Ramayan aof Valmiki and Kamban-Ayodhyakanda18.Bharatha arrives

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18. Bharatha arrives

 

On the day when the messengers from Ayodhya arrived Bharatha was depressed despite the efforts of his friends to cheer him up with music ,dance, jokes etc. On being asked the reason he told them that he had a bad dream in which he saw his father with dishevelled hair and dirty body falling from a mountain into a pond of filth and covered with oil and eating rice mixed with sesame and plunging into the oil himself and later going towards south in a chariot drawn by donkeys. This portended that either himself or Rama or Lakshmana or the king would die. Not only that, he said, but he dreamt that the whole world was falling to pieces the oceans drying up, the moon falling down, the earth covered by darkness, a blazing fire suddenly extinguished, the earth quaking, the trees dry up, and the mountains vanishing in a smoke. So Bharatha feared a great calamity to happen. At that moment the messengers arrived.

 

Bharatha on seeing them asked anxiously about the welfare of Rama, Lakshmana and Dasaratha and enquired after Kousalya, referring to her as a noble, virtuous, righteous and the mother of valiant Rama and asked them about Sumithra also. Finally he spoke about his mother Kaikeyi, describing her as the one who loves herself, who is fierce and stung to anger quickly and thinkes herself as highly intelligent, thus showing that he was under no illusion about his mother.

 

The messengers told him that all were well in general and that good fortune awaited him and he was called to Ayodhya at once. Bharatha took the permission of his grandfather and uncle and returned to Ayodhya with rich gifts and large number of attendants and animals fit for royalty following him

 

Bharatha and Sathrugna travelled for seven nights and seven days and Valmiki gives a detailed description of the way from Kekaya to Ayodhya. The country of Kekaya is in the west of modern Punjab. From there Bharatha travelled to Ayodhya.

 

When they arrived in Ayodhya Bharatha was shocked to see the state of the city which looked gloomy without its usual festive appearance and Bharatha entered th palace of of his father and not finding the king there his anxiety increased. Then he went to the palace of his mother.

Kaikeyi was delighted on seeing him and embraced him and enquired after him and her relatives in Kekaya. Then Bharatha asked her the whereabouts of the king and she replied that the king has had a long and good life and had gone to join his forefathers. Bharatha fell on the floor and lamented for long and expressed his grief that he could not be at the side of his father at the time of his death and Rama and Lakshman alone had that good fortune and said that since his father was no more he would go and see Rama whom he considered as his father now and wanted to know the last message of his father to him.

 

Now Kaikeyi who might have had doubts by this time about the fulfillment of her design on seeing the pure heart of Bharatha and his love of Rama, was torn between the dire reality and her ambition. She did not dare to break the news to Bharatha all at once but had to ladle it out in instalments. She first said, in order to let Bharatha know that his father was not thinking about him a the time of death, that Dasaratha breathed his last by crying , "Ha Rama, Ha Lakshmana, Ha Jaanaki," and saying that he was not destined to see them return and happy are those who will. Thereupon Bharatha asked her the reason why Rama and others were not by the side of the king during his last moments and Kaikeyi said that Rama put on hermit's garments and went to forest which made Bharatha exclaim whether Rama committed any crime such as killing a brahmin or desiring someone's wife etc. which was highly unlikely knowing Rama's blemishless character.

 

Then Kaikeyi had no alternative but to tell him exactly what happened and urged him to accept the kingdom. If she had expected him to appreciate what she has done for his sake, that hope might have been diminished now but what transpired after Bharatha heard her was something she never bargained for, as otherwise she would never have done what she did.