Akbar and Birbal

Birbal Does Justice

Once a man sold his well to a farmer. Next day when farmer went to draw the water from that well, the man did not allow him to draw the water from it. He said, "I have sold you the well, not the water, so you cannot draw the water from the well."

The farmer became very sad, and came to the Emperor's court. He described everything to the Emperor, and asked for the justice.

The Emperor called Birbal and handed over this case to him. Birbal called the man who sold the well to the farmer. Birbal asked, "Why don't you let him use the water of the well. You have sold the well to the farmer." The man replied, "Birbal Ji, I have sold the well to the farmer, not the water. He has no right to draw the water from the well."

Then Birbal smiled and said to him, "Good, but look, since you have sold the well to this farmer, and you claim that water is yours, then you have no right to keep your water in the farmer's well. Either you pay rent to the farmer to keep your water in his well, or you take that out of his well immediately."

The man understood, that his trick has failed and pleaded Birbal to forgive him.

Birbal Passes the Test

Once a Pandit came to Akbar's court and expressed his desire to test the intelligence of his courtiers. Akbar granted the permission, so all his courtiers gathered in the court at the appointed time. The Pandit had a pot covered with a cloth. He asked the courtiers, "What is in the pot?"

Everybody was silent. Nobody knew how to tell the contents of a covered pot. Then Birbal came forward, he uncovered the pot, peeped inside, and said, "There is nothing inside the pot. It is empty."

The Pandit said, "But you opened it." Birbal said, "But you never said not to open it." Pandit understood that he was at mistake. He bowed to the Emperor and walked away.

Birbal Is Brief

One day Akbar asked his courtiers if they could tell him the difference between truth and falsehood in three words or less.

The courtiers looked at one another suprised.

"What about you, Birbal?" asked the emperor. "I'm surprised that you too are silent."

"I'm silent because I want to give others a chance to speak," said Birbal.

"Nobody else has the answer," said the emperor. "So go ahead and tell me what the difference between truth and falsehood is — in three words or less."

"Four fingers" said Birbal

"Four fingers?" asked the emperor, perplexed.

"That's the difference between truth and falsehood, your Majesty," said Birbal. "That which you see with your own eyes is the truth. That which you have only heard about might not be true. More often than not, it's likely to be false."

"That is right," said Akbar. "But what did you mean by saying the difference is four fingers?'

"The distance between one's eyes and one's ears is the width of four fingers, Your Majesty," said Birbal, grinning.

Thief and Wood Sticks.. Birbal’s Wisdom

Once upon a time there was a rich merchant’s house was robbed. The merchant suspected that the thief was one of his servants. So he went to Birbal and mentioned the incident. Birbal went to his house and assembled all of his servants and asked "Who stole the merchant’s things" Everybody denied.

Birbal thought for a moment, then gave a stick of equal length to all the servants of the merchant and said to them that the stick of the real thief will grow longer by two inches tomorrow. All the servants should be present here again tomorrow with their sticks.

All the servants went to their homes and gathered again at the same place the next day. Birbal asked them to show him their sticks. One of the servants had his stick shorter by two inches. Birbal said, “This is your thief, merchant.”

Later the merchant asked Birbal, “How did you catch him?”

Birbal said, “The thief had already cut his stick short by two inches in the night fearing that his stick will be longer by two inches by morning.”