The story about Herriot the Parrot identifying the killer of his mistress and her dog had not sounded right to me from the beginning. The truth is finally out. It was the swift and solid investigation carried out by the police (for once!) that nabbed the suspect, not the parrot. Even the bird’s name was Hari and not Herriot, which Agatha Christi gave her fictitious detective. The deceased woman’s husband, a newspaper editor by profession, proudly declared that the made-out story was the best yarn of his 40-year career. That left me confounded. Was the caper of a lie superbly told more significant for the veteran media-person than his pain on the loss of the spouse?
‘Good question!’ That was Kaga Bhushundi Ji, of course. ‘The moot point is why should a man, whose livelihood is to trade truth, devise an elaborate lie at the cost of his own credibility? ‘
‘And the answer, Kaga Ji?’ I asked him.
‘The short answer, my son, is that man, of all creatures, is a liar at heart. In the news-story you mentioned, the editor played a little game to make his personal tragedy as fascinating to the world at large as he could.’
‘How could anyone be so bird-brained!’
‘Please do not insult us birds. We are not like you humans who live out their lives on one or the other lie. Man is mayavi – a magician craftier than Ravana’s uncle Maricha ever was. Birds don’t play tricks. A crow acts like a crow, a peacock a peacock and a sparrow a sparrow. If a few locked-up parrots start mimicking the speech of their mindless captors, they don’t matter. They are outside their ilk. Now look at you. Earth bound, you want to fly….’
Kaga Ji,’ I interrupted him, ‘I am afraid you are straying.’
‘Perhaps I am. But have you understood why that editor of yours lied to the whole world? What did he gain from his sham? Has he been able to win back his wife from Yama-loka?’
‘As you said, he bargained for a little fame….’
‘A bargain indeed!’ exclaimed Kaga Ji. ‘If a mere akhbar-wala can do this, imagine what kind of maya the netas will be playing with you people in the coming weeks that precede elections. Reminds me of what Rahul Gandhi said in a recent public meeting: ‘…those who read Gita would know what Congress has done for Hindus!’ Why did no one tell me before that the Holy Gita narrated only the good deeds of the Indian National Congress? All these millennia I have been thinking that the scripture spoke of matters quite different!’
Follow our WhatsApp channel