2. Who is Valmiki?
He is the greatest poet or the Poet
of Poets in India.
3. He was born along the banks
of the Ganges in ancient India
to a sage by the name of
Prachetasa.
His birth name was
Ratnakara.
Author of RAMAYANA, the
very first poem in the Sanskrit
4. He apparently got lost in the
jungles as a child and was
found by a hunter who raised
him as his own son.
When he grew up he became a
hunter like his foster father but
also took to being a bandit to
supplement his livelihood. Once
it so happened he met the
Maharishi Narada and tried to
5. He narrated the story of Rama
to him and asked him to write
it down for posterity.
Ratnakara did penance for
many years and an ant-hill
grew around him. Hence his
new name 'Valmika' which in
Sanskrit means an ant-hill. He
came out of the anthill and
penned the great epic.
7. Characters:
Dasaratha – the king of Ayodha; He
has three
queens, Kausalya, Kaikeyi and Sumit
ra; and had 4
sons, Rama, Bharata, Lakshmana a
nd Shatrughna.
8. Rama – incarnation of the God
Vishnu; he is the favorite son
of Dasaratha to Kausalya
Bharata – son of Dasaratha
and Kaikeyi
Lakshmana & Shatrughna –
sons of Dasaratha and
Sumitra
9. Sita – wife of Rama
Ravana – king of Lanka; ruler
of the demons
Indrajit – Ravana’s son
Hanuman – a devoted follower
of Sugriva who is the king of
the monkey army; he helped
Rama to find Sita