Beholding Rama in the mendicant's attire, the king and his consorts broke down, the sorrowing monarch could neither bear to look at Rama nor speak to him. "Perhaps the transgressions of my past lives haunt me now, causing me such distress. Glowing like the god of fire, he stands before me robed in the coarsest of garments, witnessing which I should have perished, but even death unkindly flees me. Men will accuse me saying is this the reward of virtue? How is it that a prince so noble is banished by his father and mother?"

Dasaratha ordered the best of clothes and jewels to be brought for Sita. Draped in those most gorgeous of silks her beautiful limbs aglitter with jewels, she illumined the entire palace with her celestial beauty. Kausalya overwhelmed with love and admiration for Sita, embraced her, saying, "Many ignoble woman, though cherished and pampered by their husbands, will desert those men should they fall in their fortune. They will not shy away from severing bonds grown strong over the years. Their passing fancies render them inconsiderate to family, to kindness received and to the bonds of affection. Deceitful and fickle, their wicked minds lack finesse. Only the virtuous and the faithful with their supreme sense of duty, realize their husbands to be their asylum and their salvation. Hence, though in exile do not censure my son, in prosperity or adversity he is your master". Sita with palms held together in respect said "Like a chariot without wheels and a veena without strings, is a wife without husband. How can I who have been taught these values by my parents, forget my obligations towards a consort who is my god." With these words Kausalya's tears of grief turned into tears of joy.

Rama assured Kausalya that his fourteen years exile would pass but like a dream. Bowing to the three hundred and fifty consorts of Dasaratha he said, "If I had ever, in my ignorance caused you any distress do forgive me". Those humble words saddened them even more, plunging the palace into deeper gloom. The resonance of music and the clanging drums was soon replaced by the wailing of many tormented souls.