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Stories told by Śrīla Prabhupāda
<< 37 One nice story about envious nature >>
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| Here is the last story. This is again about Agbar and Birbal. Agbar had one Hindu minister, his name was Mahesh Das, but because he was serving the Muslim king, he had changed his name to Birbal. The stories about Agbar and Birbal are very famous in India. There was one nice story about envious nature. Birbal was very clever. All the other ministers were Muslim, Birbal was the only Hindu. These Muslim ministers were very envious of him. They wanted this Hindu minister would be sacked, be kicked out of his position. They wanted to know how to get rid of him. Without Birbal, Agbar would not be able to run the kingdom. The king was very attached to Birbal, he was always thinking: “I must have Birbal always by my side.” Agbar and Birbal were always together and that’s why these Muslim ministers were very, very envious. “We have to do something, we have to force this Birbal to quit. If we approach one of Agbar’s wives, then she may be able to find out some way that we can force him to quit.” One of the queens of Agbar had a brother whose name was Hussein Shah. He was a complete fool, everybody knew he was a fool but they thought: “If we go to the queen in praise of her brother, she may do something to help us.” Because the idea is, because when you go to a lady in praise of her brother, than that will make her happy. So they approached the queen: “Your brother Hussein Shah is very intelligent. We feel sorry for him. We request you to convince Agbar that he should be the minister, not Birbal. He is unnecessarily carrying this Hindu on his head.” The queen felt very happy: “Yes, my brother is very intelligent.” Also actually she was a big fool. The queen got puffed up by all this praise and their plan was working. The Muslim ministers were very happy, they said: “We will definitely back your brother, he should replace Birbal.” “Leave it to me”, the queen said: “I’ll work out some scheme, tomorrow Birbal will be sacked.”
| | In the evening Agbar came and entered the queen’s quarters and this particular queen, he approached her but she wouldn’t talk to him. He came to say something and she just turned away, ignored him completely. He went to the other side and she turned to that side. Finally he stood in front of her and said: “What’s the matter?” And she said: “Hmm, I don’t want to talk to you.” And he became a little desperate: “Come on, what’s the matter, please tell me, whatever it is, whatever you want I’ll do it.” “No, you won’t.” In this way carried on. Finally, finally, after he practically had his head on her feet: “Please tell me, tell me, tell me.” Then she replied: “It’s my brother Hussein Shah.” “What’s the matter with your brother?” She replied: “He is so very intelligent.” Agbar said: “Queen, with all due respect I must tell you, that he is a complete fool.” Then she became very angry again and again she wouldn’t talk to him, just turning away. And he was kept pleading and finally, finally he said: “All right, all right, your brother is very clever, yes.” And then she said: “Now that you know my brother is very clever, you should know, that all your ministers also tell me that he is so clever, that he should be the chief minister.” And then Agbar said: “Well, you know, with all due respect to you and your brother, I must tell you, that without my chief minister Birbal I’ll not be able to run this kingdom. He is the cleverest minister there is, even those other ministers, they cannot hold the candle to him, what to speak of your brother.” Then the queen replied: “No, no, you’ve already admitted that my brother is the cleverest of all. So that means he’s cleverer then Birbal, therefore he should be the chief minister.” And he replied: “I tell you, that your brother is not so clever as Birbal.” “No, no, you don’t understand, listen to me”, and so on.
| | Finally, finally, finally the king surrendered. “All right, but I just can’t go tomorrow to the court and tell Birbal that he is sacked. There has to be some good reason.” “You do as I tell you and you will find out the reason,” the queen said. “Tomorrow you go to the court, you call Birbal and tell him that you are going to the vegetable market to buy vegetables.” “Queen, you are mad. There are so many important things to be done. Why should Birbal and I go to the market? There are so many servants that we can send.” “No, no, you just do as I tell you.” “All right I will.” “Then what is to happen. While going to the vegetable market you stop half way and then you tell Birbal to call me, because you want me to be with you, but I will not come. When he will return you say: ”Simple job, you can’t do it? Just getting the queen from the palace. How are you going to run the kingdom? And then you sack him.” The king asked: “Are you positive that you won’t come? Otherwise the whole thing will go wrong.” “No, no, I am definitely not coming”, she assured. Then they put this plan into practice. Agbar the next day in the court, he said to Birbal: “Birbal, we have to go to the market to buy vegetables.” Birbal said: “King, what’s the matter? There are so many important things we have to do.” “No, we have to go.” Immediately Birbal thought: “Hmm, something fishy is going on here.” And he knew that these other ministers are very, very envious. So he said to one confidant, one close friend that you follow myself and the king, but no one should see that you are following. So they went and in the middle of the road on the way to the market Agbar stopped and said: “Oh, by the way, you have to go back Birbal, to the palace and fetch my queen, she has to come with us.” “All right,” Birbal said. So now Birbal knew that had something to do with the queen. He didn’t know what it was, but again, he stopped and told his friend to follow him and he went to the palace. He went to the queen’s quarters and the queen was sitting there and he said: “Queen, Agbar is standing in the middle of the road waiting for you. We don’t have much time, so please get ready and come. He wants you to go there.” And she said: “I am not coming.” Then Birbal could understand. He said to her: “No queen, don’t do that, I will be in difficulty.” And then he could see how the queen was becoming jubilant and she said: “No, no, I am not coming.” “But you must come because Agbar is waiting on the way.” “No, no, I am not coming. You can just go tell him I’m very busy.” “All right”, Birbal said. In the meantime, he called for his friend and he made some sign and the friend came in. The friend had a message from the king. There was no message, it was just this sudden plan of Birbal. He said: “But I can’t give you this message loudly because it is only for you. The queen should not hear.” Birbal was standing in the room, the friend came close to him and started whispering to his ear and he was just, in the ear, he just was going: “Pssss, pssss, pssss, beautiful, pssss, pssss, pssss very, very beautiful, pssss, pssss, pssss.” All the queen could hear was the words beautiful, very beautiful, very young. Birbal looked at the queen and said: “It’s all right, queen, you don’t have to come.” And then he turned and walked on. The queen was now very suspicious and she thought: “A minute ago, this fellow was very strong to invite me and after he got this message he just turns and goes away and says I don’t have to come. All I could hear was ‘very young’ and ‘beautiful’. What does this mean? This must mean that there is a beautiful girl there meeting with Agbar and that’s why he doesn’t want me to come now. What is this? I am going.”
| | Agbar was going down the road and the queen was running up behind him. “Wait, wait, wait, I am coming with you.” When Birbal arrived to Agbar, the queen was there and Agbar said: “So, Birbal, you remain my minister, you brought the queen!”
Srila Prabhupada ki jay!
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