Canto 2 -
Ayodhyā-kāṇḍa
Chapter 4: Daśaratha’s Anxiety About Coronating Rāma
Text 2.4.25
विप्रोषितश्च भरतो यावदेव पुरादितः।
तावदेवाभिषेकस्ते प्राप्तकालो मतो मम॥
viproṣitaś ca bharato yāvad eva purād itaḥ
tāvad evābhiṣekas te prāpta-kālo mato mama
viproṣitaḥ ca = has gone away; bharataḥ = Bharata; yāvat eva = while; purāt = city; itaḥ = from this; tāvat eva abhiṣekaḥ = coronation; te = Your; prāpta-kālaḥ = is at the right time; mataḥ = think that; mama = I.
I think that Your coronation is at the right time while Bharata has gone away from this city.
Daśaratha had married Kaikeyī by paying the king of Kekaya the price of his kingdom.1 He remembered this incident while speaking this verse. This incident will be made clear in Chapter 107 [of this Canto] thus:
purā bhrātaḥ pitā naḥ sa mātaraṁ te samudvahan
mātāmahe samāśrauṣīd rājya-śulkam anuttamam
[Rāmacandra to Bharata:] “Brother, in the past when Our father married Your mother, he had promised Our maternal uncle [the king of Kekaya] that he would pay the unrivalled price of his kingdom, [that is, the son born to his daughter would inherit his father’s kingdom].”
1. Kaikeyī’s father had set a condition for whoever wanted to marry her—her son would become the next ruler of her husband’s kingdom. Daśaratha agreed to this condition and therefore he was given Kaikeyī’s hand in marriage.