Question:
Answer in about 80 words: What vow did the Maharaja take and how did he fulfil that?
(From 'The Tiger King' by Kalki)
Answer in about 80 words: What vow did the Maharaja take and how did he fulfil that?
(From 'The Tiger King' by Kalki)
(From 'The Tiger King' by Kalki)
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The Maharaja's vow and its ironic fulfilment through a wooden toy tiger form the story's central twist.
Updated On: Sep 24, 2026
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Solution and Explanation
Step 1: The prophecy:
As an infant, astrologers predicted the Maharaja of Pratibandapuram would one day be killed by a tiger, the hundredth he encountered.
Final Answer:
Enraged by this prediction, the Maharaja vowed to kill 100 tigers himself to defy fate. He hunted relentlessly, killing tiger after tiger across his kingdom and even marrying into another royal family purely to gain access to its tiger-rich forests. When real tigers ran out at 99, he secretly bought an old tiger from a circus and 'shot' it to complete his tally of 100 — but a splinter from a wooden toy tiger later caused a wound that turned septic and killed him, fulfilling the prophecy in an ironic twist.
As an infant, astrologers predicted the Maharaja of Pratibandapuram would one day be killed by a tiger, the hundredth he encountered.
Final Answer:
Enraged by this prediction, the Maharaja vowed to kill 100 tigers himself to defy fate. He hunted relentlessly, killing tiger after tiger across his kingdom and even marrying into another royal family purely to gain access to its tiger-rich forests. When real tigers ran out at 99, he secretly bought an old tiger from a circus and 'shot' it to complete his tally of 100 — but a splinter from a wooden toy tiger later caused a wound that turned septic and killed him, fulfilling the prophecy in an ironic twist.
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It is clear that language is used for more than one purpose. The man who hits his thumb nails with a hammer and utters a string of curses is using language to relieve his feeling and needs no audience but himself. But when a philosopher uses language to clarify his ideas on a subject, he is using it as an instrument of thought. When two women gossip over the fence or two men exchange greetings as they pass in the street, language is being used to strengthen the bonds between the members of society. Language, it seems, is a multipurpose instrument. One function, however, seems to be basic — language enables us to influence people's behaviour and thereby makes human co-operation possible. Some animals co-operate especially the social animals like bees and ants, but human co-operation is more thorough, more detailed, more effective than that found anywhere in the animal kingdom. The human co-operation would be unthinkable without language.
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