Hari Om.
Let us begin the sixty sixth sarga of the ayOdhyA kAnDam by offering our prostrations at the lotus feet of SrIrAma and our sathguru.
King daSaratha found it too hard to bear the burden of guilt of banishing rAma and even more than that the separation from rAma was impossible to handle. On the sixth night after rAma left for the forests, the king lay sulking in his bed talking to queen kausalyA in monologues. The sea of grief that surrounded him prodded him to remember a terrible sin that he committed as a young prince. The memories of hurling a sound-guided-arrow at the son of a sage by mistake came surging forward. As the fatal arrow claimed the life of the boy, the deceased boy’s parents cursed daSaratha to suffer separation from his son similarly during the end of his life. This was the last nail and recalling the event vividly and aware that one reaps what one sows and not otherwise, the king breathed his last in his sleep. The next morning bards and eulogists turned up to wake the king up and noticed that he had not risen until sun rise! The attendants then went into his chamber and checked and found him to be dead. They wokr up the queens kusalyA and sumitrA and the entire palace bewailed. Onwards…
Queen kausalyA was wrecked to behold the body of the king who just attained the heavens and without him ayOdhyA appeared like a raging fire has been doused, like the oceans dried up, like the sun dimmed. She drew the head of the king onto her lap in overwhelming grief and looking at kaikEyI said –
“O kaikEyI, you wicked, perverted wretch, I guess your wish has been fulfilled! Go and enjoy the kingdom unobstructed now to get which you worked with complete focus. My rAma left me and so did my husband as well. bereft of those two, I have no zeal to live now. Which woman would want to live without her god-like husband unless of course kaikEyI who has given up the ways of dharma. Just like consuming a poisonous fruit in ignorance that leads to death, out of avarice and misleading counsel of the hunchback, kaikEyI has destroyed the race of raghus.
The great king janaka, coming to learn of the banishment of rAma along with his wife in place of crowning will be shocked. That old king, without a son, will grieve knowing what has come up on his daughter sItA and may even give up his life.
My righteous son rAma, one of lotus like beautiful eyes has left from here rendering our lives useless and he doesn’t know that I am a widow and without a protector now. The daughter of janaka, sItA doesn’t deserve grief and yet will be experiencing the hardships all the time in the forests. She must be taking refuge in rAma for protection from the ferocious wild beasts. I shall embrace this body of my husband and in full commitment, I shall enter the funeral pyre along with him”.
As kausalyA was flooded with grief embracing her husband’s body, her attendants took her away from that place. The ministers preserved the body of the emperor in an oil bath knowing fully well that none of the king’s sons are around to perform the last rites. Being well versed in these matters, the ministers preserved the body and kept a watch. Meanwhile the news of the death of the king sunk and the wives of daSaratha wailed miserably with uplifted arms and floods of tears. They cried addressing their dead husband –
“O king, we are already deprived of the pleasant and truthful rAma and now you have also left us. Alas! Due to the evil machinations of kaikEyI first we were separated from rAma and now we have lost you as well. How are we to coexist with her who has killed her own husband! Bereft of you and rAma how are we to survive in the presence of kaikEyI, the one who didn’t mind eliminating rAma and her own husband. We are just runovers for her”.
In that flood of sorrow, the wives of daSaratha lay unconscious on the floor. That city of ayOdhyA without its king resembled a star-less sky and a woman without her husband. The city of ayOdhyA wore a deserted look, quite opposite to earlier happy times, as the citizens mourned the death of the king and the housewives raised cries of alas!
In the reigning sorrow, the day passed off and the night dawned. All the friends and well wishers of the king who assembled there beholding the unimaginable state of the king lying in state, were unwilling to conduct the last rites in the absence of his sons. All the citizens, both men and women, who gathered in places denounced the acts of the mother of bharata and were extremely distressed at the current state of their kingdom.
Here we conclude the sixty sixth 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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Next: 2.67. Longing for the leader
Previous: 2.65. The dreadful morning dawns
rAmabhaktisAmrAjyam 