Vikram and Betaal - The Three suitors - Story #5
Vikram and Betaal – Story 5
We saw how King Vikramaditya
(Vikram) went to the cremation ground at the instruction of a sage to get a
dead body and found a ghost. It agreed to come on the condition that the king
should not talk till he reached his destination. The ghost had been telling him
stories and tricked him into talking by putting an interesting question. The
ghost also threatened him saying he will die if he knew the answer and did not
answer. Vikram had the problem of either knowing the answer and dying or opening
his mouth and letting the ghost go. He chose to answer as obviously he had to live
to do the sage’s bidding. Here goes yet another trip and yet another story.
The three suitors
There lived a famous priest in
one of the village near Ujjain. It so happened that he was blessed with a very
beautiful. If there is a beautiful girl in a home, there will be young men who
will be interested. The girl, named Mandravati also had a problem of plenty. She
had many suitors, but three of them were serious contenders.
It became so difficult that each
of them told Mandravati’s father that they would kill themselves if she was
married to anyone other than them. Mandravati’s father was confused and scared
that he may cause the death of two young men by getting his daughter married to
one man. He hoped time would provide a good solution.
Well, time did provide a
solution but a strange one. One day Mandravati caught a rare form of fever. She
was sick for sometime and eventually died. All the three suitors were shocked
and sad. They performed the last rites of Mandravati jointly.
Not willing to let go of her,
each of them decided to keep a piece of her. Weird, isn’t it? What to do? Each
person has their own peculiar beahviour. Who are we to judge?
Coming back to our story, one
suitor collected her ashes and slept with the kalasha containing the ashes. The
other one took her bones, washed them in the Ganges and kept them. The third
one was a bit more practical. He became an ascetic and started visiting many
temples and kshetras to pray for her soul.
The ascetic happened to go to a powerful
brahmin’s house. He understood that the brahmin had a rare book that had the
chants to bring back people from the dead. Tempted, he stole the book from the
brahmin one day and returned to the village.
He found the other suitors still
mourning over the girl with her ashes and bones. With the help of the book and
using the ashes and bones, they decided to try and bring back Mandravati to
life. The ascetic used the book and chanted the mantras while one of them held
her bones and the other held the pot containing her ashes. After a few
suspenseful moments, lo and behold ........ Mandravati came back alive.
Now all the cooperation was
forgotten. The three suitors started fighting about who should marry her now.
Betaal now stopped and asked
King Vikram “Who should marry Mandravati? If you know the answer and don’t
speak your head will burst. If you answer, you break your promise and I will
fly back to my tree.”
Vikram realised that he had been
trapped. After some thought he said “The ascetic who chanted the mantra gave Mandravati
life. So, he is like her father. The suitor who collected her bones, has
performed the duties of a son. The suitor who kept her ashes and slept with it
is her lover. Mandravati should marry him.”
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