Hari Om.
Let us begin the sixty first sarga of the ayOdhyA kAnDam by offering our prostrations at the lotus feet of SrIrAma and our sathguru.
King daSaratha was deeply hurt at the banishment of rAma and was suffering the pangs of separation. The words of kausalyA were like the sharp arrows that hurt his already wounded heart and forced him down the memory lane to remember the bitter experience he had as a prince regent. The fatal arrow that he unleashed at the son of a sage by mistake and the consequent curse that he received from the sage to suffer untold grief at the end of his life came back to his memory gushing. The impact of that guilt was so much that the king couldn’t survive that. The unbearable grief of separation from rAma and on top of that the unintentional misdeed of the past and the inescapable curse of the sage ensured that the king lost his life in utter sadness that night. Onwards…
As the morning dawned, proficient panegyrists and seasoned singers flocked to the palace of the king and his inner chambers to sing paeans to the king and wake him up as is the practice everyday. Their benedictions, good wishes and the heroic deeds of the king that were being rendered musically, set to meters and played on stringed instruments like vINA in high pitch along with their claps reverberated all over the palace.
The birds woke up to their songs of praise of daSaratha and tweeted all over the place. Other regular staff of the royalty such as the priests, those who help the royal personas in their ablutions and decorations arrived along with their paraphernalia of water filled in golden vessels along with other fragrant articles. The articles that they had brought to bathe the king and get him ready for the day were of top quality.
They waited for the king till the sun rise and when he didn’t present himself yet, they wondered what had happened. Then those attendants that make the bed in the morning, approached the king and began to wake him up. They conducted themselves honorably and with restraint in waking up the king. They were well versed in the knowledge of how sound the sleep was based on the movements and the consequent changes of the bed spreads. They were apprehensive that the king had passed away and shuddered at the thought of that. They saw him up close and ascertained that their worst fears are true!
Then they looked at queens kausalyA and sumitrA who were still sleeping on account of fatigue arising from the sorrow of separation from their sons. Queen kausalyA looked lusterless and it was evident that she had shed lot of tears. The attendants ascertained seeing the sleeping queens that the king had actually died in his sleep. The women didn’t know what else to do and cried loudly and bitterly at the death of the king and due to that noise both queens kausalyA and sumitrA were jolted out of their slumber. Both of them woke up, touched the body of the king and fainted with a cry. As the news of the death of the king spread in the inner chambers all his wives along with kaikEyI began to assemble there and wail bitterly at the death of their lord. The wailing grew louder and bitter and reverberated in the palace.
At the death of the king daSaratha, joy disappeared from the royal palace in one stroke. Anxious and bewildered people thronged the court and the whole palace looked like a picture of misery. The wives of the king surrounded him and wept unconsolably like orphaned children.
Here we conclude the sixty first sarga of the ayOdhyA kAnDam of SrImath vAlmiKi rAmAyaNam and humbly offer it at the lotus feet of SrIrAma. Hari: Om!
jAi SrIrAma.
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rAmabhaktisAmrAjyam 