Gummadikaya donga ante bhujaalu thadumukunnattu

So, first let me tell you the story behind this proverb.

There was a rich landlord who had a pumpkin growing and selling business. The business was going well until one day the landlord noticed that his sales were dropping. It was not by much but there was a definite drop in the sales. So, he started going through the entire process of selling to find out what was going wrong.

So he went to the pumpkin farm and saw all the farmers honesty growing the pumpkins and then reaping them. He went to the market and found his shops operating without a glitch. Finally, he went to the storage and found that instead of the hundred jute bags that held the pumpkins, only 98 were there. Every week he went to the storage and found that two bags were missing.

One night he decided to go and and find out the thief himself. He went, hid himself behind a bush and saw his night watchmen patrolling the storage alert. He suddenly jumped out of the bushes and shouted aloud. “WHO DARES STEAL MY PUMPKINS?”

All the watchmen came running to him to see what’s wrong. He watched all of them as he asked again, “WHO DARES CARRY MY PUMPKINS AWAY? IF I FIND THE HAIR OF JUTE ON YOUR BACK, YOU WILL BE PUNISHED LIKE ANYTHING!”

Immediately, one of the watchmen started touching his shoulders and dusting them off in a jerky manner, trying to look not too guilty and at the same time, trying to get rid of jute hairs from his back. The landlord saw him and immediately knew who the thief was!

So “gummadikayala donga ante bhujaalu thadumukunnattu” means, trying to not look too guilty when you are confronted for the crime that you have done, but getting caught because the guilt is plain shown on your face.

I would say, if there is a proverb in English, it would probably be like “When asked who’s the thief, he started sweating bullets”

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dasi Mantri Mata Rambha Lakshmi and Dharitri - The roles

Today I wish to talk about the shloka "Karyeshu Dasi, Karaneshu Mantri, Bhojyeshu Mata, Shayaneshu Rambha, Roopeshu Lakshmi, Kshamayeshu Dharitri, Shath dharma yuktah, kula dharma patni" There have been many interpretations of this shloka. The most accepted one is "a woman who works like a servant, advises like a minister, feeds you like a mother, pleases you in bed like sylph (a beautiful goddess), is the embodiment of goddess lakshmi, forgives you with patience as that of mother Earth, that woman who possesses these six virtues is your true wife who can share the dharma of you and your family". So, is this the interpretation? But this makes no woman eligible to be a wife. Not every woman is sylphlike, not every woman possesses intelligence enough to advise you, not every woman can please you in bed, not every woman can dress up and prance around in anklets, not every woman can forgive your monumental mistakes and definitely not every woman can feed you unle...
Read more

Supporting a Choice

People talk a lot about making a choice. How difficult it is, how hard it is, how mind-racking it is, how nerve-wrecking it is, etc-etc. Some choices we make to better our situation, some we make to get out of a situation, while some we make nonchalantly, some we make for a higher purpose and so on. Every choice has Yin and Yang side. It doesn't always mean that a choice has good and bad sides. It merely has advantages and disadvantages. If a choice offers more advantages, one simply opts for it. But sometimes, we simply make a choice not because its advantageous, but it is morally right. For example, a desperate man stole medicines for his ailing wife. He is a righteous man, so he surrenders himself to the law. He made a choice of surrendering himself, because it is simply the right thing to do. Another time, a student has to choose between two equally competent colleges. He looks at the advantages of each college offers to him and then decides. Here he makes a suita...
Read more