Just One Question One Day a scholar came to the court of Emperor Akbar and challenged Birbal to answer his questions and thus prove that he was as clever as people said he was. He asked Birbal: "Would you prefer to answer a hundred easy questions or just a single difficult one?" Both the emperor and Birbal had had a difficult day and were impatient to leave. "Ask me one difficult question," sad Birbal. "Well, then, tell me," said the man, "which came first into the world, the chicken or the egg?" "The chicken," replied Birbal. "How do you know?" asked the scholar, a note o ... read more

The Foolish Brahmin Once upon a time a foolish brahmin came to visit Birbal with a strange request. He wanted to be addressed as ‘pandit’. Now, the term ‘pandit’ refers to a man of learning. But unfortunately this poor brahmin was uneducated. Birbal tried to explain the difference to him saying that it was not correct to call an uneducated man a pandit and because of this very reason it would be improper to call him so. But the silly brahmin had his heart set on this title. So, as usual, Birbal had a brilliant idea. He said that as the brahmin was an uneducated man he should hurl abuse ... read more

List of blinds Once King Akbar questioned Birbal if he knows the number of blind citizens of their kingdom. Birbal had requested Akbar to give him a week’s time. The next day Birbal was found to be mending shoes in the town market. People were astonished to see Birbal doing such work. Many of them started to question "Birbal!! What are you doing?" Once when he was asked this question by someone he started writing something. It continued for a week when on the 7th day King Akbar himself asked Birbal the same question. Giving him no answer, Birbal reported at the court the next da ... read more

Birbal, can you Identify The Guest Once Birbal was invited for dinner by a rich man. When Birbal reached there, he found himself in a large crowd. The host greeted him warmly and took him inside. Birbal said, "I did not know that there will be so many guests in this gathering." The host replied politely, "They are not guests, Sir. They are my employees except one who is the only other guest here besides you. Could you tell who is that other one guest here?" "Maybe, I could. Tell them a joke, and I will observe them." The rich man told the joke and everybody laughed uproariously. Perhaps ... read more

Three Idols As you know Akbar considered Birbal the most intelligent person of his kingdom. Once a sculptor challenged Baadshaah Akbar that he would show three idols to him, which would look exactly like each other to his courtiers and they would have to rate them good, ok and bad. Akbar agreed. All the courtiers tried to rate them but failed, because they were so alike that they did not know how to rate them. Now it was Birbal's turn. He noticed a small hole in the ears of the idols. Birbal got curious, so he took three wires and inserted them in those holes. In the case of the first ... read more