Raja Harishchandra and the Price of Truth

Harishchandra, king of Ayodhya, was famous for never speaking an untruth. When he was praised in Indra's court, Vishwamitra said he would test it.

Vishwamitra came to him in a dream and asked for his entire kingdom as a gift. On waking, the king kept the word — throne, treasury, land, all handed over.

Then Vishwamitra said, "A gift must be followed by the customary fee."

The kingdom was already gone. To pay the fee, Harishchandra came to Kashi with his wife Taramati and his son Rohitashva.

There he sold his wife and son into service in a brahmin's household. When the amount still fell short, he sold himself to a chandala — and was set to work collecting the fee for corpses at the cremation ghat.

The king stood at that gate, day and night.

One night a woman came carrying the body of a boy. Her clothes were torn, she was weeping, and she had nothing to pay with.

In the light he saw that it was Taramati, and the body was Rohitashva's — the boy had died of a snakebite.

Harishchandra broke. But he said, "This ghat is not mine. Here I am a servant, not a master. I cannot let a cremation happen without the fee — not even for my own son."

Taramati tore half her sari to offer as payment.

At that moment the gods appeared. Vishwamitra came forward and said the whole thing had been a test. Rohitashva was restored to life, the kingdom returned, and Harishchandra's name became a synonym for truth.

How to read this story

It is not meant for simple applause. It also shows a man's vow being paid for by his family — Taramati and Rohitashva never made that choice. Gandhi wrote that a play about Harishchandra, seen in childhood, moved him more than anything else.

Moral: Truth is not cheap; the bill comes due precisely on the day lying would be easiest. And there is a second question worth asking — am I the only one paying, or is someone else paying with me?