Sita in a few Ramayanas was hardly a lifeless, flat doll

“I am tired of static, unidimensional, predictable epic women,” my young friend shrugged. I decided to check this out by looking at the iconic cult woman of India: Sita.

Popular convention shapes Sita as a flat, lifeless paper doll. Accepting misfortunes with meek martyrdom, the oppressed queen finally disappears into the earth, but not before fulfilling her duty of producing twin male heirs to safeguard her husband’s lineage.

Submissive, forgiving, tender — depending on male guidance, male protection, is Sita the perfect woman of patriarchal pipe dreams? The ultimate fantasy of the male gaze? “This is Sita, my daughter, she will follow you like a shadow,” says her father as he gives her in marriage to Rama. This verse is still recited in many Indian weddings as the summary of ideal womanhood.

However, Valmiki’s Ramayana indicates that she has a personality of her own. When Rama announces blandly, “Take care of my parents, I am going to the forest,” Sita retorts indignantly, “You swore never to leave me. Is this the way you keep your promise?” She speaks her mind: how could Rama make a decision for her without consulting her?

Once in the forest, Sita remonstrates with Rama yet again, opposing his decision. “Why did you assure the sages that you would safeguard them by killing demons? Why get entangled in issues that don’t concern us? You are not here as an avenging warrior, but to spend quiet years in exile.” Look at her political acumen in advising Rama to avoid what is not his business!

Sita’s strength is obvious in her dealings with captor Ravana. Yet she really comes into her own when Rama tells her brutally, “I did not wage this war to rescue you, but to restore my honour. ‘Squeezed’ as you were in lustful Ravana’s arms when he abducted you, I cannot take you back. You are free to go anywhere. You and I have nothing in common anymore.”

Sita does not lose her self-command. She voices bitter truths: “Physically, I was helpless when I was captured. But that which was under my control — my heart — always abides in you. If you don’t understand this about me, though we were married so young and grew up together, there is no point in my living anymore, subject to slanders.”

One version has it that, years later, when Rama claims his sons from his banished wife, a disillusioned Sita asks him, “Having accused me of being unchaste, how are you able to accept my sons as your own?” I can see Sita’s refusal to be “forgiven” by Rama, and her exit from his world, as her irrevocable protest.

Subsequent generations have glossed over Sita’s resistance, her ability to confront. They deify her gentleness. To ensure her unstained chastity, some Ramayana versions even make Ravana her father, while Tulsidas has an illusory (maya) Sita who is abducted. The real “unsullied” Sita re-emerges from the ordeal by fire, leaving Rama blameless.

But myths have multiple layers; and archetypes are continually reinterpreted, revalued. A Kannada folk tale has Sita preferring Ravana’s honest passion to Rama’s hypocrisy. Malayalam filmmaker G Aravindan shot Kanchana Sita with tribal actors, as a feminist fable. Contemporary Tamil poet Ambai images Sita at the river’s brink, saying, “I am Sita/ made up with words/ bound in words/ imprisoned in words.../ I shall cross the river/ to see the new world/ to assume a new form/ to create a new rajya.”

With contrastive Sitayanas, I can make my choice of what the epic woman means to me — in my time and milieu. Integrity? Steadfastness? Fortitude? An inflexible will?

The author is a playwright, theatre director, musician and journalist, writing on the performing arts, cinema and literature