The Value of The Statue
Once upon a time, there was a king whose one desire in life was to grow popular. No doubt, he did his best to please his subjects. He had created a post of the headman in every village and had appointed a prominent villager to the post. Once a year he called a meeting of all the headmen. In their annual meetings, the headmen generally praised the king. At the same time, they brought to his notice whatever problems their villages faced. The king took steps to solve the problems. "Never in the history of our kingdom was there a King who was loved so much!" a headman would say. "Why in the history of our Kingdom alone? Was there ever a king in all the neighboring kingdoms who could rival our King in popularity?" would say another. The king, though a good man, was quite flattered by such comments. When the king was quite sure that the people loved him very much, he made his statues adore all the villages. No doubt, people derived much benefit from their king. So they regularly garlanded the statue. In many villages, they grew gardens around the king's statue.
When the king learned how his statues were treated, he was delighted. In the next conference of the headmen, Suryakant, the headman of Nigampur informed the King that his villages suffered much due to scarcity of water. The king made arrangements for potfuls of water to be brought from a river in a cart and distributed among the villagers. But the arrangement did not work satisfactorily. Those villagers who were influential claimed more water. Poor families continued to suffer. Suryakant told the king, "Your Majesty, we are grateful to you for the arrangements you have made. But, the system is not dependable. The cart may break down, the carter may fall ill. The best course will be to send a team of water diviners. They can point out the ground under which water can be found. We can dig wells following their indication. The king sent a team of experts. They examined every part of the village and found that there was only one chunk of ground that could yield water. But that is the ground on which stood the king's statue. The team and Suryakant reported their finding to the king and said, "The statue must be shifted to another place if the water is to be struck."
"How dare you propose such a step!" blurted out the king. "Don't you realize how sacred is my statue to the people?" He dismissed Suryakant from his post and took the experts to the task. However, in order to remove the difficulty of the people of Nigampur, he arranged for two carts to supply water to them instead of one. He had no doubt in his mind that the villagers would feel grateful to him. A year passed. One day the king donned a disguise and paid a visit to Nigampur. To his great surprise, he saw that his statue stood neglected. Wild shrubs grew around it. Nobody cared to garland it. Only then did the king realize that water was much more valuable to the villagers than his statue. They had grown an aversion for the statue which deprived them of water. The king, upon returning to the palace, ordered for the statue to be shifted. Further, he ordered two wells to be dug on the ground where the statue stood earlier. He also restored Suryakant to his position and apologized to the experts. A year later the King visited Nigampur again. He observed that the villagers had grown a garden around his statue and the statue was duly garlanded. The incident proved to be of great value to the king. He went on doing good for his people, but without giving much importance to the people's praise for him.
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