Ayodhya

The sage Narada, the wandering messenger of the gods, came to Valmiki's hermitage, and Valmiki asked him a question.

Was there anybody living in the world who was truly virtuous, truthful, brave, steadfast, learned, kind to all creatures, and self-controlled? And Narada told him that there was such a man, Rama, of the line of Ikshvaku, the king of Ayodhya.

And he told Valmiki, briefly, the whole story of Rama's life.

After Narada had gone, Valmiki went down to the river Tamasa to bathe with his disciple Bharadvaja.

They learned the whole of it by heart, and went about singing it, in the hermitages of the forest and in the streets of cities.

In the story, it will turn out that the boys were Rama's own sons, but neither they nor anybody who heard them knew that yet.

In the land of Kasala, on the bank of the river Sarayu, there stood the city of Ayodhya.

Its name means the unconquerable, the city that cannot be fought against, and in Valmiki's telling it was one of the most beautiful cities in the world.

When we talk about Diwali, we talk about the moment Ram comes home.

The lamps, crowds and the whole city of Ayodhya glowing after 14 long years.

And it is one of the most beautiful images in all of our storytelling.

But today, I want to ask who was baiting in that city and more specifically, who was baiting the hardest? Because there was one person in Ayodhya who spent every single one of those 14 years living as though Ram might walk through the gates at any moment and who ran a kingdom without ever once sitting on its throne.

His name was Bharat and this Diwali episode is his story.

Let us begin with what Bharat did not know.

When Darshad sent Ram into exile and then died of grief, Bharat was far away at the home of his maternal uncle in Kaikal along with his brother Shatrughna.

Messengers came to bring him back to Ayodhya and they were told to say only that he was needed urgently and to give no reason.

Yeah, okay.

I would like to strongly recommend to visit Varanasi and Ayodhya once.

Varanasi, right? You know what, actually, that was my original plan.

I had a plan to visit Varanasi, but my friend changed my mind.

Oh, yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

So you said Ayodhya and Varanasi, those are the good places in Uttar Pradesh, right? So I will definitely come and visit.

Sure.

There's more to it.

There's a whole story of how Lord Rama went into Ayodhya, and he had to defeat the king, Lord Rama.

And after his victory over Rabindra, as described in the Ramayana story.

So there's going to be a Bollywood film coming out this year, an Indian film, which I wanted to actually let the audience know.