Ram Tirath, about eleven kilometres west of Amritsar, is held in tradition to be the ashram of Valmiki, where Sita took refuge and where Lava and Kusha were born.
It has an old tank, a temple complex and a very large fair in November that draws several lakh people over four days, principally from the Valmiki community of Punjab, for whom it is the central pilgrimage.
The Valmiki community, historically the sweeper caste, is one of the largest Scheduled Caste groups in Punjab. Ram Tirath is its own place, and it is the largest religious gathering in the Majha that is not Sikh.
A statue of Valmiki was erected there and the site has been substantially developed.
Almost nothing written about Punjab mentions it, which is a fair indication of whose sites get recorded.
The fair is held in the week after Diwali and runs several days, drawing lakhs of people. Its scale puts it among the largest gatherings in Punjab and it is almost absent from any published account of the state's festivals.
The tradition holds that Sita lived at the ashram here after leaving Ayodhya and that Lav and Kush were born at the site. A well and a tank on the grounds are pointed out in connection with the account.
The Valmiki community's claim on the site is also a claim on the Ramayana, whose author the community takes as its own. The development of the site since the 1980s has been driven by that community and by its own organisations.