Stories have a high potential of teaching important lessons and staying in one’s mind longer when told in a funny way. The following story is about a man who broke the trust of his friend just to gain some money. It teaches an important lesson about friends, lying and about teaching people a lesson when they behave rudely. If you are interested in other stories from the Panchatantra you should definitely check out the other books too.

Panchatantra
Panchatantra is an Indian collection of animal tales dated to around 200 before Christ. It is thought that the stories are far more ancient and based on oral traditions. The official author is not known but it is believed to be Vishnu Sharma, an Indian scholar, or Vasubhaga. The collection exists in almost every big language in India and in 50 additional languages around the world. Most translated versions in Europe are copied from the 12th-century Hebrew version by Rabbi Joel. In 1480 the German translation by Anton von Pforr received a lot of attention. The original text was composed in Sanskrit and the original title, among others, could be Tantrakhyayika or Panchakhyana. The end of the words “akhyayika” and “akhyanaka” translate to “little story” from Sanskrit.

The collection consists of an introduction and five stories. Each of these stories also contains embedded stories and could be seen as independent books. The first book, Mirta-bheda, is translated to “Dissonance Among Friends”. It makes up almost half of the collection and contains 34 different sub-stories, like “The Rat that Ate Iron”. The second book is called “Mitra-lābha” which translates to “Achievement of Friends”, and the third “Kākolūkīyam” or “The Story of Crows and Owls”. The fourth book is called “Labdhapraṇāśam” in the original and was translated to “Loss of What was Attained” and the fifth book is “Aparīkṣitakārakaṃ” or “To do without pre-examination”.

Summary
The story is about a merchant called Naduk. Over time, he lost all of his money, sold everything he had and wanted to leave the city for new opportunities. He gave the only thing he had left, an iron beam, to his friend Bondu for him to protect. Over the years Naduk became rich again and moved back to his old town to start a business. When he visited his friend Bondu and asked him to give him his beam back, he lied and said that the mice ate it. Since he knew that the iron beam was worth a lot, he didn’t want to give it back. Naduk pretended to be understanding but then asked Bondu to bring him his son to give him presents. Once the son arrived at Naduk’s house, he locked him in his basement. Once Bondu started getting worried Naduk told him that a hawk had stolen his son and taken him away. Bondu accused him of lying and said that it would be impossible. They went to court and Naduk said “If mice can eat up an iron beam, surely a hawk can carry off a boy!” He then went on to tell the entire story to the judge and everyone laughed about it. The settlement was to both return what they took from the other.

For the original story, click here! https://www.talesofpanchatantra.com/the-rat-that-ate-iron

The moral that the story wants to bring across is that “Tit-for-Tat is the best policy in life”. Even though I wouldn’t fully agree with this statement since it doesn’t make you any better than the other person, I still think that it is good sometimes to hand people a mirror and show them what consequences their behaviours have.