Tenali-Raman – Theft-a-Palooza – {Ep.206} – Stories From India – Podcast

Today’s story is about a Theft-a-Palooza in Vijaynagar, where Tenali Raman teaches us the best place to hide our money when the country is overrun by thieves on a stealing spree!

Welcome to “Stories From India”. This is a podcast that will take you on a journey through the rich mythology, folklore and history of the Indian subcontinent. I am Narada Muni, the celestial storyteller and the original “time lord”. With my ability to travel through space and time, I can bring you fascinating stories from the past, the present, and the future. From the epic tales of the Mahabharata and Ramayana to the folktales of the Panchatantra to stories of Akbar-Birbal and Tenali Raman, I have a story for every occasion.

The purpose of the stories is neither to pass judgment nor to indoctrinate. My goal is only to share these stories with people who may not have heard them before and to make them more entertaining for those who have.

Today’s Story

In this episode, we’re back to Tenali Raman. If you haven’t heard previous Tenali Raman stories that is totally okay, because all of his stories stand alone.

But I will give you a bit of context on who he was. He was a jester in Emperor Krishnadevarayar’s court. This Emperor was a real historical person. But as famous as he was for ruling an Empire that covered most of Southern India in the 16th-century, Krishnadevarayar was just as famous for the many stories told of him and his court jester – Tenali Raman.

Often, Tenali Raman found every possible means he could to humiliate or upset his Emperor or to make money off of him, or both!

Krishnadevarayar took all this in good humor. Some of the times! At other times he tried to have his jester punished, or banished or executed or tortured. Somehow or the other Tenali always came out on top.

And it wasn’t just the Emperor who was humbled in encounters with Tenali. The jester did this to ordinary people, scholars, traders, everyone!

Well today’s story is another such instance. In this one, Tenali tricks a thief. 

“Guards!” screamed Krishnadevarayar.

Only two guards rushed to the scene. Which sadly reminded the Emperor about all the budget cuts he had had to make.
“What’s going on here?” screamed the Emperor. “Everything is going missing here in the palace. Yesterday it was my throne, today my calendar is gone.”

The Minister for Justice stroked his beard and nodded sagely. “He’ll get 12 months for that”

The Minister for Crime interjected “Your throne and your calendar aren’t the only things that were stolen, your highness. The royal bakery was also broken into last night. And lastly before leaving the thief took a shower in your royal bathroom”

“The royal bakery?” the Emperor said “What could be the motive for such a crime?”

“Your highness, we figure the thief kneaded some dough.”

The Emperor winced at that but was bold enough to ask about the thief using the royal bathroom. To which the Minister replied that according to the collective wisdom of the Ministry, the thief had taken a shower so that he could make a clean getaway”

Collective groans from the rest of the court – but what else could they do? They weren’t responsible for the poor quality of jokes on this show!

Krishnadevarayar wandered off into a tangent by wondering aloud why there was a minister for Crime and another for Justice. How did that make sense? He decided that they must do a time and motion study to see if the two ministries could be merged.

The person who responded next was the Minister for Economy in Administration of Government Efforts in Restructuring, or MEAGER for short. MEAGER said that they had done a time and motion study a few months ago. And the conclusion was that the Ministry of Crime and the Ministry of Justice needed to be broken up into 7 independent ministries. Each.

Krishnadevarayar glared at MEAGER. Government spending was out of control. No wonder he had to cut down on security to the point that he was left with two guards in the palace. 

And on that note, he asked if his favorite coffee mug might have been stolen by this same thief. The ministry of irrigation reminded the Emperor that that could not be the case. Recently when exploring a dam on the Tungabhadra river the coffee mug had accidentally fallen into the water. And there was a massive irrigation project underway to retrieve said coffee mug from the river. Krishandevarayar didn’t care about the Minister of Irrigation’s so called “technicalities”. Where was Tenali Raman when the Emperor needed him?

But the Minister for Official Vacation Enforcement or MOVE for short said that Tenali was on holiday. 

And indeed he was. Typically when people went on vacation they might have hired an ultra deluxe horse cart. But not Raman. He was stingy. So he did what all the other poor people, as well as the miserly rich did – which was to go around on foot. And the fact that his destination was three days and two nights away did not discourage him. He was off to watch a gilli-danda tournament in a distant town and no silly objections were going to stop him.

His wife tried to warn him – there had been a string of thefts, and burglaries and stickups all around town and in the forest too. Especially in the forest. And so far none of the thieves were stolen. Except for that one guy who had stolen a grand bullock cart and accidentally barged into a policemen’s conference about donuts. The newspaper headlines the next day read “Grand Theft Auto-corrected”. But that was an isolated incident. Most of the other thieves, burglars and highwaymen were still at large. 

And that was not going to stop Tenali. He left his wife to look after their children, and without so much as wishing her a proper goodbye, he walked off. He had too much on his mind anyway. Whether his favorite fielder – Jadeja would be playing or not. Whether the danda-man Kohli would be in top form or not! Tenali had placed a large bet on the outcome of that match. Without consulting with his family, of course. That would have been too unconventional for a person in 16th century India.

On his path and waiting for him, was Chor Singh Daaku. He was a very versatile thief, highwayman, and burglar. He had won the thief of the year award three times in a row! His autobiography “Roads of Deception: Confessions of a Highwayman” was on the bestseller list for the 20th week in a row. Who could beat that?

Chor Singh Daaku hadn’t always wanted to be a thief. He wanted to be on stage. He worked hard and even got his first acting job at a theater. But then he found that stealing the spotlight was a lot more satisfying and lucrative when he did it literally rather than metaphorically.

And now years later, Chor Singh Daaku had found a way to combine his two favorite interests into his profession. We shall soon see his MO.

As Tenali appeared on the path, Chor Singh Daaku stepped up and politely introduced himself.

“Hi Kind and well-dressed Sir, I’m Chor Singh Daaku from Tihar.”

Tenali Raman responded politely that he was Tenali Raman from Vijayanagar. And that he didn’t know where Tihar was. Was it somewhere up in the North? Anyway, how could Tenali help?

Chor Singh Daaku explained that yeah Tihar was indeed somewhere up in the vague north. And thankfully, I mean unfortunately, no specific maps existed in their time for them to try to locate it exactly. Anyway, moving on to specifically why Chor Singh Daaku had hailed Raman. He asked Raman his destination and upon learning it, Chor Singh Daaku feigned surprise and joy that they were headed to the same place!

He explained why. “I’m just a traveler. And I have some money with me. I’m worried someone might steal it. I’ve heard there are many many highwaymen on this route. You look like a respectable person. And I wonder if the two of us could stick together. Statistics show that most highwaymen operate by themselves. So if there are two of us, and one of him, our money is likely to be safe”
Raman agreed that that sounded like a good approach, because he had money with him too.

So the two went on their way towards the Gilli Dandi tournament. Turns out, Chor Singh Daaku had kept up with current affairs to know about a few surface details about any topic. He considered it a necessary business expense in his profession, and had been able to successfully take a tax deduction for his newspaper subscription.

Chor Singh Daaku also observed as he saw Raman take out the money when they encountered a pani puri seller along the way. 

So that day passed easily enough. When it got to late evening, Raman and Daaku decided that it was time to find a place and pitch camp for the night. They found a clearing that would get about as comfortable as could be expected from sleeping on the forest floor. They had carried their pillows with them at least. That wasn’t a matter of luck, just standard practice in those days.

They each said good night and dozed off. Well, only Raman dozed off. And it was easy for anyone to see that his snores were indeed genuine. Chor Singh Daaku who had only pretended to sleep, slowly got up. He tiptoed around to where Raman had kept his bag. Good thing he was wearing sneakers. But he needn’t have worried. Raman was fast asleep.

Chor Singh Daaku rummaged through Raman’s bag but there was no sign of the money. He looked around Raman’s sleeping area, but nothing. He even looked under Raman’s pillow. The jester was sleeping soundly and didn’t even notice Chor Singh Daaku’s attempts.

But the thief found nothing. Not a paisa. Not under the pillow, not hidden in a nearby tree branch, not in Raman’s shoes, or his turban, or hidden in his stuffed animal. The money seemed to just not be there. Maybe Raman had accidentally dropped it on the way, or maybe the pani puri seller had picked Raman’s pocket without the travelers realizing it.

Disappointed, Chor Singh Daaku went back to bed. 

He was in for a shock the next day however. Because they encountered a chai shop on the way, and Raman casually took his wallet out to pay. And Chor Singh Daaku could clearly say there was even a lot of money in it! How was that possible! Chor Singh Daaku had been thorough! His only guess was that maybe Raman had buried the money somewhere in the ground around where he slept? But how could he have managed?

The next night, before selecting a sleeping spot, Chor Singh Daaku made a thorough examination. He did that under the pretext that last night there’d been bedbugs and he was keen to avoid being on the dinner menu for those pesky bugs two nights in a row. Raman shrugged and agreed. To him it didn’t matter. He acknowledged that he slept soundly, and nothing – not even an earthquake or the sound of a cannon going off was likely to wake him up.

Encouraged by this, Chor Singh Daaku took more risks when he performed his search again that night. He even displaced the sleeping Raman and dug every inch of the place. He again checked Raman’s bag, his turban, his clothes, the nearby trees, under rocks. But again, nothing. Where was Raman hiding it? And it had to be simple, because Raman was getting no more than a few seconds of privacy.

Chor Singh Daaku was getting frustrated at this point. Where was that wallet? He just couldn’t take it. Literally and figuratively.

How was Raman managing to trick him like this? He definitely was – for the next day he had the wallet on him. Chor Singh Daaku debated breaking out of character and doing an old fashioned stickup. But no, he couldn’t give up on his principles.

Well, I’ll add that Chor Singh Daaku was desperate enough to solve this problem, that he invented some excuse to also accompany Raman on the return journey. But again the same thing happened both nights!

After the two parted company back in Vijaynagar, Chor Singh Daaku decided he needed a real relaxing vacation. He’d been working too hard. He was being too hard on himself. He’d figure it out eventually.

Raman was finally back in the palace, where the Emperor was glad to have him back, for a change.

“Raman, it’s outrageous. Do you know I was held up?”

The Emperor explained how he’d been strolling through the nearby forest and a guy in a bandit mask jumped down from the tree and demanded all the Emperor’s money.

“And how did you react, your highness?” the jester asked.

“I told this highwayman he couldn’t do that. I was his Emperor!”

“And then what happened?”

The Emperor sighed. “This highwayman changed his demand. He wanted me to give him all his money back. And I couldn’t do anything. But don’t laugh Raman, bet you’d have been forced to do the same”

Raman explained that on the contrary, he had just recently very successfully repelled a highwayman. He then explained the whole story.

The Emperor was intrigued. “But then Raman, where did you hide your wallet? Why was Chor Singh Daaku unable to find it”

“Your highness, I hid it in the last place he might look. Under his pillow”

The Emperor was amazed by how smart Raman was. Surely, with his brains he could help fix Krishnadevarayar’s little problem of excess government spending.

Raman was ready to strike while the iron was hot.

“Sure, your highness. I can fix the problem, I just need time and money. Shall we say a 5 year budget and a thousand gold coins per month?”

That’s all for now

Some notes on the show

Previous Tenali Raman stories are here

The Krishnadevarayar history episode is here

That’s all for now. 

Next Time

In the next episode, we’ll do a folk tale again. It’s one about humans learning from animals about the value of sacrifice.

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The music is from Purple Planet.

Thanks for listening and I’ll see you next time!