The Night Ayodhya Lit Up

Rama came home. The whole city put out diyas. That's the night we still celebrate.

After fourteen long years of exile and the great battle against Ravana, Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana fly home to Ayodhya in the Pushpaka Vimana. Bharata, who had been ruling all this time with Rama's wooden sandals on the throne, runs to receive them. The whole city cleans, decorates, and lights tiny clay lamps in every window, on every wall, along every path. That night of light became Diwali, the festival families across the world still celebrate.

The Boy at Nandigram

For fourteen years, a young man had been waiting.

His name was Bharata. He was Rama's younger brother. And he was, on paper, the king of Ayodhya. But he had refused to live in the palace. He had refused to sit on the golden throne. Instead, he had built himself a small hut in a place called Nandigram, just outside the city, and he had lived there like a forest hermit, in plain clothes, eating simple food.

On the throne in his hut, instead of a king, sat a pair of small wooden sandals. Padukas. Rama's sandals. Bharata had asked for them when Rama left for the forest, and he had carried them home on his head like a crown.

"These will be the king," Bharata had said back then. "Not me. I am only the servant of the one who wears these."

For fourteen years, every single day, Bharata had bathed the padukas, decorated them with flowers, brought them food, asked them about the day's decisions. Every law of Ayodhya had been passed in front of those sandals.

And every day, Bharata had counted. Fourteen years. Fourteen long, long years. Rama had promised to come back on the very last day. Bharata had promised himself something too.

"If my brother does not come back on the day he said," he had whispered to the padukas, "I will not live another sunrise."

Now it was the last day.

A Sound in the Sky

That morning, Bharata was sitting outside his hut, looking up at the sky. He had not eaten. He had not slept. The sun was rising. Where was his brother?

And then, very softly, very far away, he heard something.

A sound he had never heard before. A whoosh, almost like a giant bird. Almost like the wind in a thousand silk flags. The deer in the field looked up. The birds went quiet.