Once upon a time, there lived a rich man who had one son and seven daughters. The son had recently reached marriageable age. As preparations for the wedding got underway, the rich man’s son visited his sisters to invite them.
He began with the youngest sister. When he asked her to accompany him, she told him that she would come after completing the pending household chores. Early morning, she prepared some chapattis for her brother as he left for the other sister’s house. She also left some chapattis for her son.
When it was time for her son to eat, she noticed that the chapattis had turned green in color. She checked the cooking utensil and found a dead snake in it. She ran out to stop his brother. Fortunately, she was able to find him on the way. She took back the food she had packed for him and gave him something else to eat.
On her way back home, she spotted a couple working at the potter’s wheel. She saw a heap of earthen lids and asked the potter why there were so many lids. The potter replied that the only son of a rich man with seven sisters would die on the day of his marriage. Shocked to hear this, she asked for a way to save the groom. The potter’s wife answered that one of the groom’s sisters needed to act as a madwoman and risk her life during every wedding ritual.
In order to save her brother’s life, she began acting like a maniac at once. During the haldi function, she forced women to apply turmeric on her before they applied it on her brother. The following day, when the village women went to collect yellow earth from the mine, she pestered everyone at home so they would let her go with the group. As a result, the group couldn’t make it to the mine on time for the rituals. However, before they finally got there, a part of the mine came crumbling down, destroying everything in there. Everyone in the group escaped unscathed.
During the Ganpati worship, the apparently crazy sister sat on the chowk where her brother needed to sit. She found seven scorpions hiding under the seat and killed them. Next, she grabbed the poisonous thorn hidden under the bamboo mat and broke it into pieces.
She then accompanied the marriage procession to the bride’s house. Once again, she saved her brother from crushing underneath the main gate. Thanks to her timely warning, everyone in the procession was able to escape to safety.
Acting crazy, the sister then forced everyone to make her sit on her brother’s wedding seat. She made the priests chant the mantras and carry on with the rituals. Just then, many needles came flying in and hit her on the neck. She was quick to remove them. She then asked her brother to sit on the groom’s seat. After the marriage rituals were over, she compelled everyone to let her walk around the sacred fire first. This time, she had to put up with seven snakes, whom she killed with ease.
When the bride and bridegroom retired to their chamber at night, the seemingly crazy sister insisted that she sleep alone on the bridal bed. A lion’s picture on the bedhead came alive and attacked her. She killed the animal with a sword in one stroke. She then picked up the lion’s nail and allowed the newly married couple to come in.
The next morning, she came back to her normal self and told everyone everything that had happened. She even showed her relatives everything she had collected. Everyone appreciated her, and her brother felt proud to have such a loving sister.
Kalai is passionate about reading and reinterpreting folk tales from all over the country. Write to her at kalai.muse@gmail.com to know more about her.
Folk tale adopted and abridged from Internet Archive.