Long ago, Ravana, the demon king of Lanka, carried Sita away from her husband, Prince Rama. Rama and his brother Lakshmana are searching for her. In spring they come to Pampa, a lake full of lotuses, where flowers fall from the trees like rain.
Cuckoos call and peacocks dance, but everything lovely makes Rama miss Sita more. “How can she live without me?” he asks. Lakshmana says, “Be strong. With courage we will win her back.” They walk on. From a mountain, someone sees them and freezes with fear.
The watcher is Sugriva, a chief of the vanaras. His big brother Vali drove him out of his kingdom, and now he lives on Mount Rishyamuka. He sees the strangers’ bows and their clothes of tree bark. “Vali must have sent them!” he says.
The frightened vanaras leap from peak to peak. The mountain tops shake, flowering trees break, and deer, wildcats and even tigers run away. Then they all gather round Sugriva and stand with their palms joined.
Then Hanuman, Sugriva’s helper and the finest speaker of them all, speaks up. “Gentle Sugriva, do not be afraid. Vali is not here on this mountain. A king must keep his mind steady, or how can he lead?”
Sugriva says, “Their arms are long, and look at their bows and swords! Who would not be afraid? Go to them, Hanuman, but not as a monkey, or Vali’s helpers will know you. From their faces and words, find out if their hearts are good.”
“I will,” says Hanuman. He leaps down from Mount Rishyamuka and changes his shape. Now he looks like a bhikshu, a holy wanderer. He bows to the two brothers and speaks to them softly and sweetly.
“Your eyes are like lotus petals,” he says. “Your arms are like an elephant’s trunk. Your bows are like the bow of Indra, king of the gods. Yet you sigh again and again. Who are you?”
The brothers do not answer. So he tells them, “Sugriva, a good chief of the vanaras, has been driven out by his brother. I am Hanuman, son of the Wind, his minister and helper. Sugriva wants to be your friend.” Then he says no more.
Rama’s face grows glad. He says to Lakshmana, “He is Sugriva’s minister, and Sugriva is the one we seek! Not one word he says is wrong. There is no fault in his face or eyes. His voice is not too loud and not too soft.”
Rama says, “Even an enemy with his sword raised would be won over by words like these. A king with a messenger like this will win in all he does.” Then Lakshmana tells Hanuman, “We know Sugriva is good. We will do as he asks.”
Hanuman is glad. He thinks, “Rama can help Sugriva win back his kingdom, and Sugriva can help Rama.” Then he asks, “Why have you come into this wild forest, so full of snakes and wild animals?”
Lakshmana answers. “My brother is the eldest son of King Dasharatha. He obeyed his father, lost his kingdom and came to the forest. His wife Sita followed him, as light follows the sun. Then a demon who could change his shape carried her off.”
“A shining spirit named Danu, set free from a curse, told us, ‘Sugriva can help you.’ Then Danu rose up to heaven.” Lakshmana’s eyes fill with tears. “Rama always gave shelter to everyone. Now he comes to Sugriva for shelter.”
Hanuman answers, “Sugriva lost his home too. His brother Vali drove him out, and he lives in fear. He and the vanaras will help you search for Sita.” Lakshmana says to Rama, “See how glad his face is. Hanuman will not tell a lie.”
Then Hanuman lets go of his holy-man shape and becomes a monkey again. He lifts Rama and Lakshmana onto his back and carries them to Sugriva’s mountain. He is as happy as someone who has finished a hard task.
Hanuman tells Sugriva, “This is Rama. Ravana stole his wife, and he has come to you for help. Be his friend.” Sugriva is glad. He says to Rama, “Take my hand in yours.” Rama takes it gladly and hugs him.
Hanuman rubs two sticks together until a fire glows. He decorates the fire with flowers. Gladly and with great care, he sets it between Rama and Sugriva.
Rama and Sugriva walk round the glowing fire together, and so they become friends. “From today, our joys and our sorrows are the same,” says Sugriva. He breaks off a flowering branch of a sala tree, and he sits on it with Rama.
Then Sugriva tells Rama his trouble. “My brother turned me out. I live in these forests in fear. Make me safe from Vali.” Rama smiles. “Friends help each other. My arrows never miss. They have eagle feathers. Vali will not frighten you again.”
Then Sugriva says, “I saw Sita! Ravana was carrying her away, and she was calling, ‘Rama! Lakshmana!’ She saw five of us on the mountain, and she dropped her shawl and her jewels. We kept them safe.”
“Bring them quickly, my friend!” says Rama. Sugriva hurries into a cave and brings out the bundle. When Rama holds Sita’s jewels, tears fill his eyes, and his face is like the moon behind mist. He holds the jewels close to his heart.
“Lakshmana, look!” says Rama. Lakshmana says, “I do not know the bracelets, and I do not know the earrings. But I know these anklets, because every day I bowed at her feet.”
Rama asks Sugriva, “Where did he take her? Where does he live?” Sugriva’s eyes fill with tears, and he joins his palms. “I do not know where he lives. But I promise you truly, you will get Sita back. Be brave.”
Rama wipes his tears with the edge of his cloth and hugs Sugriva. “A friend like you is hard to find. Tell me what I must do. I have never told a lie.” Now Rama has a promise to keep: to help Sugriva against Vali.
For grown-ups
Where this story comes from
This story is from the Valmiki Ramayana, Kishkindha Kanda, sargas 1–7: Rama and Lakshmana at Lake Pampa, Hanuman’s meeting with them, and the friendship of Rama and Sugriva. The sarga numbers are those of the Gita Press (Gorakhpur) edition. The verse numbers here follow the English translation by Desiraju Hanumanta Rao on valmikiramayan.net. They can differ by a few verses in the Gita Press text. It is a faithful simplification. We shortened and left out parts, and we name them below. We did not add events, and we did not change anyone’s reasons. The words people say are a plain rendering of the translation, not a word-for-word quotation. Seven lines need a note.
1. “On his back” (page 16). Valmiki says that Hanuman took his own monkey form again and put both brothers on his back (4.34; the Sanskrit word is pṛṣṭham, “back”). Many later tellings and pictures say “on his shoulders”. The book follows Valmiki.
2. “Vali will not frighten you again” (page 20). In Valmiki, Rama says plainly, “I intend eliminate that Vali”, and tells Sugriva he will see Vali fall “like a splintered mountain” under his arrows (5.24b–29a). The page keeps the arrows that never miss and the eagle feathers (5.26b–28a), and softens the rest. Later sargas tell how Rama keeps this promise.
3. “Now Rama has a promise to keep” (page 25). This line is ours. Rama’s oath at 7.19–22 (“Untruth is not uttered by me earlier nor will be at anytime”) does not name Vali. It answers Sugriva, who asked Rama to make him safe from Vali (5.23b–24a), and after it Sugriva feels sure he will overcome his brother (7.25).
4. Danu (page 14). In these sargas Lakshmana names him Danu: a being made a demon by a curse, who was freed, told the brothers that Sugriva could help, and rose to heaven shining (4.15–16). The brothers met him earlier, in the Aranya Kanda, where our guide calls him Kabandha. The book says only “a shining spirit named Danu, set free from a curse”.
5. “Clothes of tree bark” (page 3) and “her shawl” (page 21). The Sanskrit at 2.6 is chira, the bark or rag cloth of forest hermits; the translation says “jute cloths”. At 6.11 Sita drops “the upper cloth of her sari”; the book calls it her shawl.
6. “Not too loud and not too soft” (page 10). The translation says Hanuman’s speech was not drawn out, not halting, and “in a medium tone” (3.31). The page says it in a child’s words.
7. Which mountain. Sugriva lives on Mount Rishyamuka (1.128; 3.1). After the monkeys flee, Hanuman says “it is Mt. Malaya” (2.14), and 5.1 says he went “from Mt. Rishyamuka to Mt. Malaya”. The book says only “Sugriva’s mountain” after page 7.
Read the full episode
Three things this telling leaves out, and why
- Ruma, Sugriva’s wife (5.21b–22a, 5.25–26a, 5.30). Sugriva tells Rama, “stolen is my wife”, and Rama calls Vali “the abductor of your wife”. Sugriva then asks to win back “my wife and kingdom too”. The book leaves Ruma out. Later sargas tell the quarrel of the two brothers, and this book gives Vali one line only. Page 20 says only, “My brother turned me out.”
- Vali’s story, in one line. Page 3 says only that Sugriva’s big brother Vali drove him out of his kingdom (3.20; 4.27). Why the brothers quarrelled, and why Vali cannot come to Rishyamuka, are told in later sargas.
- Rama’s long lament at Pampa (1.1–113). Sarga 1 is more than a hundred verses of Rama’s grief in the spring. The spring itself is a fire of longing to him (1.22–32), and much of it speaks of love and passion. The book keeps two pages: the beauty, and “How can she live without me?” (1.105). It leaves out his fear of what to say to Sita’s father, Janaka (1.106), and his words to Lakshmana: go home to Bharata, “I may not be able to live on leaving off Seetha” (1.113).
- Rama falls to the ground (6.17–18). When he sees Sita’s jewels, Rama falls on the ground wailing, and as he holds them to his heart he “hissed like a wrathful serpent”. The book shows his grief by his tears only (6.16), as the commission asked.
- The vows against Ravana (1.117–119, 6.25–27, 7.4). Lakshmana says Ravana will not escape even if he hides in the netherworlds. Rama says he will “lead him to the fore of Death today itself”, and Sugriva promises that Rama will kill Ravana “along with his henchmen”. Page 24 keeps Rama’s question, “Where does he live?”, and Sugriva’s promise that Rama will get Sita back (7.3).
- How Sita was carried (6.4, 6.10). Sugriva says Sita was “writhing in the flanks of Ravana like the wife of serpent’s lord”, and Hanuman had told him that Ravana killed the eagle Jatayu. Page 21 says only that Ravana was carrying her away and that she called Rama and Lakshmana.
- Hanuman’s teasing (2.17). Hanuman tells the frightened Sugriva, “You made a monkey of yourself … and your monkeyshines is clear by it.” The book keeps his serious advice to a king (2.18).
- Two signs (1.55, 5.31). A crow cawing on a tree tells Rama that Sita will come back (1.55). While Rama and Sugriva talk, the left eyes of Sita, Vali and Ravana flutter at the same moment, an omen (5.31). Both are left out to keep the story on the friendship.
- Sugriva’s first promise and his long advice (6.1–8a, 7.5–14). Sugriva promises twice to bring Sita back: once before he shows the jewels (6.5–8a) and once after (7.3). The book tells it once, on page 24. His advice on courage (7.5–14), with a man who gives way to grief sinking “like an overweighing ship”, becomes “Be brave.”
Page 1 joins the arrival at Pampa (1.1), the spring (1.22) and the flower rain (1.11); the book names Ravana here, as Hanuman does to Sugriva at 5.6. Page 2 joins the cuckoos (1.15) and peacocks (1.36b–37a) with Lakshmana’s long comfort (1.114–123: “taking hold of vehemence alone we regain Seetha”), and Sugriva’s sight of the brothers (1.128–129). Page 4 tells 2.7–12; the monkeys fled first to the hermitage of the sage Matanga (1.130). Page 8 keeps three of Hanuman’s many comparisons (3.9–12) and the sigh (3.7–8). Hanuman also says he can go where he wishes and take any form (3.23). Page 10 joins Rama’s praise of Hanuman’s speech (3.26–32), which begins with a note that no one could speak so who had not learned the Vedas (3.28). Page 11 joins 3.33–35 and Lakshmana’s reply (3.36–38). Page 13 tells Lakshmana’s long account of Dasharatha (4.5–14) in four sentences; the simile at 4.11 is “like the Sun followed by his consort Prabha”, and the page says “as light follows the sun”. Page 14 joins Danu (4.15–16) and Lakshmana’s tearful words that Rama, the shelter of all, now seeks shelter with Sugriva (4.17–25). Page 15 joins Hanuman’s reply (4.26–29) and Lakshmana’s word to Rama (4.30–32: “he will not speak untruth”). Page 17 tells Hanuman’s report (5.1–7) in three short lines; Sugriva first says that friendship with Rama is an honour to him (5.9–10). On page 19, after the fire, Rama and Sugriva gaze at each other and cannot look enough (5.16b–17a), and Hanuman gives Lakshmana a flowering branch of sandalwood to sit on (5.19b–20a); the page does not show these. Page 20 tells Sugriva’s plea (5.20b–24a) and Rama’s answer (5.24b–29a); Sugriva’s reply (5.29b–30) is left out. Page 22 joins 6.13–16 and 6.18. Page 23 leaves out Rama’s words that Sita dropped the jewels onto soft grass, so they are whole (6.21). Page 24 joins 6.23 and 6.25 with 7.1–3 and 7.5. Page 25 joins 7.15–22; it leaves out Rama’s thanks for Sugriva’s advice (7.17), his simile of crops sown in the rains (7.20), the gladness of Sugriva and his ministers (7.23), and their talk in private (7.24).
The question children ask here
“Why did Hanuman dress up as a holy man?” Valmiki gives the reasons:
- Sugriva was afraid. When he saw the two strangers with bows, he thought, “definitely Vali must have dispatched them” (2.6; 2.21).
- Sugriva told Hanuman to go “in a commoner’s form, for your monkey-hood is distinguishable by Vali’s agents” (2.24). Vali’s helpers would know a monkey.
- Hanuman was to learn what was in their hearts “by their conduct, by their semblance, and by their conversation” (2.24; 2.27). Valmiki adds that Hanuman himself was not yet sure of them (3.2).
- When Lakshmana told him their story and trusted him, Hanuman dropped the disguise, took his own monkey form and carried them to Sugriva (4.33–34).
“Sugriva was scared, so Hanuman went quietly, as a holy man, to find out if the strangers were good. When he knew, he became himself again.”
A Sanatani Production
