The storm broke the ship on which the daughter of the king of Lanka (Ceylon) Ratnavali, destined to marry the king of the Vats Udayana, sailed. Clutching the board, Ratnavali escaped, and, found on the shore, she was given under the name Sagariki (from the Sanskrit “sagar” - “ocean”) to the care of the first wife of Udayana, Queen Vasavadatta.
At the solemn celebration in honor of the god of love Kama, which takes place at the court of Udayana, Sagarika first meets with the king and falls in love with him, seeing in him the true embodiment of Kama. Having secluded herself in a banana grove, she paints a portrait of her beloved, and her friend, the maid of Tsarina Susamgata, finds her in this occupation. Susamgata immediately guesses the feelings of Sagarika and, next to the portrait of Udayana, draws her own portrait on the drawing board. At this time, confusion rises in the palace due to the angry monkey escaping from the cage, and friends hide in a grove, having forgotten the drawing board in fear. She is found by Udayan and his buffoon, the brahmin Vasantaka. The king cannot restrain his admiration, admiring the portrait of Sagarika, and when her friends return to pick up the drawing, Sagarika passionately declares her love and, to her great joy, hears a reciprocal recognition from her.
As soon as Sagarika leaves, Vasavadatta appears and, in turn, finds a drawing board dropped by Vasantaka. Brahman awkwardly tries to explain the similarity of the portraits with Udayana and Sagarika by a simple coincidence, but the queen guesses what happened and leaves, seized by jealousy. She establishes constant monitoring of Udayanaya and Sagarika, so Vasantaka and Susamgata have to be sophisticated in every way to arrange a new date for lovers. So that the servants did not suspect anything, they decide to dress Sagarika in Vasavadatta's dress. However, the queen in a timely manner finds out about this and is on a date first. Having taken his wife for the dressed Sagarika, the king turns to her with words of love, and Vasavadatta, having convicted him of treason and showered with angry reproaches, quickly leaves. After some time, however, she begins to repent that she had treated Udayana too harshly and returned to make peace with him. However, this time she finds her husband hugging Sagarika: he just pulled her out of the loop, because she wanted to put an end to her life after learning about the anger of Vasavadatta. Now Vasavadatta does not even want to think about reconciliation; insulted, she orders Sagarik to be taken into custody.
Meanwhile, an ambassador from the king of Lanka arrives at the court of Udayana and informs Udayana that his master sent his daughter Ratnavali to the Vats king, who disappeared after the shipwreck. At the same time, the invited great magician gives a performance in the palace. It creates the illusion of the appearance of the gods Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma and Indra, the demigods - the Gandharvas and Siddhas in the palace hall. Suddenly a fire breaks out. Udayana rushes into the inner chambers of the palace and carries Sagariku from her arms.It turns out that a sudden fire is also an illusion of a magician, but, to everyone’s surprise, the ambassador from Lanka recognizes his princess Ratnavali in the Sagarika brought out of the fire. The wise minister of Udayana Yaugandharayana explains to those present that the events that occurred: the disappearance of Ratnavali, her appearance in the palace under the name Sagariki, which arose between Udayana and Sagariki Ratnavali passionately attracted to each other, are all the fruits of his intention to conclude a marriage between the king of Vats and Tsar Lanka love - a marriage, which, according to the prediction of the holy sages, will provide Udayans with power over the whole world. Now for such a marriage there were no obstacles left.
