Once there was a king…and ghosts

Even as a stray dog furiously burrowed in the sand to dig out possibly a body buried there, it disdainfully flung out an old and frayed manuscript on the river bank. It turned out to be the long-lost 26^th tale in the Betaal Panchavinshati, which till now was known to contain 25 stories.

The kingdom of the legendary King was hit by a terrible epidemic. When people began to die like flies, high level meetings of task forces and empowered groups began to be presided by the emperor himself. He had his nine favourite courtiers known as his Navratnas or his nine gems. Being gems, they maintained a suitable distance from commoners and reported directly to their king.

The king, who was suddenly receiving bad publicity from Gandhara to Taxila, from Lanka to Timbuctoo, was livid. “With nine of you working 20 hours a day, how did things spin out of control? How come we are learning from foreign media what is happening in the kingdom,” he thundered at them.

The Navaratnas stood with bowed heads. The Health Minister finally gathered courage and whispered that the well-known Yogi who headed a large province, had undertaken a secret, tantric ritual. At the end of the ritual, the ghost or the devil himself would answer all questions about how to control the epidemic.

Rather than aerial surveys, the king would observe the ritual on the ground, he announced. The royal priest reminded him that the ritual would succeed only if it was done in secrecy and on a moonless night.

The emperor did find the Yogi sitting astride a dead body and chanting ‘mantras’. He would periodically sprinkle black sesame seeds, grains of rice and liquor. The king watched from a distance.

Hours later he froze to see the neck of the dead man turn and ask in a rasping voice, “So, what do you wish to know?’ The Yogi, known for his foul temper and intemperate language, bowed his head in reverence and asked, “I wish to know why we have been hit by this terrible pandemic and also how to control it. If I go back without answers, I will be beheaded.”

The dead man laughed. ‘Listen you son of a jackal, the epidemic has you in thrall because the king ignored the signs. You and other lapdogs kept quiet. When bad news finally got through the palace gates, you decided to punish the messengers. You told the healers that if they dared to tell the truth, they would meet the same fate. Didn’t you order them to keep prescribing sweetened granules of homeopathic medicine, cow urine and cow dung?

Sir!

“You then organised ‘Havans’ on the street and asked people to clap and bang on pots to scare away the virus,” the dead man roared.

“What could we do?” whimpered the Yogi, “They were orders from the emperor. We promoted Panchgavya till the Army began to be affected,” he whined.

“When the poor began to die like flies, what did you do,” rasped the dead man.

“We held a series of very high-level meetings. We also formed task forces, committees, sub-committees and empowered groups to monitor the situation,” informed the Yogi meekly.

The dead body suddenly took the Yogi by surprise by landing a hard reverse kick on his ample back, causing him to roll down like a stuffed bag.

Thereafter the dead body turned into Betaal or a ghost, and as Betaals are wont to do, flew away to hang upside down from the Peepul tree, leaving the emperor and the Yogi speechless and in shock.

(Any resemblance with real events or people is a coincidence)