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wish to clarify at the outset that I am going to focus primarily on the ISita of popular imagination rather than the Sita of Tulsi, Balmiki or any other textual or oral version of the Yes to Sita, No to Ram! Ramayan. Therefore, I deliberately refrain from detailed textual analysis. The Continuing Popularity of Sita in India I have focused on how her life is inter- preted and sought to be emulated in today’s context. Madhu Kishwar However, there is no escaping the fact that in north India the Sita of popu- lar imagination has been deeply influ- enced by the Sita of Ramcharit Manas study carried out in Uttar Pradesh, 500 was a 1957 survey. However, Sita con- by Tulsi. In most other versions of boys and 360 girls between the ages tinues to command similar reverence the Ramayan, close companionship of 9 and 22 years were asked to select even today, even among modern edu- and joyful togetherness of the couple the ideal woman from a list of 24 names cated people in India. This paper is a are the most prominent features of the of gods, goddesses, heroes, and hero- preliminary exploration into why Sita Ram-Sita relationship rather than her ines of history. Sita was seen as the continues to exercise such a powerful self-effacing devotion and loyalty ideal woman by an overwhelming pro- grip on popular imagination, especially which have become the hallmark of portion of the respondents. There among women. the modern day stereotype of Sita. were no age or sex differences.1 That The medieval Ramayan of Tulsi marks A Slavish Wife? the transition from Ram and Sita being I grew up thinking of Sita as a presented as an ideal couple to pro- much wronged woman — a slavish wife jecting each of them as an ideal man without a mind of her own. And pre- and woman respectively. cisely for that reason she was not for As a maryada purushottam, Ram’s me a symbol of inspiration, but a warn- conjugal life has to be sacrificed at the ing. She was all that I did not want to altar of “higher” duties. Sita is now be. I naively believed she deserved portrayed in a highly focussed man- her fate for being so weak and sub- ner as an ideal wife who acts as the missive. It was not as though I were moral anchor in a marriage, and stays deliberately and consciously rejecting unswerving in her loyalty and righ- Sita as an ideal. Fortunately, she was teousness no matter how ill-matched never held up as an example for me be her husband’s response. The and, therefore, she did not seem an power of the ideal wife archetype in important reference point — positive Tulsi’s Ramayan overshadows the or negative — in my life. Sita forced happy conjugal life of the couple prior herself on my consciousness only af- to Ram’s rejection of Sita. ter I began working on Manushi. The The Sita image indeed lends itself articles and poems that came to us, es- to diverse appeals which is perhaps pecially those for the Hindi edition, why it has continued to hold sway showed an obsessive involvement over the minds of the people of India with Sita and her fire ordeal over the centuries. For instance, in a (agnipariksha). My impression is that 80 to 90 per- This article has been extracted from a cent of the poems that came to us for longer paper presented at a conference the Hindi version of Manushi, and at organised in January 1996 at the School least half of those for English Manushi, of Oriental and African Studies in revolved around the mythological Sita, London. or the writer as a contemporary Sita, 20 MANUSHI with a focus on her steadfast resolve, woman? Young girls tend to name of my mother or grandmother’s gen- her suffering, or her rebellion. Sita public figures like Rani Lakshmibai of erations but even young college- loomed large in the lives of these Jhansi, Indira Gandhi, and Mother going girls — not just those in small women, whether they were asserting Teresa as their ideals. But those al- towns and villages, but also those in their moral strength or rebelling ready married or on the threshold of metropolitan cities like Delhi. against what they had come to see as marriage very frequently mention Sita Even among my students in the the unreasonable demands of society as their ideal (barring the few who are Delhi University college where I teach, or family. Either way Sita was the point avowedly feminist). At this point of Sita invariably crops up as their no- of reference — an ideal they emulated their lives, the distinction between an tion of an ideal woman. She is fre- or rejected. I was very puzzled by this ideal woman and an ideal wife seem to quently the first choice if you ask some- obsession, and even began to get im- often get blurred in the minds of one to name a symbol of an ideal wife. patient with the harangues of our mod- women. That includes not just women When I ask women why they find this ern day Sitas. And then came the biggest sur- prise of all. The first poem I ever wrote was in Hindi, and was entitled, Agnipariksha. I give some extracts in a rough translation: I too have given agnipariksha, Not one — but many Everyday, a new one. However, this agnipariksha Is not to prove myself worthy of this or that Ram But to make myself Worthy of freedom. Every day your envious, dirty looks Reduced me to ashes And everyday, like a Phoenix, I arose again Out of my own ashes Who is Ram to reject me? I have rejected that entire society Which has converted Homes into prisons. Not just me, even my former col- league, Ruth Vanita, who is from a Christian family, wrote many a poem around the Sita theme. Her recent col- lection of poems has several poems that revolve around the Sita symbol. It took a long time, but eventually I became conscious that this obsession with Sita needs to be understood more sensitively than I was hitherto pre- pared for. Therefore, I began to ask this question fairly regularly of vari- ous men and women I met over the years: who do they hold up as an ex- ample of the ideal man and ideal A modern calendar representation of Ram and Sita No. 98 (January-February 1997) 21 ideal still relevant, the most common response is that the example Sita sets will always remain relevant, even though they may themselves not be able to completely live up to it. This failure they attribute to their living in kalyug. They feel that in today’s de- based world it is difficult to measure up to such high standards. However, most women add that they do try to live up to the Sita ideal to the best of their ability, while making some adjust- ments keeping present day circum- stances in view. Importance of Being Sita Since I don’t have the space to quote extensively from the large num- ber and variety of interviews I have done on the subject, I merely give the gist of what emerged out of these in- terviews. It is a common sentiment among Indian women (and men) that the ide- als set in bygone ages are still valid and worth emulating, though they ad- mit few people manage to do so in today’s world. This attitude contrasts sharply with the popular western view that assumes that people in by-gone ages were less knowledgeable, were The abandoned Sita with her newborns in Balmiki’s ashram far less aware and conscious of their rights and dignity, had fewer options, very when they mention Sita as their perior to and more awe inspiring than and therefore were less evolved as ideal. Sita is not perceived as being a that of Ram — someone who puts even human beings. This linear view of hu- mindless creature who meekly suffers maryada purushottam Ram — the most man society makes the past something maltreatment at the hands of her hus- perfect of men — to shame. She is the to be studied and kept in museums band without complaining. Nor does darling of Kaushalya, her mother-in- but is not expected to encroach upon accepting Sita as an ideal mean en- law, who constantly mourns Sita’s ab- the supposedly superior wisdom of dorsing a husband’s right to behave sence from Ayodhya. She worries the present generation. In India, on the unreasonably and a wife’s duty to bear about her more than she does for her other hand, Ram and Sita are not seen insults graciously. She is seen as a son Ram. As the bahu of Avadh, she as remote figures out of a distant past person whose sense of dharma is su- is everyone’s dream of an ideal, loving to be dismissed lightly just because daughter-in-law. To the people of we are living in a different age and Mithila, she is far more divine and wor- have evolved different lifestyles. They Ram’s rejection of Sita is thy of reverence than Ram. are living role models seen as having almost universally Her father-in-law, Dashrath, and set standards so superior that they are condemned while her her three brother-in-laws dote on her. hard to emulate for those living in our Ram has at least some enemies like more “corrupt” age, the kalyug.

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