Short Stories: Vikram Aur Betaal

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Vikram Aur Betaal



The legend says that King Vikramaditya, in order to fulfil a vow, was required to remove a corpse of betaal from a treetop and carry it on his shoulder to another place in silence.



Enroute, the spirit of Betaal (in the corpse) used to narrate a story to the king and after completing the story Betaal would pose a query that if he (The king) knew the answer, was bound to respond lest he will break his head into thousand pieces.



But if he does speak out, he would break the vow of silence and Betaal would fly back to the treetop, leaving the king inches short of his destination! The king would go after the vampire and start all over again. And so on and on.



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The stories of Vikram and Betal, originally written in sanskrit, have been an integral part of Indian fairy tales for many centuries. Legend has it that King Vikramaditya (Vikram), the emperor of Ujjain promises a monk to bring Betal, the vampire as a fovour promised to him. The condition is that the king should bring the vampire in complete silence, lest Betal, the vampire will fly back with the corpse to its abode. As soon as Vikram attempts to fetch the corpse in which the vampire Betal was residing, the vampire starts to narrate a story. And at the end of every story it compells king Vikram to solve the puzzle of the story, thus breaking his silence. The stories thus narrates by Betal, the Vampire forms an interesting series of fairy tales.

The introduction shows the setting for the stories, and conclusion shows what happened after King Vikram fulfilled his promise to the monk.



http://www.samasya.com/stories/vikram/vikram-betal.html



http://www.bharatadesam.com/literature/stories_of_vikram_betal/vikram_and_betal.php



http://www.nalanda.nitc.ac.in/resources/english/etext-project/fairytales/vikram.pdf