Reinterpreting the Ramayana

[Guest guest]

[An editorial for the Women's Feature Service, by Deepti Priya

Mehrotra, published in "The Rising Nepal," November 3, 2006.]

 

The Ramayana continues to be interpreted by different artistes and

scholars in manifold creative ways. Anurupa Roy's multimedia play

"About Ram," recently staged at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi,

projects Rama's inner dilemmas -- his tormented soul as he goes to

rescue Sita from Lanka; overtaken by doubt once he sees her; unable to

accept her because she might have changed.

 

Explains Roy, "The mainstream Tulsidas version [of the Ramayana,]

which I was first exposed to and the TV versions often left me very

uninterested in the Ramayana. Rama appeared to me to be a very 'flat,'

one-dimensional character. With this dissatisfaction came the need to

challenge the 'popular' versions of the story."

 

Roy's is not the only modern reinterpretation of the Ramayana.

Interestingly, the Ramayana -- literally, the story of Rama -- has

been told in thousands of different ways over the centuries. The

mainstream version in North India holds that Dussehra and Diwali

commemorate the victory of good over evil, as Lord Rama freed Sita

from Lanka, where she was abducted by the demon-king Ravana. However,

in parts of South India as well as in southeast Asian countries such

as Indonesia, it is Ravana who is worshipped as a hero.

 

Centuries ago, some oral versions of the Ramayana posited Rama and

Sita as siblings! Even after Valmiki penned the first written Ramayana

around two millennia ago, various versions continued to be written,

sung or told with widely varying plots, characterisations and beliefs.

No version is "wrong." It is valid to interpret a story in different ways.

 

Ram-lilas performed at numerous sites by ordinary people are based

largely on Tulsidas's "Ramcharitmanas," which portrays Sita as meek

and docile, Rama as brave and virtuous, and Ravana and his sister

Surpanakha as evil. The TV serial "Ramayana" by Ramananda Sagar used a

similarly stereotypical portrayal. In this, Sita was described as "the

shadow to the substance, to her lord a faithful wife."

 

However, in the 15th century, the folk poet Chandraboti composed a

Bengali version of the Ramayana in which Rama was shown as being far

from ideal. Still sung by rural women in Bangladesh, Chandraboti's

version portrayed Rama as "a poor king, a poor father, a poor husband

easily influenced by the opinions of others." Sita, on the other hand,

was portrayed as a tragic figure of epic proportions, born of the

blood of ascetics: "Floating, I have come to this tapoban [forest

where penance takes place], and where I shall be tomorrow, nobody

knows ... "

 

Even today in Mithila, Bihar, many people refuse to marry their

daughters to any man from Avadh, Uttar Pradesh -- for they recall that

Sita's life was ruined because she married into an Avadhi family!

Women enact a folk play in which the priest's wife says to her

husband, "Listen to me, my dear: Go bring back Sita, who is pure as

our sacred books." The warrior's wife says to her husband, "Listen to

me, my dear: Bring back Sita and install her with full dignity beside

her husband. If you cannot do this, then get a drum fashioned out of

the skin of your body!"

 

Telugu women's songs (from Andhra Pradesh) also dwell on Sita as the

central figure in the Rama-Sita story. These songs have descriptions

of Sita's birth, marriage, her journey to her inlaws' home, her

puberty, her youthful relationship with Rama, her life in the forest

and in Lanka, the fire-ordeal to test her purity, her pregnancy, her

motherhood, and so on.

 

Even in Valmiki's Ramayana, Sita is not a docile wife; rather, she is

vibrant and articulate. For instance, when Rama is about to go into

exile for 14 years, Sita insists upon accompanying him, and is furious

when he refuses. She declares she is no luxury-loving palace-dweller;

that rather she looks forward to a life in the thick of nature, and is

prepared to endure hardships. She asks him, "Who are you afraid of?

Are you so weak that you will not be able to protect me?"

 

Reminding him that she is born of the earth, she says she will walk in

front and keep removing the thorns from his path. As we know, Sita won

her way, and went into the forest with Rama.

 

The 'Iravataram', written in Tamil by Kampan in the 12th century AD,

is a highly popular version of the Rama-Sita story. In it, Sita's

anguish and anger during the fire-ordeal to prove her purity

(agnipareeksha) is vividly depicted. As she approaches the fire, the

whole world goes into crisis. The fire is scorched by her burning

faithfulness, and Agni lifts her, saying to Rama, "Have you abandoned

Dharma [the religious way]? Will rain fall, will the earth still bear

its burden without splitting in two? Or can the Universe survive if

She becomes enraged? If She utters a curse, even Brahma on his lotus

will die."

 

Thus, Sita is depicted in several versions as a powerful figure,

bravely facing harsh circumstances. Mallika Sarabhai's creative

interpretation of the Ramayana -- a dance-drama called "Sita's

Daughters" -- shows Sita as a strong woman caught in a difficult

situation because of her weak-willed husband. In this, Sita describes

Rama as "the delicate prince who needed my support in coping with life

in the forest; the weak man who had to gather an army to fight his

battles; a chauvinist who needed proof of his wife's virtue; a king

who failed in his duty as a husband ..."

 

During the 1950s, Snehlata Reddy penned "Sita," a play that was

performed extensively by radical political activists in South India.

Reddy's Sita is shocked when Rama rejects her after the Lanka war. She

starts musing over Ravana's caring attitude, in that he never forced

himself on her. She wonders whether she did the right thing in

rejecting Ravana and preserving herself for Rama. Rama does not seem

to understand, respect or care for her in the same way.

 

Embittered, she exclaims, "Remember me not as a goddess of virtue, but

as a defenceless woman fighting for her self-respect. History has

never recorded the whole truth. They will gloss over my suffering and

camouflage their sins with my submissiveness and devotion ... I reject

you! I reject you as husband, as lover - and I reject you above all as

the father of my unborn children!"

 

In the Valmiki Ramayana, Rama takes Sita back to Ayodhya after the

agnipareeksha, but then rejects her after somebody casts aspersions on

her fidelity and purity. Sita then goes to the forest to give birth to

her children and brings them up there. Later, when Rama asks her to

return to the palace, she refuses. She chooses to return to the earth

rather than live with Rama - thus avoiding any replay of the pattern

of betrayal and abandonment.

 

SOURCE: Women's Feature Service; published in The Rising Nepal

URL: http://www.gorkhapatra.org.np/content.php?nid=5587

[Guest guest]

Thanks for this!

 

Max

--

Max Dashu

Suppressed Histories Archives

Women in Global Perspective

http://www.suppressedhistories.net

 

New poster: Our Reproductive Rights!

http://www.maxdashu.net/shamanic/reprorights.html

Beautiful, multi-issue, empowering 11 x 17 laser print