The Tulsi Mala Maker and the Maharaja’s Ruby

Today is World Book Day 4 March 2021 – the theme is “Share a Story”..

In a hamlet of Tinpahar there was a devout Tulsi Mala Maker. His fame spread all over India. His Mala were awesome. He was constantly working.

One day before the Monsoon, there was a great commotion outside the Mala Maker’s workshop: the Maharaja of Malda had arrived and demanded to see the artisan.

“Mala Maker, you are quite famous and I have come to engage your skill. You see this”, said the royal visitor holding a dazzling object, “this is a precious Ranaghat ruby.” Everyone knew these were priceless and more than any kingdom could buy.

“I want you to set this ruby in a Tulsi Mala and I’ll give you ten times whatever you ask.”

With that the Maharaja dropped the precious ruby in the Mala Maker’s dusty corn-cracked palm and left with his retinue.

There was an auspicious Mala almost completed just the thing, and the Mala Maker carefully carved a Tulsi bead specially for the ruby. When this was done he set the bead down ready to string it when the window flew open and a myhah was literally blown into the startled Mala Maker’s workshop.

The bird was disoriented and crashed into tools malas Tulsi fragments and other paraphernalia before scattering all the Mala beads and passing out exhausted before the Mala Maker.

The poor mynah had no visible injury so the Mala Maker resuscitated it pressed it to eat some chilli-chana gave it some water and tossed it into the air at the window. The restored mynah flew off perfectly sound.

Now to clear up the mess, but first, alas, where was the bead with the ruby in all the chaos? There were hundreds of beads to check, and not the remotest hint to help now.

Every bead would have to be sliced in half and destroyed to find the ruby.

When close on a thousand beads had been halved and the ruby hadn’t turned up the Mala Maker panicked.

He set off an a day’s journey by boat up the Ganga to Malda to confess the loss.

The Maharaja gave the distraught man an audience, heard the details and calmly announced ‘don’t worry the ruby has magical powers, let’s wait and see’.

The Mala Maker returned home dejected. Gossip spread. No more commissions came his way. His tools gathered dust and began to rust. He couldn’t bear to look at them anymore. His income was soon spent and he was anticipating a certain swift miserable close to life.

One day before Saraswati Puja and at his lowest, from the same single window in the workshop a mynah appeared. The Mala Maker was aghast, here he thought was the final disgrace for him from a mere mynah.

The bird hopped down from the window before him and deposited a solitary Mala bead. What! It can’t be!

Trembling with disbelief the weakened Mala Maker fingered the bead. Sure enough this was the bead unmistakably and more: the dismal daylight caught a facet of the ruby and refracted a dazzling laser-like shaft of ruby light.

The mynah had stood quite motionless observing the man all the while, and then miraculous to tell what happened next: just as the Mala Maker turned his gaze to the jet-black bird it uttered in clear Hindi ‘Jai Shree Ram’ and with that flew out the window whence it entered.

The Mala Maker lost no time. He completed the Maharaja’s Mala with its Ranaghat ruby and set off up river to Malda.

He was admitted to the palace and there recounted the miraculous recovery of the ruby.

“See,” said the Maharaja “I told you not to fret, I never doubted your integrity.

Now you will make your home in the palace grounds and I have already furnished you with a new workshop.”

So the villagers of Tinpahar now visit their Mala Maker in the grounds of the Maharaja’s palace in Malda.

Happy World Book Day 2021!