger brothers and his servants as a father does. Why then, hunchback, do you burn to hear of Rama’s consecration?”
“After Rama has ruled his hundred years, Bharata too will surely inherit the ancestral kingdom. Why then do you grieve, as though scorched with envy, over this festival and the good that is to come? As Bharata is worthy of my honor, so is Raghava, and even more; he serves me more than Kausalya herself. If the kingdom is Rama’s, then it is Bharata’s too, for Raghava holds his brothers to be as his own self.”
The gist: Manthara threw down the jewel and held up before Kaikeyi the terror of Bharata’s future, that he would live as the slave of Rama and Kausalya. But Kaikeyi stood firm, praising Rama’s dharma, his virtues, and his brotherhood, and counting the kingdom as belonging to Rama and Bharata alike.
Manthara’s third blow: demand Rama’s exile
When she heard this answer, Manthara was deeply pained. Drawing a long, hot breath, she said, “Out of sheer folly you fail to see the truth, and you are about to sink in a rising sea of grief and disaster. Raghava will be king, and after him his son; Bharata will be shut out of the royal line altogether. My proud lady, not all of a king’s sons keep the throne; if they were all set on it at once, there would be great ruin. Therefore, Kaikeyi, kings hand the reins of rule to the eldest son alone, however full of virtue the others may be.”
“Your son, like a boy without a guardian, will be stripped of comforts and thrust out of the royal line. I have come here for your good, and you do not know my worth; you reward me for your co-wife’s rise. Rama, once he holds the kingdom, will certainly drive Bharata out of the country, or out of the world. As for Bharata, you sent him off in childhood to his mother’s people, and it is closeness that breeds affection, as it does even in rooted trees and creepers. Shatrughna followed Bharata away.”
A sub-tale: Manthara offered a saying she had heard, that a tree marked for felling by those who live off the forest had been saved by the thorny shrubs that had grown up around it. Her point was that nearness gives protection; Bharata is far away, and so unguarded. And as the leader of a herd of elephants, driven hard by a lion in the forest, must be protected, so Bharata, pressed by Rama, must be protected by you.
“Lakshmana will guard Rama, and Rama Lakshmana; their brotherhood is famed everywhere, like the love of the two Ashwins. So Rama will do Lakshmana no harm, but he will surely harm Bharata. Let Raghava go to the forest from the palace itself; that is what pleases me, and it is best for you. Only if Bharata gains the ancestral kingdom in the right way will your mother’s people prosper. How will that boy of yours, Rama’s born rival, born to comfort, live under Rama’s power once he has lost everything?”
“In the pride of your good fortune you once slighted Kausalya; how will she, Rama’s mother and your co-wife, not pay back the grudge? When Rama has won the jeweled earth with its seas and mountains, you and Bharata will be brought low, will suffer the ugly disgrace of servitude, and Bharata will surely be destroyed. So contrive the kingdom for your son and the banishment of this enemy, Rama.”
The gist: Manthara piled argument on argument, that only the eldest gets the throne, that Rama would drive Bharata out, that Lakshmana was Rama’s man, that Kausalya would take her revenge. In the end she named the plain remedy: ask for the kingdom for Bharata and exile for Rama.
The memory of two old boons
Hearing this, Kaikeyi, her face now blazing with anger, drew a long, hot breath and said to Manthara, “This very day I will send Rama from here to the forest, and quickly have Bharata consecrated Prince Regent. Now think how, by what means, Bharata may get the kingdom and Rama not get it on any account.” Raising herself a little from the bed, she said again, “Manthara, tell me the means by which Bharata will have the kingdom, and not Rama.”
Then Manthara, working Rama’s ruin, said, “Listen now, Kaikeyi, and watch what I do. In the old days, in the war of the gods and the demons, your husband, the great king Dasaratha, went to the aid of Indra, the king of the gods. Together with royal sages, and taking you with him, he marched into the southern quarter, toward the Dandaka forest, against the city called Vaijayanta, where a demon named Timidhvaja lived, so called because his banner bore the sign of the Timi, a fish of enormous size.”
A sub-tale: That demon was also known as Shambara, a master of hundreds of illusions, whom not even the assembled gods could overcome. He challenged Indra to battle. In that great war, the demons would carry off the wounded warriors as they slept at night, and kill them.
“There King Dasaratha fought a great battle with the demons and was cut and torn by their weapons. My queen, you drew him out of the fighting while he lay senseless; and even there he was wounded again, and you carried him to a safer place and saved him. Pleased with you, he granted you two boons. You said then, ‘My lord, I will ask them when I wish.’ The king answered, ‘So be it.’ My queen, I knew nothing of this; it was you yourself who first told me, long ago. Out of love for you, I have kept the memory in my heart.”
“Bind your husband to his word and stop the preparations already under way for Rama’s consecration. Ask the two boons: the crowning of Bharata as Prince Regent, and fourteen years of exile in the forest for Rama. In fourteen years, while Rama lives in the forest, Bharata will sink roots of affection into the hearts of the people and grow firm. Daughter of Ashwapati, go this very day into the chamber of anger, put on soiled clothes, and lie down on the bare ground. The moment the king appears, begin to weep; do not look at him, and do not speak.”
“You are your husband’s beloved always, of that there is no doubt; for you the king would walk into fire. He cannot make you angry, nor bear to see you angry; for your pleasure he would give up his very life. Gentle one, understand the strength of your good fortune. King Dasaratha will offer you gems, pearls, gold, and jewels of every kind; do not let your mind settle on them. Remind him of the two boons he granted in the war of the gods and demons, before the moment slips out of your hands.”
The key: the war of the gods and demons is the old battle in which Dasaratha fought on Indra’s side and was wounded. Kaikeyi carried him from the field and saved his life, and in return she was given two boons, which she had kept unspent. Manthara’s whole scheme rests on cashing these two deposited boons now.
Kaikeyi’s mind turns, and praise for Manthara
Manthara laid the whole plan open. “When Raghava himself lifts you up and offers you that promised boon, bind the king and ask this: ‘Let Rama go far off to the forest for fourteen years, and let Bharata be made king of the earth, O jewel among kings.’ By the time Rama comes back after fourteen years, your son will have taken firm root on the throne and will rule for the rest of his life. In this way the exiled Rama becomes unwelcome, and Bharata a king with no thorn in his side.”
“By the time Rama returns from the forest, your son will have set down roots within the palace and beyond it, and will have won the people to his side. I hold this to be the proper moment. Bind the king with an oath, and fearlessly stop him from his resolve to consecrate Rama.” Taught to see evil as good, Kaikeyi was glad at heart. Great in intelligence though she was, at the hunchback’s words she went astray down the wrong road like an inexperienced girl, and, full of wonder, she spoke to Manthara.
“I do not slight your judgment, best of women, for the counsel you give me is the finest of all. Among all the hunchbacked women on earth you stand highest in soundness of mind. You alone are my well-wisher, always at work for my good. I had not fully understood the king’s purpose, hunchback. Hunchbacked women are usually crooked and full of sin, but you are not so. You are as lovely as a lotus bowed by the wind; only your chest is arched by the hump that rises to your shoulders.”
Then Kaikeyi went on at length in praise of Manthara’s form, her moon-like face, her hips, her long thighs, her walk. She said, “In this hump of yours live all manner of thoughts and policies and clever devices, as though the thousand illusions of Shambara were stored right here. When Bharata is consecrated and Raghava has gone to the forest, I will drape this hump with a chain of pure gold, anoint it with sandal, set a jeweled golden mark on your brow, and give you fine clothes and ornaments until I have made you like a goddess. You will walk proud among my co-wives, and just as you always press my feet, so other hunchbacked women will press yours.”
Praised in this way, Kaikeyi lay on the bright bed like the flame of an altar fire, and Manthara said to her, “No dam is built once the water has flowed past, my fortunate one. So get up, work your good, and show the king an angry face.” Urged on like this, the queen, drunk on the pride of her fortune, went with Manthara into the chamber of anger, took off her pearl necklace worth hundreds of thousands and her fine costly ornaments and threw them down, and, golden as she was, lay on the ground.
Then the hunchback once more, in her harshest words, gave the king’s wife and Bharata’s mother counsel hostile to Rama but, as she framed it, good for herself. “If Raghava gains this kingdom, you and your son will surely suffer. So work it so that your son Bharata is made Prince Regent.” Struck again and again by these arrows of speech, greatly amazed and enraged, her hand pressed to her heart, Kaikeyi said to the hunchback.
“Hunchback, either Raghava goes to the forest for a long time and Bharata has his wish, or you carry to the king the news of my death, gone to the world of Yama. I have no use for gold, nor for jewels, nor for food. If Rama is consecrated, that is the end of my life. If Rama does not go to the forest, I want no bed, no garland, no sandal, no collyrium, no food or drink, nor even life itself.” So saying, she took off all her ornaments and, like a Kinnari fallen from heaven, lay on the bare ground with no cloth beneath her. The darkness of fierce anger covered her face, and she looked like the night sky when the stars have sunk and it is wrapped in dark.
The gist: by explaining the trick of the two boons from the war of the gods and demons, Manthara turned Kaikeyi’s mind completely. Kaikeyi praised the maid lavishly, cast off her ornaments, and, in soiled clothes, lay on the floor of the chamber of anger, vowing that if Rama did not go to the forest she would give up food, drink, and life.
Dasaratha in the sulking-chamber, and Kaikeyi’s coaxing
Fully led astray by the sinful hunchback, the queen lay on the ground like a Kinnari pierced by a poisoned shaft. Judging the plan well made, the shrewd Kaikeyi told Manthara, little by little, all that she intended. Sighing long and hot like a serpent-maiden, she brooded awhile on the road to her own comfort, and Manthara rejoiced as if her end were already won. Then, her mind made up and her brows knit, she lay down; the bright, many-colored garlands and heavenly ornaments she had cast off were strewn on the ground like stars in the sky. Her hair bound in one tight braid, in soiled clothes, spent like a Kinnari, she lay in the chamber of anger.
Meanwhile King Dasaratha, having given the order for Raghava’s consecration and taken leave of his council of ministers, entered his inner apartments. Since Rama’s consecration had only that day been proclaimed, he went to bring his dear Kaikeyi the happy news, into her fine palace, like the moon entering a sky curtained with white clouds and marked by Rahu. That palace rang with the cries of parrots and peacocks, of curlews and swans, and with music. It was full of hunched and dwarf maids, of bowers and picture-halls, of ashoka and champaka trees, of altars of ivory, silver, and gold, and of stepwells, and it seemed like a piece of heaven.
Moving through this rich inner court, the king did not find his beloved wife Kaikeyi on her fine couch. In his eager longing to see Rama consecrated, and not finding his dear one, the king was filled with distress; he called for her, and no answer came. Never before had the queen missed this hour of his coming, nor had the king ever gone back from an empty chamber. Then he asked the doorkeeper. Frightened, her hands joined, she said, “My lord, the queen, in great anger, has gone into the chamber of anger.”
At this the deeply grieved king grew more wretched still, and his senses reeled. Scorched with sorrow, he found her lying on the ground in an unseemly way. The sinless, aged king saw his young wife, dearer to him than his own life, lying on the floor with her sinful resolve, like a creeper cut from the tree that held it, like a fallen goddess, a Kinnari cast out of heaven, a celestial nymph dropped from the sky, or a broken enchantment. As an elephant in the forest sees a she-elephant pierced by a poisoned arrow, so the shaken king looked at that lotus-eyed woman, and, stroking her with his hands, he spoke.
“I cannot believe that this anger of yours is turned against me. Who has scolded you, who has insulted you, that you should be rolling in the dust? You are unsettling my mind. Why, while I am here, do you lie on the ground as though some evil spirit had seized you? My skilled physicians will make you well again; tell me your illness. Who today is to be dear, and who unwanted? Who deserves no death and yet should die, and who under sentence should go free? Which poor man should be made rich, which rich man made poor? I and all who are mine are under your command; whatever your wish, I will carry it out even at the cost of my life. I swear by my own good deeds that I will do whatever pleases you.”
“As far as the sun’s disc shines, the earth is mine: the lands of Dravida, Sindhu and Sauvira, Saurashtra, the southern country, Vanga, Anga, Magadha, Matsya, and prosperous Kashi and Kosala, and all the wealth and grain, the cattle and sheep that they yield; all of it is mine. Ask whatever your heart desires of it, Kaikeyi. Timid one, what will you gain by tormenting yourself? Rise, stand up, lovely one; tell me truly where this fear has come from, and I will drive it off as the sun drives off the mist.” Reassured by these words, Kaikeyi began to torment him further, in order to bring out that unwelcome demand.
The gist: Kaikeyi told Manthara the plan and lay down on the floor of the chamber of anger. Not finding his beloved on her couch, the anguished Dasaratha came to the chamber, and, stroking her, swore to give her an empire and grant her every wish; and Kaikeyi drew him on.
The oath on Rama, and the demand for two boons
Pierced by the arrows of desire and driven by its force, the king listened as Kaikeyi spoke her hard words. He gathered her scattered hair in his hands, laid her head on his lap, and, smiling a little, said, “Proud lady, do you not know that, apart from Rama, that tiger among men, there is no man dearer to me than you?” Kaikeyi said, “My lord, I have not been insulted, nor slighted. I have only one desire, and I wish you to fulfill it. If you mean to do it, make a vow, and then I will speak my mind.”
Smiling a little, the king said, “By that Rama, unconquerable, best of men, dearer to me than my own life, I swear: say whatever your heart wishes. By that Rama, without the sight of whom for even a moment I cannot live, Kaikeyi, I give my word that your wish will be kept. By that best of men, whom I would choose over myself and over my other sons, I swear that your command will be carried out. Knowing my mind to be such, open your heart to me and save my life; say whatever you think right.”
Moved by favor for her son and by the joy of knowing her husband wholly in her power, the queen spoke words that would have been hard even for an enemy to say. Thrilled by that thrice-sworn oath, she gave out her purpose, terrible as Death standing at the door. “In the order in which you swear and grant me the boon, let the thirty-three gods, led by Indra, hear it. Let the moon and the sun, the sky, the planets, day and night, the quarters of space, the Gandharvas and the demons, this world and the earth, the spirits that walk by night, and the household gods, all be witnesses to your word: that this true-vowed, righteous, pure, greatly glorious king is granting me a boon.”
Having praised the bow-wielding king in this way and brought him under her power, she said to the passion-clouded king, ready now to grant the boon, “O king, recall that old event in the war of the gods and demons, when the enemy struck you down and spared only your life; and how, that night, I kept awake and labored to save you, and you granted me two boons then. Those two boons, laid in trust with you, joy of the Raghus, I now claim. If, having sworn by dharma to grant them, you do not give them, then, wounded by your slight, I will give up my life this very day.”
Seeing the passion-clouded king ready to grant the boons, she said, “Lord of the earth, give now those two granted boons, and hear my word. With the very preparations made for Raghava’s consecration, let my Bharata be consecrated Prince Regent. And the time has come for the second boon granted in the war of the gods and demons: let the steadfast Rama, dressed in bark and deerskin, live the life of an ascetic in the Dandaka forest for fourteen years, and let Bharata this very day receive the office of Prince Regent with no rival to it. This is my dearest wish; I am asking only the boon already given. And let me, this very day, see Raghava setting out for the forest.”
With words alone Kaikeyi brought the king under her power; the king walked into the noose set for his own destruction, like a deer. Then she said, “O king of kings, hold firm to the truth of your word, and guard your line, your character, your birth, and the world to come. Those rich in austerity say that truthful speech is the highest good for men.”
The gist: after swearing three times upon Rama, Dasaratha gave his word to fulfill every wish. Calling the gods to witness, Kaikeyi demanded the two deposited boons: the crowning of Bharata as Prince Regent and fourteen years of forest exile for Rama. The king was caught in the noose of his own word.
Dasaratha’s lament, and Kaikeyi’s hardness
Hearing Kaikeyi’s cruel words, the king sank into anguish and burned with it for a while. He thought, “Is this a daydream, or a wandering of my mind? Or the trace of something lived through in a former birth, or some sickness of the heart?” Even after all this thought he could make nothing of it, and he fell into a swoon. Coming back to himself, tormented again by the memory of her words, shaken like a deer before a lioness, seated on the bare ground, he began to sigh like a venomous snake pinned by spells. “Alas, and shame!” he cried, and fainted once more.
After a long while he came to, and, in deep grief and anger, as though he would burn her to ash with his own glow, the king said, “You pitiless woman of wicked conduct, destroyer of this house. What harm have Rama or I done you? Raghava has always treated you as he treats his own mother. Why then are you set on his ruin? Without knowing it, I brought a sharp-fanged serpent into my home, taking her for a princess. When the whole world sings the praises of Rama, for what offense should I cast off my beloved son?”
“I can give up Kausalya and Sumitra, my royal fortune, even my life, but not Rama, who so loves his father. To look on my eldest son is my highest joy; if I do not see Rama, my very awareness dies. The world may go on without the sun, the crops may live without water, but the breath cannot stay in my body without Rama. So have done; let go of this resolve, O woman of sinful design. With my head I touch your feet; be gracious to me. For what reason did you devise so cruel a thing?”
The king counted off Rama’s countless virtues: his forbearance, his austerity, his self-denial, his truth, his dharma, his gratitude, his gentleness toward every living thing; and he said that none serves, honors, and obeys better than Rama, and that no word of blame against him had ever been heard. “Kaikeyi, have pity on me, an old man near his end, begging you again and again. Whatever is to be found on the sea-girt earth I will give you; but do not move toward what ends in my death. I join my palms, I touch your feet; be a protector to Rama, and let no wrong from the breaking of my word cling to me in this life.”
To the king, so scorched with grief, wailing, half-senseless, drowning in sorrow, again and again praying to be carried across the sea of grief, the fierce Kaikeyi gave a fiercer answer. “O valiant king, you granted two boons, and now you repent them; how then will you declare your dharma before the earth? When many royal sages gather and ask about these boons, O knower of right, what answer will you give them?”
“Will you tell them, ‘I made false the word I gave to Kaikeyi, by whose favor I live, and who saved me’? The man who grants a boon today and then talks otherwise brings a stain even on the other kings of his line.”
A sub-tale: Kaikeyi held up the example of kings who stood firm on the truth. In a dispute between a hawk and a dove, King Shibi, lord of the Shibis, cut away his own flesh and gave it to the bird that could not be satisfied. King Alarka plucked out his own eyes and gave them away, and so reached the highest goal. And the ocean, having given its word, never oversteps its shore. The scriptures add that the hawk and the dove were Indra and Agni in disguise, come to test the king; the later tradition holds these up as the ideal examples of keeping one’s word.
“Remembering the conduct of your forefathers, do not make false the promise you gave me. Now I understand, you foolish king, that by casting off dharma and setting Rama on the throne you mean to enjoy life forever with Kausalya. Whatever you spoke to me, whether it be against dharma or in keeping with it, whether true or false, cannot be undone. If Rama is consecrated, I will drink a great draught of poison and die this very day before your eyes. If for even a single day I see Rama’s mother accepting the homage due to the mother of a Prince Regent, then death is better for me. I swear by Bharata and by myself that nothing but the banishment of Rama will content me.”
Having said this much, Kaikeyi fell silent; so the tradition tells it. She gave the wailing king no answer at all. Hearing that unwelcome thing, the exile of Rama and the kingdom for Bharata, the king for a while could not say a word to her; with unblinking eyes he gazed at that beloved who spoke such unwelcome words. Hearing that speech, hard as a thunderbolt and hateful to his heart, full of pain and grief, the king’s happiness was gone.
Thinking of the queen’s fierce resolve and of the terrible oath he himself had sworn, breathing out “Rama!”, he dropped to the ground like a felled tree. His wits lost, like a madman, turned about like a sick man, drained of strength like a snake, the king lay still. In a wretched, feeble voice he said to Kaikeyi, “Who taught you this ruin that wears the face of gain? Speaking to me as one possessed, are you not ashamed? I did not know this flaw in your nature before; now you seem the opposite of the girl you once were. What has frightened you, that you ask such a boon: that Bharata sit on the throne and Raghava live in the forest?”
“If you wish the good of your husband, of the world, and of Bharata, give up this enmity toward Rama and this groundless dread, O pitiless, sinful, petty doer of evil deeds. What sorrow, what false fault, do you find in me and in Rama? Without Rama, Bharata will not even wish to live in the kingdom, let alone rule it; in dharma I hold him stronger even than Rama. How, having said ‘go to the forest,’ shall I look even once on Rama’s moon-face gone pale? How shall I look upon my own plan, made with my friends’ counsel, wrecked like an army destroyed by its enemies? Kings come from every quarter will say, ‘Look, how did this fool of an Ikshvaku rule so long?’”
The king lamented long: how Kausalya would question him, how Sita would hear two griefs at once, that the king had met his end and that Rama had gone to the forest; how the tender Rama would eat harsh, bitter forest fruit; how he who deserved costly robes would wear the ochre bark; and how the whole world would rise in fury the moment Rama passed from sight. “Without knowing it, I bore you like a rope around my neck, and long, sinful man that I am, I cherished you. Taking my pleasure alone with you, I did not know you for my death, as a child in a lonely place lays his hand on a black snake. I know you now for chaste and beautiful, and yet utterly unchaste, as a man knows poisoned wine only after he has drunk.”
“You kept comforting me with sweet, false, friendly words, and, luring me with a honeyed song like a fowler, you have killed me. I, who am selling my son for a woman, will be reviled in the streets like a brahmin who drinks liquor. Alas, Rama!” The king’s lament deepened: how Sumitra would ever trust him again, how Sita would wail like a Kinnari parted from her mate, how he himself would live without Rama. “Kaikeyi, cast Kausalya and Sumitra and me, with our three sons, into hell, and be happy. You alone tend the line of Ikshvaku that Rama and I have left behind.”
The king said that if the exile of Rama pleased Bharata, then let Bharata not perform his funeral rites. He cursed the whole race of women, then said that he did not mean all women, only Bharata’s mother. “You doer of cruel deeds, in the calamity of my old age you strike me this hard blow of Rama’s exile; it is a wonder that your teeth do not break into a thousand pieces and fall from your mouth. Rama never spoke you a single harsh word; he does not even know how to speak harshly. How then, O sweet-tongued speaker, do you find fault in the ever-virtuous Rama?”
“Stain of the king of the Kaikeyas, faint, or burn, or perish, or sink into an earth cracked into a thousand chasms; I will never carry out that most cruel, ruinous word of yours. You are like a razor, sweet in your lies, of the vilest heart, the killer of your own house; you would burn my heart out by the root. Without Rama I have no life, so where is happiness? Do not do me this wrong, my queen; I even touch your feet; be gracious.” Wounded in the heart by Kaikeyi, who had broken every bound, the king wailed like an orphaned child, and, not quite reaching the feet she stretched out before him, sank down senseless like a sick man.
The gist: Dasaratha counted Rama’s virtues, pleaded his life, his house, and his kingdom, touched Kaikeyi’s feet, and, in the same breath, cursed her as a serpent and a razor. But Kaikeyi held firm, threatening to drink poison and swearing by Bharata, and the king fell senseless to the ground.
A night of lament, and a wish to hold back the dawn
Fearless, evil itself in a woman’s shape, her end still unwon, seeing in Rama’s consecration only harm to Bharata, Kaikeyi reminded that good king, who deserved no such cruelty and lay improperly on the ground like Yayati fallen from heaven when his merit ran out, once more of the very same boon. “Great king, you boast that you are truthful and firm in your vows. Why then do you seek to hold back my boon?”
At this the king lay senseless awhile, then, in anger, began to answer. “Ignoble woman, my enemy. When Rama has gone to the forest and I am dead, then take your fill of joy. Even in heaven the gods will ask after Rama’s welfare; and when they learn that he has been banished, how shall I bear the reproach they will heap on me? If I tell the truth, that Rama was sent to the forest to please Kaikeyi, then my first declaration, that Rama would be Prince Regent, is made false. O Kaikeyi of sinful design, why do you yoke my beloved Rama to what he does not deserve?”
“Disgrace beyond compare in this world will surely close in on you from every side.” While the king was wailing like this, his mind quite lost, the sun set and night came on. Adorned though it was with the orb of the moon, that night could not light the heart of the grieving, wailing king; the very word for night, sharvari, is drawn from a root that means to hurt or destroy. All night long, sighing long and hot, his eyes fixed on the sky, the aged King Dasaratha wailed like a sick man. “O night adorned with stars, I do not wish you to turn into dawn; for the moment day breaks, Rama must go to the forest.”
“How shall I banish the brave, learned, wrath-conquering, forgiving, lotus-eyed Rama? How shall I send Rama, dark as a blue lily, long-armed, mighty, and lovely to look upon, to the Dandaka forest? How shall I bear to watch the ruin of Rama, who is fit for comfort and unfit for sorrow? If only my life could end without my giving Rama any grief, then I would find peace. O pitiless Kaikeyi of sinful design, why do you yoke the truly valiant Rama to what he does not deserve?”
Again the king joined his hands. “Have mercy on me, good one; I offer you my folded palms. Or else go quickly; I do not wish to see this pitiless, cruel Kaikeyi, through whom this disaster has come upon me.” Then the king, who knew the duties of a king, again with joined palms tried to soften Kaikeyi. “Show your favor, good queen, to my wretched self, of blameless conduct, fallen at your mercy, my span of life near its end, and, above all, to a king. I did not proclaim Rama’s consecration in some hidden corner; it is known to all.”
“Show your gracious kindness, young one; you are tender of heart. Be gracious, and let my Rama have the imperishable kingship you grant, O fair-eyed queen. By this you will win the highest fame. O queen of lovely limbs and lovely face, do this kindness for me, for Rama, for the world, for our elders such as Vasishtha, and for Bharata.” But even hearing the pure-hearted, wretched king’s strange, piteous wail, mixed of soft pleading and of fear, his eyes gone coppery with grief and wet with tears, the wicked-hearted, pitiless queen would not grant his prayer.
Then, seeing his beloved still unappeased, still speaking against him, still fixed upon his son’s exile, the king fainted once more and, grieving, sank senseless to the ground. So the night wore away for the anguished, heavily sighing, high-minded king. When the panegyrists and bards began to wake him, and the auspicious song that marked the king’s rising from his bed began, Dasaratha, the best of kings, stopped that festal music.
The gist: Kaikeyi kept reminding the true-vowed king of the boon; all night long he sang Rama’s virtues, touched her feet, and joined his palms, wishing that the night would never turn to dawn. Kaikeyi did not move; the king fainted again, and at first light he silenced the very music meant to wake him.
Source: Srimad Valmiki Ramayana, Ayodhyakanda, Cantos 7-13 (Gita Press, Gorakhpur).
Basis: Valmiki Ramayana (Gita Press, Gorakhpur)