The World Of Valmiki
by N. Raghunathan
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The Brothers I spoke of the brothers. They live in a world of more intimate and complex relationships than the ties of
friendship. There are a common heritage and a common responsibility. And there are forces enough in all conscience to queer the relations between the brothers. There is the world of real-politik--an old and
uxorious king, a favourite younger queen who is intoxicated with her good fortune, and who, coming from distant Gandhara, perhaps does not feel bound by the Ikshvaku tradition; there are, besides, half-forgotten or wholly
unacknowledged debilitating promises in the background. Inside this world Dasharatha lives in a private world of his own, made up of hopes and fears. Then there is the world of the gods who make plans, not always for
man's comfort. Beginning at the very beginning, they tell Mahavishnu, not only that He should take human birth in order to kill Ravana but that he should be born as four brothers. And all through the story they bob up
in various and unpredictable ways. For a brief twenty-four hours they seem to have thrown Kaikeyi into a frenzy, so thoroughly at variance with her normal easy-going character. She is deflated by Bharata as suddenly as
she is worked up by Manthara--the family serf--who was born no one knows where. The gods again intervene at the decisive moment to soften Bharata's resolve not to take a refusal from his brother. And they seem to be
present in a more shadowy way as impulses in Rama's own mind that deflect the course of events--to mention only one, look at the way in which he gives Maricha the long rope. Bharata Apart from the
complications introduced by these various external forces, there are the tensions inherent in the different temperaments of the brothers themselves. It is a different sort of tension--fruitful and fortunate for the world,
because it is based on steadfast devotion to ideals, but not the less harrowing to their feelings because they cannot choose the easy way. The poet tells us very little of their early life together. He sends Bharata (along
with the inseparable Shatrughna) to distant Rajagrha for twelve long years. His reticence is full of suggestive shadows that give the story the solidity of a 3-D film. He speaks of Bharata often thinking wistfully of his old
father, but there is no mention of the mother. It suggests that he did not like her haughty ways, her overbearing attitude to Kausalya, which with his percipient mind he must have seen was causing much silent suffering to
Rama. And he loved Rama, not as Lakshmana did, with the possessive loyalty of a mother, but as one would a venerated exemplar and a pillar of strength. The debate occasioned by the competition in righteousness
(dharma-spardha) of the brothers is literally a treat for the gods. Both are equally strong-willed. And both are equally well grounded in the scriptures and in the principles of Rajadharma and Svadharma. It is Kaikiyi
who pays tribute to Bharata's steadfastness and dispassion as the result of study and meditation. (Ayo. 72.25) And Rama himself confirms this when,replying to Vali, he points out that in Bharata-Rajya
there can be no toleration of Adharma. (Kish. 18.25) And Bharata knows of what metal his great brother is made! (Ayo. 106.3-4) Deep calls to deep. Bharata sees Rama as the
sthitaprajna
that he is. Understanding him so well he could not have expected any reply other than the one that Rama delivered with the finality of a judgment, after having listened carefully, as was his wont, to other points of view. (
Ayo. 2.18-19) But the debate serves another purpose. It makes it plain to all the world not only that Bharata was sinless and Rama knew that he was. It reveals the moral climate in which the
Ikshvakus lived. Kaikeyi had fouled it. And for that Bharata, who did not lack tenderness, could not forgive her. But Rama, whom he resembles so startlingly in fundamentals, will not tolerate this harshness
towards his mother. He would not have Bharata's perfection sullied by the slightest flaw. Rama's Philosophy But there are other reasons as well for his insistence that Bharata should cease
girding at his mother. They are grounded in the metaphysical view of things which is all Rama's own. It is in this metaphysic that we have to look for Rama's uniqueness, his quiddity as the Schoolmen would say. 'Maranantani Vairani' is one of Rama's favourite sayings; not learnt by rote, but born of a profound understanding of life. Evil must not be tolerated, else it will breed. But the doer of evil is
often a passive instrument in the hands of Destiny or of his own wayward impulses. Punished he must be, but not pursued vindictively. Vindictiveness, far from purging, can only make for a chain reaction, an
anarthaparampara. So Rama punishes because he must: 'Hantyeva niyamad-vadhyan'. But there is pity3
in his heart for Kaikeyi, for Vali and even for Ravana; not condescension, mind you, but the compassion of a brother for a fallen brother; 'mamapyesha yatha tava' was no rhetorical flourish; it has the grand simplicity of truth. It was this unaffected sympathy that made him the idol of the Ayodhyavasis. The Poet says he was one who knew his own faults as well as the faults of others: (svadosha-paradoshavit). Though he knew
his father was as wax in the hands of Kaikeyi, he would not make that an excuse for resiling him from his own duty to his father. The revelation of Kaikeyi's greed had been something of a shock, though not her overbearing
contempt for Kausalya and Sumitra. With a nature so deeply loving as his, the realization that her fondness for him had all been on the surface had left a wound; and that may explain, even if (to the hypercritical) it may not
exculpate his occasional harsh references to her in later contexts. But what he says in condemnation of her is not unfair.4
A woman who could threaten to kill herself if her unreasonable wish were not granted and who knew that by her persistence she was driving the old King to his grave was quite capable of destroying her hated rivals. That was the harshest thing that Rama says of her.
In the process of doing their duty loyally by their father they killed and maimed thousands of living creatures purposelessly and without compassion. They thus brought on themselves the wrath of Kapita. But, says the wise Garuda, their uncle, it was all fore-ordained--their death as well as the descent of Ganga. Thus even the evil impulses in men's minds are harnessed to the divine purpose . And, great as was
their transgression, no less great was the reward of their pitr-bhakti. The poet gives Sagara and his sons a special place in his history of the Ikshvakus as if to suggest that the seed of filial
piety thus sown in the muck of human passions was in time to bear the fine flower that was Ramachandra. But the notable thing is, not that Rama occasionally loses his self-control but that he almost always acts as the
Jnani that Bharata, with his insight, knows him to be. When, in a mood of frustration or despair, he is assailed by an uncharitable thought, he loyally struggles to put it out of his mind. He seems even
capricious when he chides Lakshmana with unnecessary vehemence for strong words used against Kaikeyi, which are not however stronger than his own.5 But this is not inconsistency. It is a transparent attempt
to veil what it really a mood of self-reproach. Thus, having jested with Shurpanakha and all unwittingly inflamed her passions, he falls foul of poor Lakshmana who has merely followed him, and tells him that one must not jest
with boors like that woman. It is really his own apology.
3An example of needless cruelty in the doing of one's duty is
provided by the Ramayana account of the digging of the ocean by Sagara's sons. As a case of duty done even at the cost of one's life Ram himself cites the example of Sagara's sons. (Ayo. 11.32)
4The poet, rather intriguingly, introduces Rama's long bewailing in Ayodh.
53 with the description 'auspicious converse' though he adds at the end that Rama's eyes were full of tears and he was deena, a mood totally foreign to him. Contrast this with the characterisation of Sumantra's wrath
against Kaikeyi is 'santapam ashubham gatah'. 5Compare Rama's tirade against Kaikeyi in Sarga 53 of the Ayodhya Kanda with the much milder remarks of Lakshmana in Aranya
Kanda, 16th Sargas. But Rama interrupts him, saying that he would rather listen to the praise of Bharata than the denunciation of Kaikeyi: 'But speak by all means the praise of Bharata, the Lord of the Ikshvakus'. (
Aran. 16.37)
Even more suggestive in its own way is perhaps the fact, which does not seem to have been remarked upon, that Jabali, in preaching hedonism, seems to take his cue from certain sentiments
uttered by Rama himself. In telling Bharata that one must not give way to unavaiing grief Rama points out that man comes alone into the world and goes out of it alone and must therefore not place too much importance on the
relationships and attachments formed during his brief sojourn here. Starting from the same premise and using the same similies Jabali comes to a very different conclusion. And in putting an apologia into his
mouth--he says he was a nastika for the nonce and may have to revert to the role again if circumstances should demand it--the poet would seem to suggest that the influence of Time (Kala)--part of the spiritual continuum in
which man lives--is ineluctable and incalculable and so powerful as to constrain even the tallest at times to falter. Rama too, though rarely, loses his divine recollectedness (daivee smrtih
).