Once there lived a large troop of monkeys in the premises of a temple. They fed on the food given by the devotees who visited the temple.
One day there was a grand fest at the temple. The devotees thronged in large number to embrace their favorite diety of the temple. The monkeys too decided to show their devotion towards the temple God by fasting.
The chief monkey of the troop assembled am the monkeys and said, 'God has blessed us with good living. We get ample food here by his devotees. They respect us too. We must fast today in honor of God'.
The monkeys agreed with their chief. They decided to fast that day.
The devotees who visited the temple gave the monkeys various kinds of food especially bananas. One of the monkeys received a pack of jaggery and roasted gram, the favorite monkey food. All the monkeys gathered food and gave it to the chief. The chief collected the food for a breaking the fast after sunset. It was decided that all monkeys would share whatever was received during the day.
By noon the monkeys were very hungry. They sat in a row around the chief with food in front if him. All eyes were fixed on food.
Suddenly the chief said, 'Soon it will be dark. We could have problem in distributing food in dark. I think we should take our share of food and keep it with us'.
The monkeys were delighted. They jumped and took their share of food.
After they took their shares, a young monkey said, 'What if the bananas we have are rotten? We should peel them and check if they are fresh. It would also save our time at the time of breaking fast'.
'Well thought!', said the monkey chief and asked all monkeys to peel their bananas. By now the starving monjys were too tempted to resist, but under chief's vigilance none of them dared to eat the banana.
A little monkey said to his father, 'By evening, my hand will become too weak to pick the banana and eat it. Can I place it now and eat it when we all break the fast?'
The father asked the chief if they can put banana in their mouths and wait for dusk. The chief thought it was a fine idea. So all the monkeys placed the bananas in their mouths.
The monkeys wondered what to do next. But soon they realised that the banana crept down their throats. The chief who had gulped the banana too, shouted 'We are fasting aren't we? So how have we eaten the bananas? The fast is broken !'
Soon as the chief said that the fast was broken, the monkeys gobbled down the food they had.
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