Assamese Cartoon

The Foolish Crane and The Mongoose

The crab thought for a while, "I have to devise a plan to have the black snake killed, and have the cranes destroyed at the same time. The cranes are our natural enemy. I will tell him half truth and half lies, to my advantage."

Thinking so, the crab said to the crane, "Aunty! I will tell you a plan to get rid of the black snake. All you have to do is scatter some fish and flesh from a nearby burrow, where a mongoose lives, to the snake`s hollow. When the mongoose will come following the food and reach the snake`s home, he will certainly kill him!"

The crane agreed to do as the crab planned. As anticipated, the mongoose saw the black snake while following the trail of food. They had a fight, and the mongoose killed the snake.

After this, the mongoose realized that there were many cranes on the top of the trees. In due course of time, the mongoose climbed up the trees and started killing the cranes, till all the cranes were destroyed.

The wise indeed say:

The solution of the problem should not be worse than the problem itself. That is, while trying to solve the problem, you should not complicate the problem further.

Suchimukha and The Monkey

There was a gang of monkeys who made their home on a mountain slope. When winter came there, it brought not only severe cold but also heavy rains too. Monkeys weren`t able to stand the severe cold, so they started collecting red berries which were wildly growing in the mountain slope. They mistook berries for embers. They started to gather berries around one place and began to blow air at them thinking it would keep them warm.

Suchimukha, a bird was there who was watching all this vain effort of monkeys in amusement thinking what are these monkeys trying to do with those berries. He told them, “You fools, you are thinking that these are embers but they are red berries. Why are you all wasting your time and energy like this on them? This is not going to save you from the cold in any way. Better for you people to go and look for safe shelter in a cave or a place free from the wind where you can keep yourself warm. Can`t you see or notice? the clouds are very thick and there will be no immediate relief from the rain. Go as early as you can.”

There was also an old member of the monkey gang who was listening to bird`s every word quietly. He became very angry with whatever unasked advice that bird gave. He told the bird almost fuming with anger, “Why do you poke your nose in our affairs? It`s none of your business. Go away. There is no one asking for your wasteful words. Haven`t the elders said that he Suchimukha and The Monkey who cherishes his welfare should not talk to a gambler or an inefficient workman? So is the person a fool who talks to an idiot or a pleasure seeker.”

But the bird didn`t learn his lesson and he didn`t take his leave from there. Instead of that, disregarding the old monkey`s anger and not giving room to any other monkey to talk, the bird went on repeating his advice to them continuously poking them to go somewhere else and seek shelter elsewhere in which monkeys weren`t even interested. Monkeys were irritated and tired with the bird`s unwanted advice, so one of the monkeys sprang at the bird and bashed him against a rock till he was dead.

Karataka finished the story and said at the end of it, “If you counsel a fool it will only provoke him and not pacify. You know if you feed milk to a snake it will just increase its store of poison and it will come back to you with more passion to bite you. That`s why you shouldn`t be advising everyone. Look, how two good sparrows lost their home, all due to a foolish monkey.”

Damanaka`s requested Karataka to began the story and, Karataka began telling the story of the evil monkey and his bad deeds.

Birbal's Polenta

It is known by all how much Akbar was fond of Birbal and considered him to be one of his dear friends. But one day Akbar got frustrated with him and Birbal, unable to understand Akbar’s mood, kept on cracking jokes on him. Suddenly Akbar burst out in anger and dismissed Birbal from his court duties and asked him to never return back. Birbal left in peace thinking that once Akbar’s temper cools down, he will be summoned back to the court.

Days passed by but no one from the court arrived to fetch him. Akbar tried to replace Birbal with a new minister but no one could meet up to the standards of witty Birbal. Therefore, Akbar decided to spread the word that whoever will answer his questions properly will be appointed as the next minister in his court.

On the day of the selection, Akbar’s other ministers started asking questions “How many shells are there in the seafloor?” Some aspirants answered lakhs while others said crores but one man named Chandan answered: “The count of total human eyes in the world is equal to the number of shells in the seafloor.” Next question was what is the prime happiness for the human body to which Chandan said it is to stay happy. Third question was what is the biggest weapon and Chandan said its intelligence.

Fourth question was how one can separate sand and sugar without water than Chandan suggested to let ants in the mix and they will take all the sugar away. Similarly more questions followed and Chandan impressed everyone with his knowledge and witt.

Akbar had already guessed from the answers that it was Birbal only in the attire of Chandan and was happy to take him back in his court when Birbal revealed his true identity. Among the many Akbar Birbal stories for kids, this one happens to be their favorite.