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Yesterday I was talking of the bear myths of our childhood.
And the biggest and strongest of all was Jambavan, the king of bears.
It all started with our home-made Ganesh Puja in our childhood (and now Ishani's childhood). The Punditji would leisurely go through his hour-long puja while we kids would be listening to him famished...no food till the entire puja was over.
At the end of the Sanskrit puja that made no sense to us, the Punditji would get down to the Ganesh Katha (story) in Telugu, listening to which was compulsory and compelling (food would follow in another ten minutes).
Apparently, for reasons too involved to go through here, Ganeshji was mocked at his unwieldy dancing figure by our Chandamama (Moonji) who fancied he had the most beautiful figure. And Ganeshji got wild and cursed him:
"Anyone who looks at you on this recurring evening (4th day after the New Moon of Bhadra month) will suffer from calumny and slander"
Upon which the narcissist Moonji begged pardon of Ganeshji and asked for redemption. Ganeshji took pity on him and gave this remission:
"Alright, they will forestall this slander if they perform my puja in the morning and listen to my story attentively"
Lord Krishna was aware of this curse but couldn't resist the temptation of drinking his evening milk from his fond cup.
And while he was about to take his first greedy sip he saw the reflected image of this crescent moon in his milk:
The cow milk supplied to Krishna must have been watery like our Hyderabadi toned milk...otherwise there would have been a creamy layer over it like the silky folds of a Tangail sari, and no reflected image would have been there...just a diffused light.
Anyway it was too late and Krishna was reconciled to the forthcoming slander which came duly from Satrajit, a neighborhood king.
This guy had a huge big diamond called Shamantak Mani in his treasury chest. This Golconda diamond was unique...it yielded 20 tonnes of gold each day like that goose which laid its daily golden egg.
And Krishna came to know about this diamond and asked Satrajit to lend it to him. And Satrajit refused. Krishna said 'okey-dokey' and forgot all about it.
A few days later, Satrajit's younger brother wore this diamond in his necklace and went hunting and got killed by a stray lion which took the mani away, and in turn it got killed by the Big Bear named Jambavan who took the Samantak mani and gifted it to his baby daughter, Jambavati.
Lots of killings there...
Upon the discovery of the dead body of his younger brother in the bushes sans his necklace, Satrajit suspected that it was all Krishna's covetous doing and spread the word.
...the curse of slander and calumny...
Krishna badly wanted to clear himself and followed the footprints of the lion which he found near the bushes. And they led him to the dead body of the lion. And nearby he found the footprints of a huge bear which led him into a cavernous cave.
Lots of Sherlock Holmes stuff there...
Krishna entered it and found the baby Jambavati playing in her cradle with her lustrous diamond.
And tried to coax and cajole the baby to give it up.
But Jambavati was too clever for Krishna and cried hoarse with all her bearish lung power. This brought forth her fond daddy who found Krishna toying with and trying to snitch his baby's diamond, and challenged him.
Their wrestling match lasted all of 27 days and nights at the end of which the mighty Jambavan got tired and realized that this gent must be the very reincarnation of Lord Raam himself.
And he admitted defeat and begged pardon, and along with the Shamantak Mani (which was still yielding her golden eggs) he gifted his daughter, Jambavati, too into the hands of Krishna in marriage.
And Krishna had this rule that he never refused and disappointed a single addition to his long list of wives.
And then Krishna duly offered to return the diamond he retrieved to Satrajit to redeem himself of calumny.
And Satrajit felt sorry and apologized for his mistake and asked Krishna to keep the golden diamond to himself, which offer Krishna couldn't refuse.
On top of it, Satrajit offered his own fond and proud daughter, Satyabhama, in marriage to Krishna who simply said:
"The more the merrier!"
The story got happily over thus and we were all fed Ganeshji's prasad of payas, tamarind-rice, poppadams, fried dal, fried baingan (begun bhaja), and pots of sour curd.
I don't know the moral of this story, if any.
Except that Krishna got his bear-hug pretty often though not pretty cheap.
...Posted by Ishani
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