Sita: Power, Penance, Promise - An Introduction

SITA: POWER, PENANCE, PROMISE

An Introduction to “Sitayana”

DR. PREMA NANDAKUMAR

“The work of Valmiki has been an agent of almost incal­culable power in the moulding of the cultural mind of India: it has presented to it to be loved and imitated in figures like Rama and Sita, made so divinely and with such a revelation of reality as to become objects of enduring cult and worship, or like Hanuman, Laksmnana, Bharata the living human image of its ethical ideas; it has fashioned much of what is best and sweetest in the national character, and it has evoked and fixed in it those finer and exquisite yet firm soul tones and that more delicate humanity of temperament which are a more valuable thing than the formal outsides of virtue and conduct.”
–Sri Aurobindo

When referring to the Ramayana, the Vaishnava classic Sri Vachana Bhushanam fondly and reverently records: “The great itihasa, Ramayana, speaks of the nobility of the imprisoned lady.” That is indeed the very essence of Valmiki’s epic, the image of the imprisoned splendour, the epic of the Earth-born.

When we read the Ramayana we do follow the life story of Rama – and a marvellous tale it is of ethical imperatives, war-­heroism and awe-inspiring idealism. But it is Sita who stays in our consciousness at the end. Sita brought to the marriage pandal by Janaka; Sita giving away her riches and preparing to follow Rama into the forest; Sita shyly recounting her marriage festivities to Anasuya; Sita charmed by the Rishis and Rishipatnis; Sita thrown into a fright by Viradha and Surpanakha; Sita demand­ing the golden deer and accusing Lakshmana; Sita abducted by Ravana and imprisoned in Lanka; Sita terrorised by the ogresses and consoled by Hanuman; Sita spurned at the very moment of victory but vindicated by the tire-ordeal; Sita anointed queen and gifting Hanuman a string of pearls; and, of course, the terrible fate that awaits her in the Uttara Kanda, and her withdrawal.

But what were the antecedents of Sita? She is shown as rising to the occasion at every moment of crisis. But we have not the same ground knowledge about her as we have of Rama. Rama the student of Vasishta receives advanced training inspecial missile warfare from Viswamitra; he is later seen discoursing with Rishis, lecturing to Bharata on Raja Dharma, and mollifying Lakshmana: throughout the epic we see Rama interacting with a variety of people around in one way or the other. But Sita has a passive role most of the time. She is on her own only in the Sundara Kanda. The birth and growth of Sita, her “world” within: of these Valmiki is mostly reticent. For instance, after her marriage, Janaka fades out of the story altogether. While Dasaratha, Kausalya, Sumitra, Kaikeyi and the brothers are a constant presence, we do not hear anything about Janaka, his queen and sita’s sisters. Indeed, except for the names Urmila, Mandavi and Srutakirti we have no idea of their lives, characters and relationship with Sita. It is mostly Rama’s world in the Ramayana in spite of the fact that we are equally concerned with Sita’s story of noble suffering. How about Sita’s world? If this epic is about the “noble tale” (charitam mahat) of Sita, how do we trace the evolution of an Avatar who by her sheer penance looms as a power that guides us still? If Rama is the prince who became God. Sita too is a princess who became a goddess. But what are the guiding pathways in her ascent to the summits?

This is not the first time such questions have been posited in the minds of scholars, devotees and poets. Archaeologists and historians have conducted research all over the sub-continent to establish Sita’s historical identity. Devotees have linked Sita to the Supreme Mother seen severally as Sri Devi, Bhu Devi and Sri Ranganayaki. Parasara Bhatta exclaims in Sri GunaRatna Kosa: “The Ramayana lives because of you.” In another famous verse, he says:

“O Mother who was born as Maithili! While Rama saved only those who surrendered to him, you saved even those who did not. Such is thy profound compassion.”

And in verse 57 he says that the Sita incarnation was a rehearsal for the stage appearance as Sri Ranganayaki by Lakshmi Devi.

Poets and dramatists have also sought to approach the Ramayana events from Sita’s point of view. Among the most significant creations in this genre in recent times is Kumaran Asan’s Chintavishtayaya Sita (l919), As a remembrance of events past in Sita’s life while she awaits the return of Lava and Kusa from Rama’s court, the poem is almost bitter. How could one who showered so much affection upon her during the 13 years’ exile become the stone-hearted crowned King of Ayodhya? Does power really corrupt people?

“It is hard to say it – Even a scamp would resent anyone slandering his wife. How then did the noble king heed as gospel truth the aspersions made against me?” ¹

And yet the image of compassionate that Sita is, that she forgives Rama as easily as she forgave the ogresses in the Asoka grove. The ways of Raja Dharma are inscrutable! Hence she ends up blaming herself for her clouded vision:

“Lord, have mercy on your vainglorious mate!
pardon me for the blemishes
that in a state of mental disturbance
I discovered just now in you!” ²

Coming from a family devoted to Ramayana scholarship, my father. Prof. K.R. Srinivasa Iyengar grew up in a traditional Hindu household where the elders used to read the Sundara Kanda daily as Parayana. While father has not followed this ritual (though my mother has been reading the Sundara Kanda daily for forty years), he has immersed himself in the Ramayana world since his childhood day and he has written on the Ramayana at various times. And recently he has edited Asian Variations on the Ramayana for the Sahitya Akademi and translated the SundaraKanda of Valmiki into English as The Epic Beautiful.

The epic Beautiful? Is it not a mere kanda? But then, Prof. Iyengar feels that the Sundara Kanda was the nucleus, the seminal epic to which other portions were added later. In fact, the Agasthya Samhita refers to this as the bija kanda. While translating the Sundara Kanda Prof. Iyengar was increasingly held captive by the Ramayana action as Sita’s story. It was Sita everywhere for him and he also referred to the Sundara Kanda as Sitayana in his introduction to The Epic Beautiful.

After the completion of the translation, friends and disciples came forward with a string of suggestions and asked for more of the Ramayana world in English verse.

The work was begun on 1 January 1983 when he wrote the Prologue. A lifetime spent in prayerful surrender to Sita and watching her presence in the women he had come into contact with – dives images of suffering, forgiveness, penance, power and sacrifice – resulted in these twelve stanzas that open with a Miltonic echo:

Of womanhood I write, of the travail
and glory of motherhood;
of Prakriti and her infinite modes
and unceasing variety;
of the primordial Shakti’s myriad
manifestations on earth;
of the lure and leap of transcendences
of the ruby feminine.

But the real beginning of Sitayana was to be on 19 March 1983, at dawn. When he awoke from a dream - state on that day, the lines were already there:

The famed philosopher - king, Janaka,
paid obeisance to the Bard
Of the Worlds, Narada, as he floated
into Mithila’s domain.
(Mithila, 1.)....

Containing 5995 stanzas (with the Prologue and Epilogue each contributing another 12) Sitayana has seven Books. Written in the 10-7-10-7 syllabia unrhymed quatrain measure that controls the flow of the narrative without compartmentalising the thought-processes, Sitayana has a structural individuality of its own with the events of Sundara Kanda placed at the centre of the epic as the Book of Asoka, the bija - Kanda. It is the precious pendant that gives meaning to the rest of the tale: the image of the imprisoned heroine rejecting the entire wealth and power of Ravana as worthless preyas and remaining faithful to the sreyas ofbeing Rama’s wife upholding wifely chastity. The seven Books are further divided into seventy seven cantos, each Book comprising eleven cantos. Of these seventy-seven cantos, more than half are com­pletely new creation. In the rest of the cantos there is a good deal of direct translation from Valmiki but also plenty of impro­visation. Kamban and Tulsidas provide inspiration now and then, while echoes from great English and Indian writers are never far away. In terms of statistics it could be said that direct translation from Valmiki would be less than one-fourth of the total.

One word before I go to the text. Prof. Iyengar has given the sub-title: Epic of the Earth-born. Sita’s story is essentially our story too. Sita, born of earth, daughter of Mother Madhavi, is a symbol of us all, the earth - born, children of Mother Sakhambari. Sita’s story speaks of the greatness of the lady who remained in an apparently vast and foliage-rich garden, but she was really imprisoned there by an unscrupulous Rakshasa monster, and constantly teased and terrified by ugly ogresses. Well, we too are on this earth, a vast garden limning the splendour of Prakriti. But we are also imprisoned by our own senses (Karma and Jnana Indriyas) and are threatened by a variety of fate-made, man-im­pelled, self-created sicknesses. Sicknesses of the body and the mind. We are imprisoned by birth, imprisoned by the lust of others, imprisoned by our own longings.

However, the imprisoned lady in Asoka was Sita, a Princess, a queen-to-be. We too may be pigmy humanity, but we are also amrutasyah putrah, children of immortality. Hence Valmiki took up the story of Sita to tell us what we are, whither we are going, what should be our goal. Prof. Iyengar extends the parameters of the story by including the experiences of mankind through the last few centuries as well. It is interesting that Sita’s story remains astonishingly relevant even today when the world has entered the awe-inspiring Atomic Age.

While Sitayana is no mirror-image of the Ramayana of Valmiki. Prof. Iyengar has retained the seven-fold division of the original though there has been some re-distribution of the events. Since it is Sita’s story, we have – instead of Bala, Ayodhya, Aranya, Kishkindha, Sundara, Yuddha and Uttara kandas, – the Mithila. Ayodhya, Aranya, Yuddha, Rajya and Ashrama Books. Rama is never seen directly in action when Sita is not present. All such action is reported to Sita by appropriate courtiers, like Hanuman and Trijata, Anala and Sarama. Events in Ayodhya after the departure of the exiles are reported to Sita by Srutakirti.

Sitayana begins with a conversation between Narada and Janaka, just as Valmiki and Narada converse at the opening of Bala Kanda. Janaka wishes to know why the world continues to enact a “wearisome agenda” where “might, courage and cunning have been mastered by like but enhanced powers.” How do the disprivileged manage to endure and even thrive? They do so be­cause of the presence of Love, says Narada:

Dawn after a dark night, a rainbow are
trailing a heavy shower,
a bird’s cry, a child’s smile, a gardenscape.
and we sense Love’s ambience.

(Mithila, 68)

Janaka is reminded of Dasarath’s Yajna three years earlier and on Yajnavalkya’s advice begins a sacrifice. The first step is to turn the sod:

Poised between the infinitudes without
and within, his hands guided
the old ploughshare with an infallible
sense of time and direction.
He had not progressed far, when suddenly
a lightning - flash crossed his path;
he stopped and his dazed eyes fell on the form
of a wondrous golden child.
Since the vision had sprouted as it were
from the opening furrow,
the enraptured Janaka cried “Sita!”
and bent down in gratitude.
(Mithila, 252-254)

Presently the royal household at Videha has three more additions. Urmila, Mandavi and Srutakirti. Prof. Iyengar well brings out both the outward differences and the unified consciousness of the sisters through their demeanour and conversation. But Sita is the leader; and we have dreamy Urmila, self-poised Mandavi and sprightly Srutakirti.

There are charming vignettes about these flames of feminine excellence growing up in Mithila’s palace. But we are never far away from high seriousness. Sita’s dreams and thought-processes are recorded with guarded under-statement. A dream about a serpent swooping upon a bird of Paradise forth an explana­tion from Maitreyi:

A little while, my child, and you’ll be hailed
a rare phantom of delight;
and you’ll win what you ardently desire
and the world will smile on you.
And a little while after, you may have
to quaff the bitter chalice,
endure what seems eternal night, and win
and lose, and win all again.
(Mithila, 465-6)

Yajnavalkya’s wife Maitereyi is but one of the several soulful portrayals of women-teachers in Sitayana. There is, for instance, the Mother of the Mandala (reminding one of the Mother of Sri Aurdbindo Ashram) who initiates the sisters into meditation. The Mother gazes into Sita’s eyes:

Should you ever be seized with helplessness,
think of me, for I take charge
of all, all whom I may have seen even
for a mere fleeting second!
When danger in the future assails you,
fear not but look deep within
and seek – tearing through all barrier veils –­
the invulnerable You.

(Mithila, 525-6)

Now we come to an episode which gives a decisive turn to the story. While at play, a ball had disappeared under the box in which an enormous bow had been kept. The sisters run towards the box.

Drawing near in her native innocence,
Sita now took a close look,
raised the box a little with her left hand,
while the right rescued the ball.
Happening to come just then, Janaka
was o’ertaken by surprise
and cast on his beloved child a glance
of gloried recognition.
(Mithila, 598-9)

The girls run away happily. But Janaka is wistful. This is no ordinary child but a consecrated icon of Power! How will he find the right husband for her? Yes! The hero will have to string this bow of Shiva! He announces a Swayamvara. Presently Sita listens to the chattering Srutakirti speak of what she had heard. A charming young hero has come with a string of achieve­ments to his credit: Tataka killed. Maricha worsted. Ahalya redeemed. Rama wins the contest. Dasaratha comes to Mithila and the wedding takes place. Everyone is happy, and Viswamitra in particular. Hadn’t he been the cause of separating the loving couple, Harishchandra and Chandramati? He has now made amends by bringing together Gautama and Ahalya and also acted as the catalytic agent for the four marriages that have been celebrated in Mithila.

The Book of Ayodhya begins significantly with a storm. The bearers of the palanquin of Maithili and Urmila lose direction and stray away from the main party. The storm, subsides, Sita and her sister find themselves in Ahalya’s presence. Ahalya tells the young brides that one needs a guardian-spirit all the time. In future it is going to be worse for women as man would be stooping lower than the Asura and the Beast.
Sita and Urmila rejoin the royal party and find comfort and happiness at Ayodhya. Sita meets Arundhati who, speaks of the needs for aspiration, and suddenly exclaims:

Sita, Sita, my tired old eyes yet see
you framed in infinity:
you’re come to humankind as a power,
a penance and a promise.
(Ayodhya, 168)

Power, Penance, Promise. The rest of Sitayana is a progres­sive revelation of this triune radiance that is Sita. We watch the re-enactment of the dreadful scenes leading to Rama’s banishment. Sita pleads that Kaikeyi has decreed Sita’s exile as well by demanding Rama’s, banishment. But Rama will not be easily persuaded. Yet Sita will not be denied:

This, my lord, this popular assumption
that we’re but Doll’s House creatures
foolishly engrossed in colourful clothes
and glittering jewellery,
happily contained by domestic chores,
the securities of home
and boudoir, and the throes of child-bearing
and rearing, is mere fancy.
If as the partaker of your Dharma
I’ve the right to share your throne,
Why, it follows, I must with equal joy
feel the thorns of exile too.
No cheap juvenile enthusiasm, this,
nor female obstinacy:
I’ve been schooled in Mithila’s famed
Retreats in seasoned austerities.
(Ayodhya, 421)

In the Book of Aranya we meet Good and Evil in equal measure. While Anasuya fondles Sita and speaks words of wisdom, Viradha is a menace. However, inside Dandaka we have also a spiritual map of India and we meet familiar figures through the gauze-drapery of a poet’s soul-view.

Sita’s instinctive reverence for Rishipatnis like Katyayani, Maitreyi, Arundhati, Ahalya and Anasuya gives a new direction to the story. With such realised women around, it is obvious that woman is no ignorant cog in a gigantic life-machine. If she still suffers, it is because of blind tradition and crass selfishness which have turned her into a blinded slave. Thus Lopamudra:

This lunatic division of labour­–
Woman for the home, and Man
for the battlefield! – has driven a wedge
and splintered humanity.
While the sons get trained to become killers
in the horrid game of war,
the daughters get entrapped in the male’s net
of pride, possession and lust.
(Aranya. 355-6)

Later on, after the exiles take leave and move away, Agasthya calms down Lopamudra and assures her that all will be well for humanity.

Know that Maithili, both in alliance
with Rama and by herself.
she the Earth-born now come with a mission
of change and transformation,
carrying Agni in her heart of ruth,
she can suffer and redeem.
(Aranya, 390-1)

Asoka contains some of the finest flights of inspired poetry in Sitayana. In vain does Ravana tempt Sita with his riches. She remains firmly wedded to the memory of Rama. There are also othermemories which are really lacerations. She had had some hints of what awaited her, and had strengthened herself by following the advice of the Rishi Patnis. But had she not forgotten the words of one among them? Had not Ahalya told her the importance of the protective guardian - angel that Grace places before us? We can reject this symbol of grace only at our peril.

During these long months of imprisonment Trijata and Anala, daughters of Vibhishana, keep up Sita’s spirits and give her news ofthe outside world. As for Sita, she delves into the deeps within and gains the strength to face Ravana’s blandishments and threats. She also acquires a rare poise. Imprisonment is tapas for her, and this period in her life is Ashram-vas, faintly foreshadowing the much longer Ashram-vas yet to come. For the present,

This was an interim for loneliness,
and nude self-sufficiency;
this too was a part of her askesis,
and she watched, and she waited.
(Asoka, 313)

Hanuman comes, Lanka is burnt. HanUIhan goes to Rama

….and the Western orange skies
cast a rare luminous glow
onSita tranced in waiting, an inner
flame presaging the future.
(Asoka, 852)

The Book of Yuddha is an unveiling of the Spectre of Doom as seen and reported mainly by Anala. As Sanjaya had related the course of the Mahabharata war, Anala reports to Sita the vicissitudes of the mighty struggle between Rama and Ravana. The most important additions in Yuddha are the introduction of Sulochana and the dream of Ravana. Mandodari and Indrajit’s wife Sulochana, bound by an identical fate cling to one another at this fateful moment. Sulochana sees no point in this war which has meant a meaningless carnage for Lanka’s citizenry.

A pause, and Mandodari gave a groan
desperation, and said:
Where unreason and passion sit enthroned,
all good sense goes a hiding.
The insanities of lust and power
have their own queer compulsions;
and what are we, the females of the race
but expendable trinkets?
(Yuddha 481)

Ravana returns to the palace after an ignominious reprieve from Rama and falls asleep, sucked into a disturbed pool of nightmare visions. Soon he wakes up, and recounts to the startled Mandodari and Sulochana a terrible sequence. But he is doomed; no he cannot take their advice. All that he can do is to speak in trembling accents:

All I can’t ever hope to live it down,
the contrivance, cowardice.
and cruelty of the action! After
that wind, the present whirlwind!
For Sita too, the poor wounded woman,
who can predict the future?
There can be no simple cancellation
of the mangled time between.
And so my Queen and my Shaikti, whom I’ve
too long taken for granted:
and O rare gift of Grace, Sulochana,
whom my folly has ignored:
forgive me, and the males of the species,
for all our egotisms
and iniquities – but it is too late
to undo my transgressions.
(Yuddha, 569-572)

Ravana’s end; Mandodari’s lament: Sita’s fire-ordeal. In the Kuru court Vikarna’s is the lone voice of protest as Duhshasana disrobes Draupadi. Here Trijata alone raises her voice of protest:

Is there none here to rush to the rescue
of abandoned innocence?
Must the world reap the wages of the sin
of driving the pure to die?
(Rajya, 177)

But we are already in the Book of Rajya, for there is a halt to human insanity. Grace as Agni protects Sita, and the crisis is past. Rama’s “smug stony security was pierced /by the crisp airs from Above.”

Like one awakened from sleep, he let slip
the darkened past as one drops
the memory of nightmares, and advanced
to take his God-given wife.
(Rajya, 195)

The brief Book of Rajya celebrates Rama’s coronation and a mighty family get-together after all these years of prayerful waiting. Agastya tells them all about Ravana’s antecedents, his career which had a glorious terror – terribilita – about it and the emergence of the Vanara clan. There is a meaningful juxtaposition of Ravana and Hanuman as supermen:

Too soon, all too soon, the idyll comes to an end, and we come to the last Book, Ashrama. Exiled again! Sita finds refuge in Valmiki’s hermitage. There are sisters in distress here; but these women – Vasumati, Nadopasini – have transcended their life’s anguish and emptiness by work, worship, meditation, prayer. They are ineluctable companions to Sita, Lava and Kusa are born. They grow up into ideal sons, and Sita now gains “a calm of mind, all dissonance spent.” But deep within, Sita is the world-mother; and she is agitated now and then by the state of the world. Prof. Iyengar sketches the position of humanity today poised on the brink of disaster, thanks to environmental pollution and atomic weaponry:

Would Man one day, drunk with Asuric milk
and weighted with Rakshasa
armour and overwheening ambition,
dare the final sacrilege?
Ah set up the witches’ cauldron and brew
the critical concoction
that will fission the atom and invoke
the Shatterer of the Worlds?
Tear apart the filmy life-protector,
charge and change and carbomise,
infect the elements with lethal fumes,
and decree the end of life?
(Ashrama, 475-477)

Sita assures herself that Grace will never fail humanity which is itself a creation of the Supreme Creatrix, Her loving compassion.

Rama’s Aswamedha sacrifice draws almost all the figures with whom we have grown familiar in the earlier Books. Sita meets her sisters, mothers-in law, Trijata, Anala and Sarama, Also Ahalya, Lopamudra, Arundhati. There is an undercurrent of sorrow and vague apprehensions about the future. The sacrifice gathers momentum; Lava and Kusa recite the tale of Sita. All, the scene!

Once had a daughter of Mithila wept
confined to the petty space
under the Simsupa: and ten thousand
pairs of eyes now streamed forth tears.
(Ashrama, 744)

Rama recognises his sons and requests Valmiki to bring Sita to the court. The poignant moment is upon us all. As Rama and Valmiki speak, as the vast concourse looks upon her clad in ochre robes, Sita herself is far, far away from it all, re-living the momentous past. Suddenly her husband’s words penetrate her consciousness.

What was the king her husband waiting for?
Did her marble purity,
a Fire that burnt Ravana’s might of arms,
need further attestation?
Goodbye, then, to dear visible Nature,
the rich flora and fauna,
the many-hued and polyfoliate
splendour of Earth-existence!
(Ashrama, 835-6)

The Earth-born Sita goes to where she came from reclaimed by Mother Madhavi. But does Rama’s suicidal stipulation spell a doom for the future?

Ten thousand cycles of hibernation,
birth, growth, flowering, fruition,
and fall, and once more winter! But the Earth
renews itself, and endures.
The Earth never tires or stales or despairs,
for the pulses of Sita’s
heart of compassion sustain and foster
our evolving Life Divine.
(Ashrama, 939-40)

Sita is seen in this epic as a tremblingIy human and graciously divine heroine. Her innocence and wisdom, gentleness and strength, love and compassion are all reflected in her motivations, conver­sations, and actions. When the moment of despair is upon us, and we feel helpless and hopeless in an increasingly menacing atmosphere, the image of Sita clad in the ochre robes of renunciation rises before us as a promise, guiding us to sanity, guarding us as Grace. And so the noble tale of Sita becomes our sanctuary as well.

¹ Selected poems of Kumaran Asan (1975), p. 124.
² ibid. 1 p. 129.