As the headman of his village, Malukdas laid great emphasis on labour. That explains his disagreement with the priest, who fed the hungry villagers without making them contribute anything. The priest held the view that it’s erroneous to assume that humans provide food. It’s the Lord who feeds.
Malukdas decided to prove the priest wrong. So, off he trekked towards the jungle. ‘Let’s see how the Lord manages to feed me!’ he smirked. He had no inkling of the strange events about to unfold. In his attempt to avoid the travellers, Malukdas perched himself on a branch high up on a tree. Around noon, he saw a passerby sit under the tree, who opened his bag and laid out his lunch, which was enough for an entire family. That’s when Malukdas noticed the traveller make a hasty exit. He understood the reason for the strange behaviour when he saw a group of dacoits. Finding such aromatic, sumptuous fare laid out in the jungle, the dacoits wondered as to who could have kept it there. Just then, one of them spotted Malukdas.
On being accosted by the dacoits, Malukdas narrated the sequence of events, but they didn’t buy his story. They were sure the food belonged to him, and fearing that he might have poisoned or drugged it to trap them, they forced him to taste all the food items. Before he realised, Malukdas’s stomach was full. As the dacoits released him, the priest’s words rang in his head: ‘Even if you control your hunger and Ram wants to fill your stomach, he would.’ With this incident, a profound wisdom dawned upon Malukdas. Little wonder he wrote these prophetic lines: Ajgar kare na chakri, Panchi kare na kaam, Das Maluka keh gaye, Sab ke daata Ram. (Pythons aren’t employed, and birds do no job, Maluk Das says unto you, that Ram provides for all). Not that other creatures don’t work hard. They work harder, but without the needless anxiety that humans are prone to. Malukdas realised that every creature, except humans, has faith in nature. This distrust is the handiwork of the human mind.
We must recall Malukdas’s words during despondency and even while pushing ourselves to the hilt by putting our relationships, health and happiness at stake. Remember that unnecessary fretting over the result or overdoing any work is futile. The trick is to put in your sincere, concerted, balanced effort and let life unfold the rest. Appropriate results invariably follow. It’s baffling to see humans fail to comprehend the philosophy that even pythons and birds grasp naturally.
