Class 8 NCERT Solutions English Chapter 8: Jalebis

He didn’t pay the school fees on the day he brought money to school because the teacher who collected the fees Master Ghulam Mohammed was on leave and the fees would be collected the next day.

(i)   The coins were asking him what he was thinking about? They were saying that those fresh, hot jalebis coming out of the Kadhao in the shop were not coming out for nothing. Jalebis were meant to be eaten and only those with money in their pocket could eat them. They also told him that money was meant to be spent and only those who liked jalebis spent it.

He did not take the coin’s advice because he was a good boy and did not want to be misguided by the coins. He got so much at home that for him even looking at something in the bazaar was a sin. Besides they were his fees and fund money and if he did spent it on jalebis how would he show his face to the Master Ghulam Mohammed in school the next day and after that to Allah miyan at Qayamat?

(i)   The oldest coin told him that they were telling him something for his own good and he was trying to strangle them. Didn’t he feel like eating those hot, hot jalebis? Besides even if he spent the coins that day he would get the scholarship money the next day. He suggested buying the sweets with the fees money and paying his fees with the scholarship money.

(ii)  No, he did not follow his advice because he did not want to be swept away by their talk so easily.

As he reached home and sat on the bed, the coins began to speak. He went inside to have lunch, they began to shriek. Thoroughly fed up, he rushed out of the house barefoot and ran towards the bazaar. Terrified, he told the halwai to weigh a whole rupee worth of jalebis. The halwai gave him an astonished look that seemed to ask where the handcart in which he would carry all those jalebis was. The halwai opened up a whole newspaper and heaped a pile of jalebis on it.

(i)   He didn't eat all the jalebis he had bought because he had already eaten so many jalebis that if anyone had pressed his stomach a little, jalebis would have popped out of his ears and nostrils.

(ii)  Very quickly the boys from the entire neighbourhood assembled in the gali. He was so pleased with his stomach full of jalebis that he got into the mood for some fun and handed out the remaining jalebis to the children around. Delighted they ran off, jumping and screaming, into the galis.

The fear was that he had gobbled up so many jalebis that digesting them became another matter. With every breath came a burp, and with every burp, the danger of bringing out a jalebi or two. This was the fear that was killing him.

“Children's stomachs are like digestion machines” simply means that their digestive systems are very similar to machines they can eat whatever they want and as much as they want and their stomachs like machines digest all the food very easily. Like a machine his stomach too worked all through night and in the morning, just like any other day, he washed his face and headed for school. Yes, I agree with it.

He planned to pay the fees the next day with the previous months scholarship that he was to receive next day.

When it was time to pay the fees, he tucked his bag under his arm and left the school and simply followed his nose and kept walking on and on. He had decided if no mountain or ocean blocked his path he would keep going till the earth ended and the sky began and once he got there, he would ask Allah miyan, to save him just this once by ordering a farishta to pass by and drop just four rupees into his pocket. He promised he would use the money only to pay the fees and not to eat jalebis. He reached the point where the Kambelpur railway station began. The elders had warned him never to cross the railway tracks. They had also warned him never to eat sweets with one’s fees money. But he had disobeyed them by doing so.

The consequence of buying and eating jalebi with the fees money was that for the first time in his life he was absent from school and spending the day crouching in the shade of a tree in a deserted corner of a railway station.

His prayer to God is like a lawyer’s defence of a bad case. However he does not argue his case well. The points he makes were as follows;

He starts off by saying that he is a good boy and has memorized the entire namaaz, he even knows the last ten surats of the Quran by heart, and he could recite the entire ayat-al-kursi.

He says that he is a devoted servant of Allah and all that he wants from him is the fees money that he ate jalebis with.

He then admits his mistake but again tries to justify his action by saying that he did not eat all the jalebis himself but fed them to many children.

He tries to convince Allah by saying had he known that the scholarship money was to be given next month he would neither have eaten them nor fed them to the others.

He tells Allah to put just four rupees in his bag and if there was a paisa more than four rupees he will be very displeased with him.

He promised, Allah if he ever ate sweets with his fees money again, then he would deserve a thief’s punishment.

He offers to play a game with Allah Miyan. He tells Allah miyan that he will go from there to a signal and in the meantime Allah had to secretly place four rupees under a big rock. He would touch the big rock and return. It would be fun if when he picked up the rock he found the money underneath.

No, he did not get any money under the rock by playing the game. Instead when he lifted the rock a big hairy worm got up and curling, and twisting wriggled towards him.

If God had granted his wish that day, the harm that would have caused him later in life would be that he would have never realized his mistake and the importance of honesty and truthfulness. He would continue doing one wrong deed after another and would be convinced that if he begged and bargained with God he would help him out of the difficult situation he put himself into each time.