76. Birbal caught the Thief

Once there lived a rich merchant in the city.

One night the man’s house was robbed. The thieves took away all the precious jewelry, gold and money from the man’s hidden treasure chamber. On close investigation, the man came to doubt one of his servants behind the theft. He went to Birbal and narrated the mishap.

Birbal came to the man’s house. He asked all the servants of the house to assemble before him. He asked the servants ‘Tell me who was engaged in this theft?’

None of the servants agreed. In fact they all stood wordlessly. Then Birbal gave sticks of equal length to all the servants. He told the servants, ‘Here is a stick for each one of you. Tomorrow, when you see the stick of real thief would be longer by two inches tomorrow’.

Next day, all the servants gathered with their sticks when Birbal arrived. He measured all the sticks and found one of the sticks was shorter by two inches.

Birbal held the stick before the servant and said, ‘Friend, here the thief’.

The servants and the man were dumbfound.  The thief was caught and punished.

The man later asked Birbal, ‘How did you catch the thief based on the stick length? I do not understand’.

Birbal smiled and said, ‘Friend, sticks cannot grow. The real thief however feared that the stick would grow overnight. So he incised it by two inches fearing that his stick might lengthen by two inches by morning’.

The man laughed and appreciated Birbal for witty simple approach to reach judgment.