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The Jackal King (A moral story) By- Shah Pravinchandra Kasturchand I am a B.Com. graduate from Sydenham College of Commerce and Economics, Mumbai, of 1957 batch. I have worked in diverse capacities like Teacher, Accountant, Sole Proprietor, Building Contractor etc...all for sustaining life. All the time heart remained attached to WORDS. I have a feel and confident one that writing, mainly poems, is my religion. The other side is my ignorance of academic side of English Literature as such, literary dignitories of present time and their contribution to literature. I am sorry for this but this does not come in my way. I have little to cling to from them and therefore I am more dependent on self alone. My companions are my friends who read me and feed back me. I express my sincere thanks to them. Shah Pravinchandr is facilitating sawf with material for building a children section. He invites all others interested to join in his efforts.

Once upon a time, many animals lived together in a dense jungle. The king of the jungle was the mighty and majestic lion. Every animal bowed its head before the mighty lion king. The jungle was full of many different kinds of animals like tigers, bears, leopards, wolves' cows and even jackals.

One day a jackal was very hungry and was not able to procure any food for himself for number of days. He became completely emaciated and looked skinnier than other jackals. Soon it became difficult even to recognize him. Finally when he could not bear his hunger pangs any more he decided to look for some food in the nearby town.

The dogs saw him going towards the town and started running after him. The jackal sensing danger, decide to hide himself in a drum which was full of blue paint. After the dogs went away the jackal came out of the drum but now his body had turned blue. He went to the nearby pond to quench his thirst and saw his blue color. The jackal was horrified. While he was drinking water from the pond some other animals of the jungle saw him. They could not recognize him and were frightened and hence immediately ran away. The jackal being a crafty and cunning animal soon realized that other animals were frightened of him. He decided to take advantage of his disguise. He called all animals of the jungle and thundered in front of them:" hey, you fools do you know who I am?" All animals were cold with fear. The lion, however mustered some courage and fumbled" No my lord, your majesty seems to have been sent by God in heaven to rule us and we request you to protect us and take the reins of the jungle from me". Other animals at once consented and said in unison, yes, yes, you are our Lord and please take the reins from the lion and oblige us." The cunning jackal nodded and accepted obligingly.

He was however worried about his brethren, the other jackals of the forest. So he asked the lion and tiger to drive all jackals away from the jungle. The lion and tiger did accordingly and soon all jackals were banished from the jungle.

Now the jackal was never hungry. All other animals of the jungle served him with the best available food. He became fat once again and was enjoying his newly gained power. Every animal in the jungle feared him and obeyed him. The jackal couldn't have asked for anything more. Other animals tried to figure out who their new king was but they couldn't come to any conclusion.

On one full moon night, few banished jackals who had hidden themselves, started howling as all jackals do on full moon night.

This jackal too could not control himself and started howling with other jackals. The secret was out and all animals in the jungle discovered his real identity.

The lions, tigers and bears at once pounced on the jackal and ate him up. Thus came the cruel end of cunning and scheming jackal. The lion once again became the king the jungle and every one lived in harmony in the jungle once again.

The moral of the story is that it is very difficult to put on a façade for a long time. The jackal used his crafty ways to become the king of jungle but he could not help his real nature and hence was soon discovered. One should never try to put on fake masks for sooner or later you will be discovered. So it is important that we remain who we are and then try to bring about positive changes in ourselves.

Credits:

• Graphics by Suruchi Thakur

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