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Free Entrance

In the first book of the Panchatantra, the jackal Damanaka has lost his place at the court of the lion king Pingalaka. He sets out to win it back. In Arthur Ryder’s English translation, the jackal is called Victor. At the court he is known: “This is an old acquaintance, the counselor’s son Victor. He has free entrance.”

Victor brings the bull Sanjivaka to court as the king’s new friend. Then he decides that the two must be separated. “Rusty must by all means be detached from Lively,” he tells his fellow jackal. Rusty is the lion and Lively the bull. In the end the lion kills the bull.

The Kamaraj Consensus

Jawaharlal Nehru died on May 27, 1964. The Congress had to choose a new prime minister. The party president, K. Kamaraj, consulted the Congress members of Parliament and the chief ministers, and then announced the choice, Lal Bahadur Shastri.

Morarji Desai had wanted the post and opposed the method. He accepted the outcome. Shastri was sworn in on June 9, 1964. The Asian Age later wrote that Kamaraj “evolved a novel concept of consensus.”

The Hall of Gossip

The Central Hall of Parliament House in New Delhi was used formally once a year, for the President’s address. On other days it belonged to the members. “Lawmakers mainly unwind and interact with each other in the Central Hall,” the Asian Age wrote in 2020. Journalists wanted entry because the hall gave them close access to many lawmakers under one roof.

Open Magazine called it “the nation’s hall of gossip.” By an unwritten rule, private conversations held there were not made public.

The Prime Minister Makes Calls

In June 2002 the governing NDA needed a candidate for President. The name it first considered, P.C. Alexander, met resistance, including from its ally the Telugu Desam Party. On June 10 it named A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee took the name to the opposition leaders one by one.

He met Sonia Gandhi of the Congress for 15 minutes, with Manmohan Singh present. He met Mulayam Singh Yadav and telephoned the Communist leaders H.K. Surjeet and A.B. Bardhan. Kalam was elected in July with 89.58 percent of the vote.

Birbal’s Khichdi

In one of the Akbar and Birbal tales, a poor Brahmin stands all night in a freezing pond to win a reward from the emperor. Akbar refuses to pay. A light in the palace, a mile away, kept the man warm, he says.

Birbal does not argue. He sends word that he will come to court once his khichdi is cooked. Days pass. When Akbar goes to see him, the fire is far away from the pot. Akbar sees his mistake and pays the Brahmin.

The Vocabulary of the Indirect

Dabi zubaan se: with a pressed-down tongue. The Rekhta dictionary defines it as speaking in a low voice, in a muffled voice, timidly.

Munh pe aur, peeth peeche aur: one thing to the face, another behind the back. Rekhta glosses it as a friend outwardly and an enemy inwardly. Peeth peeche badshah ko bhi bura kehte hain: behind his back, people speak ill even of the emperor.

Bichauliya: the one in the middle. Rekhta gives mediator, arbitrator, go-between and middleman. Its Hindi entry adds the person who arranges a marriage or an engagement.

Personal Reasons

On October 26, 2018, Viral Acharya, a deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India, gave a public lecture in Mumbai on the independence of regulators. “Governments that do not respect central bank independence will sooner or later incur the wrath of financial markets,” he said. Reports of tension between the bank and the government followed.

On December 10, 2018, the governor, Urjit Patel, resigned. His statement gave one reason: “On account of personal reasons, I have decided to step down from my current position effective immediately.”

The Lone Dissent

On April 28, 1976, during the Emergency, a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court decided the case known as ADM Jabalpur. Four judges sided with the government on the detention of citizens without trial. Justice H.R. Khanna dissented alone. “Detention without trial is an anathema to all those who love personal liberty,” he wrote.

In January 1977 the government of Indira Gandhi passed over Khanna, the senior judge, and appointed M.H. Beg Chief Justice. Khanna resigned.

In Court Only

In the Udyoga Parva of the Mahabharata, Bhishma rebukes Karna before the Kuru court. Karna does not fight the grandsire with words. “I lay down my weapons,” he says, in the Ganguli translation. “The Grandsire will henceforth behold me in court only and not in battle.”

Karna leaves the court for his own house. When the war comes, he still sets the same condition: “Let Santanu’s son Bhishma soon withdraw from the great battle.”

Half a Lie

In the Sabha Parva of the Mahabharata, Draupadi’s question goes unanswered by the assembly. Vidura, waving his hands, silences the hall. “Ye are not answering her,” he says, in the Ganguli translation.

Then he states the rule. A person who knows the rules of morality and attends an assembly, but “doth not answer a query that is put, incurreth half the demerit that attacheth to a lie.”