The True Judgment

Click here to read in Gujarati
I am swinging on my easy chair with the news paper in my hands in my Verandah. I am concentrated in reading and meanwhile, I hear the loud words of both my sons. They are not quarrelling, but they have a dispute for their heights in-between them. They stand about ten feet away from me, keeping their shoulders touched and ask in their childlike tone of speech, “Daddy, please give us your true judgment. Who is taller among us?”

Smilingly, I observe them accurately as I have to give them my true judgment. There is the difference of only two years in their ages. They seem almost equal in height. I just try to speak; but meanwhile, I slip away to some far past. After a while, I see their faces dim as the tears in my eyes have over flown.

Both, rapidly running towards me, set themselves by my both the sides. They wipe out my tears with their rosy tiny palms and say crying, “Daddy, are you crying?”

I try to recover myself as it is true that I am crying. The news paper falls down my lap and I press their cheeks with mine and give my true judgment. “You are equal. Nobody is taller than the other. But, behind you, I saw my Swati standing with dimples on both her cheeks, like a she-pigeon and smiling like a blossomed flower. She is taller than both of you. My Swati who, before your births, had left us weeping behind almost at your age to play in the lap of your grandpa in heaven.”

On the open page of my news paper, all the six eyes of ours once again over flow and shower the tears making the sound like rain drops. At that right moment, my wife bows down to place the tray of tea on teapoy. Her lukewarm tears also fall down in my cup of hot tea and mingle in it.

-Valibhai Musa
Dtd: 10^th June, 2007

Annexure – II :-
(With reference to “A Challenging Puzzle (3 in 1) dated 10th Sept., 2007)

Modification of the Answer: – “You have to go opposite to the Answer.”