In this episode, we’re continuing with the Ramayana. It’s one of the two major epics in Indian mythology, the other is the Mahabharat which we’ve also covered in other episodes on this show. Today we’ll continue with Ram and Laxman helping to solve an intense sibling rivalry between Sugriva and Vali.
But first, let me summarize the story so far.
Ram was an avatar of Vishnu. Born to King Dhasharath and Queen Kaushalya he was meant to become King of Ayodhya. But things didn’t go his way. Because Kaikeyi, Dasharath’s other Queen cashed in on a couple of reckless unconditional promises that the King had made to her.
Ram was exiled for 14 years while Kaikeyi’s son Bharat would rule. But Ram did not go alone into exile. His wife Sita and his brother Laxman accompanied him, against his initial protests.
Bharat was only a reluctant participant in this plan, and when Dasharath died, he ruled the Kingdom not as the King but as a delegate of Ram.
Meanwhile, in the forest, Ram, Laxman, and Sita encountered one danger after another. That included the demoness Surpanakha, followed by her brothers Khara and Dushana.
The Ayodhya trio came out on top easily in those conflicts.
So, Ravana, Surpanakha, Khar, and Dushana’s brother, who was also the ruler of Lanka and the mega villain of this epic stepped in. He took revenge by carrying off Sita while Ram and Laxman were distracted.
Ram and Laxman searched around but all they found was their Vulture neighbor, Jatayu, who died soon after of injuries sustained when he had tried to stop Ravana.
They encountered a demon, who was really a good guy trapped in a demon’s body, and later an elderly lady who both directed Ram and Laxman to Sugreeva, a Vanara who could help them find Sita. Sugreeva had painted himself into a corner with his brother Vali, who was arguably the most powerful creature in the Universe.
But Sugreeva did have a bunch of loyal followers who could help their cause, the most promising of whom was Hanuman.
That’s where we’ll continue the story today.
Hanuman had taken Ram and Laxman to Sugriva’s home. They sat across from the King of the Vaanars in a cave, sipping tea. It wasn’t very comfortable. Not least because in the barely-lit and damp cave they couldn’t even see everyone properly. The seats were just rocks. It would have helped if the tea were piping hot, but it wasn’t even lukewarm.
They explained their backstory to Sugriva and explained that they had come here expecting help. What they wanted is to cover as much ground as quickly as possible. They had to find Sita. It was just the two of them, so they could go on for years without finding a trace of her or of this Ravana guy. They wanted manpower or rather vaanar power.
At the end of their appeal, Sugriva laughed mirthlessly. “Help? You’ve come to me for help? I’d love to, but look at me and tell me what I can possibly do. I can’t even step off of this mountain. Look at this place – this is what I have to call home. My wife is herself held captive. If it rains, we manage to quench our thirst. We haven’t had hot food for a long while. If there are any mushrooms here in the corners of the cave, we try to grab them, if the rats haven’t already gotten to them yet. So you see gentlemen, it’s not that I don’t want to help you. I just can’t see a path to doing that.
Of course, if I had been King, I would have the resources of a whole Kingdom and all those would be at your disposal.”
“Are you suggesting we go ask Vali?” asked Laxman. Truth be told, he was still leaning in that direction. He had come to the same conclusion that Sugriva had. Sugriva couldn’t help them.
“No, I am not. To be honest, that might have been a good idea a while ago, but that ship has already sailed,” Sugriva replied. “Vali’s spies will have told him already that you are meeting me. I bet Vali will think that you are assassins I’ve hired to eliminate him.”
“Well, why don’t you?” asked Ram. “I mean, hire us to eliminate Vaali?”
Laxman looked, open-mouthed at his brother. A lifetime spent growing up together, and his brother surprised him like this. Then he remembered the pain of Sita’s loss he had seen in Ram’s eyes when they had heard about Vaali abducting Sugriva’s wife Ruma.
“How could you? When no one else can” asked Sugriva. “I couldn’t do it. Even Hanuman couldn’t do it. My father, Surya himself couldn’t. It’s the Brahma curse as always”
“You mean a superpower, not a curse?” asked Laxman.
“It may be a superpower for him, but for us, it’s a curse. He gets half my strength every time I face him. He’s impossible to beat. He even defeated Ravana and then made friends with him. Undoubtedly they got the wife-abducting idea from each other. They are two sick and disgusting people!” Sugriva replied, emphasizing the wife-abducting part a little. That seemed to encourage Ram to think along favorable lines. Favorable from Sugriva’s perspective.
“There must be a loophole. There has to be one. Brahma’s curses always have one”
“Now that you mention it,” said Sugriva “there is something, but never mind, it’s too inappropriate for me to even suggest it”
“C’mon, you have to at least tell us,” urged Ram.
“Well, it’s like this. I did once come across a copy of the superpower terms and conditions from Brahma. It’s not my fault. Vaali himself asked me to fetch his wallet from the desk in his office. I opened the desk drawer and saw the wallet and right under it were the legal papers from Brahma about the superpower. You can’t blame me for being curious. I read through it and there was a bit of a loophole”
“Well, what was it?” asked Laxman impatiently.
“I saw something on page 17, Annexure 13. Clause 4.1 Vali had declined one optional coverage. It was called a protect-your-back clause. His superpowers only apply to opponents who face him”
“I can see why he may have declined it. It’s unthinkable for any warrior to attack someone when they are facing away. That was a completely useless clause. No one will want to shoot anyone in the back. I know I wouldn’t”
“I would,” replied Ram. And that caused Laxman to drop his jaw a second time in quick succession.
“You keep doing that bro, and I’m going to need to see a doctor about my jaw,” Laxman told Ram.
“I don’t see what’s wrong with that. The monster has kept Ruma captive. That is NOT okay. If there’s no way to counter such a threat directly, there’s really no other way to rescue her”
“We could distract Vaali and sneak her out of the palace,” Laxman suggested.
“How is that any better than shooting Vali in the back?” asked Ram.
Hanuman suggested, “you know how Vaali can’t step on this hill at all? If he does he’ll instantly drop dead? Well, if Vaali won’t come to the hill, maybe the hill can go to Vaali.”
Everyone looked puzzled. But Hanuman continued “If Vaali steps on any part of the hill, any rock, any grain of sand he’ll die instantly. That means every part of the hill has some anti-Vaali properties. We can take a small handful of the sand and throw it at him. It should hurt him.”
Honestly, that was a really good idea. And given the objects being thrown at him were inorganic, Vali’s superpower could not have helped him. But Sugriva, Ram, and Laxman voted down the idea. To them, this appeared no less sneaky than shooting someone in the back.
So the plan was laid. Sugriva would challenge Vaali to a duel, one on one.
The plan in place, a messenger was dispatched. Through me! Yes, as you know very well I am a mythological creature myself. And I am friends with everyone. So I’m just the perfect messenger. I knew what was going to happen, and I can’t say I was looking forward to it.
I didn’t hang around Vaali’s palace for too long but I’ll tell you what happened.
Angad, Vaali’s son, was the one I had given Sugriva’s message to. He had just relayed it to his father.
“So Sugriva’s tired of his miserable life and wants to give up?” he asked
“No Daddy. He said he wants to fight you” Angad replied
“Same difference. He knows he can’t defeat me. I’ll bet you anything he’s doing this just for sympathy to get public sentiment on his side. He’ll try, he’ll get badly beaten up, he’ll try again a few times until I eventually forgive him”
“Will you forgive him, Daddy?” asked Angad
“Of course I must, I’m his brother after all. But he has to learn his lesson first”
“And what if the public actually sympathizes with him? There was a stir during the last council meeting about how we’re treating Sugriva’s wife Ruma”
“Then all I have to do is to show them the evidence. We’ve got some paintings of Ruma enjoying the last grand feast”
“But Daddy, she wasn’t at the last grand feast, you had locked her up in her room” Angad reminded.
“I know but people don’t need to know that. They’ll believe what they see in the paintings. A painting is worth a thousand words I always say”
“Have you considered that this might be a trap? The timing seems suspicious, especially with the arrival of those two other strangers who met Hanuman” Angad asked
“Not a chance. And even if it’s not one-on-one I’ll still absorb half their powers” Vaali replied.
“What if he punches low?” Angad asked
“It’s an automatic negative point for him, the judges will be watching closely. He won’t win by punching low.”
“I didn’t mean that literally. I mean, what if one of the strangers attacks you in the back while Sugriva is fighting you?”
Vaali laughed and tousled his young boy’s hair. “I can see you still have much to learn in the ways of the world. Tell the chef to make a hearty dinner. After this little exercise, I might get hungry”
He bounded off and headed for the field where Sugriva was waiting for him.
Sugriva seemed confident and actually smiled. “Brother, I formally challenge you to a duel. To the death”
Vaali said, “not to the death. Let’s just say until you accept defeat. I don’t want to disappoint my little boy by killing his Uncle today”
Sugriva felt weaker, as everyone did in Vaali’s presence. He lashed out at Vaali. But Vaali didn’t even try to block it. When the punch landed it hurt Sugriva’s fist more than Vaali.
Vaali blew off a speck of dust off his cuff and calmly said. “So I’m ready to begin whenever you are. Go ahead, I’ll let you throw the first punch.” and then in mock surprise, he added “oh I’m sorry, I didn’t realize. Was that your first punch? Well then allow me to retort in kind”
He did not retort in kind. His punch was orders of magnitude more powerful and flattened Sugriva to the ground. Vaali also did a whole trampling thing. The next half an hour consisted of Sugriva dancing around trying to keep Vali between himself and the tree so that Vali’s back would be to where Ram was hiding. Sugriva kept wondering when Ram would fire. And when he was sure that no arrow was coming he held up his hand in defeat.
Vaali was magnanimous in his victory. He picked up Sugriva and, aiming carefully, threw his limp body squarely into his cave on Rishyamukha hill. “Hole-in-one!” screamed Vali in excitement.
That evening was a pleasant one in Vaali’s home. But in Sugriva’s cave, things were obviously different.
“Go ahead, laugh at me. You put me up to this, didn’t you? I hope you got a good video to upload to social media” Sugriva said glaring at Ram
But no one was laughing. Ram was apologetic. “I’m sorry it came to this Sugriva. I tried but I just couldn’t take the chance of accidentally hurting you”
“And what was your excuse for that?” Sugriva asked, still furious. “The angle of the Sun? Perhaps you’d like me to ask my Daddy to move to a more convenient spot in the sky to suit your majesty?”
“No, in the fight, I couldn’t tell you two apart,” Ram replied calmly.
“Oh wait, let me think. Maybe you should have aimed for the one who was trampling! And not the one who was lying down in a heap”
“I’m sorry Sugriva, but I wish I knew how alike you and your brother are in appearance. Now if only you had something bright and colorful that could easily tell you apart, it’ll help with my aim as well”
“Oh, that’s just perfect. Next time, I’m enjoying the luxurious comfort of being beaten to a pulp, I’ll just wear a brightly colored tropical beach shirt when ”
Laxman was about to interject that that was actually a good idea when he realized that Sugriva was being sarcastic.
But eventually, everyone convinced Sugriva to try again the next day. Hanuman even made a brightly colored garland for Sugriva to wear.
Sugriva wasn’t happy but he was going ahead. His one comforting thought was that Vaali hadn’t beaten him up as badly as he had in the past. Maybe his big brother was softening up.
This fight began very similar to the one from yesterday. Vaali did tell Sugriva that it was a nice garland. He’d love to keep it for himself if it didn’t get dirty in the fight.
“You wish” answered Sugriva.
“In fact,” Vaali said “I’ll just grab the garland right now so that it won’t get dirty along with you”
He advanced on Sugriva making a grab for the garland.
Ram was meanwhile on a branch of the tree. At this distance and height, it would take a full 3 seconds for the specially chosen arrow to do its trick. Trigonometry was a special strength of Ram’s at school. No wonder he was an excellent marksman.
He was breathing slowly as he took careful aim at Vaali. He had seen where Vaali had arrived from. And now Vaali’s back was turned to him. Why didn’t he already shoot Vaali? Because the rules of engagement demanded that Vaali represent a clear and present danger. So far he only seemed to be admiring Sugriva’s garland.
But then he was making a grab for the garland. Oh, in fact, he snatched it and in their tussle, the garland flew into the air. It was now or never, thought Ram. He confidently let fly the arrow he had prepared for this occasion.
If you know your Ramayana the outcome will hardly surprise you. But if you don’t I’ll leave it on a cliffhanger here. We’ll come back to the Ramayana in a future episode.
Some notes on the show
Previous Ramayana episodes are here:
Valmiki’s origin story is in Episode 6 – Fish Highwayman
The Ramayana kicks off in Episode 7 – Kingdom by Horse. Episode 15 – Rishi vs Rishi: Un-civil war! and Episode 16 – Six….teen Flags are about Rama and Laxman’s encounter with Vishwamitra
A flashback to Dasharath’s past is in Episode 24 – Promises made, hearts broken
Ram, Laxman, and Sita begin their exile in Episode 30 – Banished! and continue it in Episode 41 – Forest Life and Episode 64 – The First Kidnapping of Sita
They encounter Shoorpanakha in Episode 78 – Ramayana – An Indecent Proposal
We have also covered three episodes that aren’t part of the main storyline but feature some central Ramayana characters:
Hanuman’s origin story is in Episode 25 – Up, Up, and Away!
Episode 55 – Saturnine is about an encounter between Shani and Ravana.
Episode 81 – Ramayana – Wolverine Claws is the origin story of Ravana and Shoorpanakha.
And Episode 92 – Ramayana – Shanta is the story of Ram and Laxman’s sister – Shanta.
Episode 101 – Ramayana – A Wild Stag Chase explained how Ravana engineered a diversion so he could abduct Sita. In Episode 112 Ram and Laxman got their first hint of what had happened to Sita and also were told that Sugriva could help them
And most recently in Episode 118, Ram and Laxman learned more about Sugriva and Vali’s rivalry before finally meeting Hanuman.
Vali was also the character of the Week in Episode 21.
That’s all for now.
Next Time
In the next episode, we’ll do a Bengali folk tale. Featuring guardian angels, misunderstandings, a vicious snake, who was maybe just a really playful snake, and the King’s children who happen to be really accomplished storytellers.