Being under tremendous pressure to keep the alliance of political parties
together and not knowing who was capable of helping him run the country the
PM (Girija Prasad Koirala) took a trip to India and on his trip he had a
'Darshan' with Mrs. Sonia Gandhi. During the meeting he asked her, "How do
you manage to keep the alliance of parties together and run the country so
well and so effortlessly?
"That's easy," she replied, "I identify the intelligent leaders in the
alliance and keep them close to me and always take their guidance and
advise."
"But how can I tell whether they are intelligent or not?" the PM inquired.
"You ask them a riddle," she replied, and with that she pressed a button and
said, "Would you please send Manmohan Singh in."
When Manmohan arrived, Sonia said, "I have a riddle for you to answer for
me. Your parents had a child and it was not your sister and it was not your
brother. Who was this child?"
Manmohan replied, "That 's easy. The child was me."
"Very good," said the Sonia, "Thank you. You may go, now."
So the PM came back to Kathmandu and called his main coalition ally Madhev
Nepal, hoping he would pass the riddle test as he really wanted and needed
him in the days ahead to keep the alliance together. He said to him, "I
have a riddle for you, and the answer is very important. Your parents had a
child and it was not your sister and it was not your brother. Who was this
child?"
Nepal replied, "Yes, it is clearly very important that we determine the
answer, as no child must be left behind when we build the new inclusive
Nepal. Can I deliberate on this for a while?"
"Yes," said the PM, "I'll give you four hours to come up with the answer."
So Nepal went and called a meeting of the rest of the seven parties, other
than the Maoists as he didn't want them to know such an important question
let alone the answer, and asked them the riddle. But after much discussion
and many suggestions, none of them had a satisfactory answer. So he was
quite upset, not knowing what he would tell the PM.
As Nepal was going back to Baluwatar, he saw Prachanda approaching. So he
said, "Comrade, can you answer this riddle for me. Your parents had a child
and it was not your sister and it was not your brother. Who was the child?"
That's easy, said Prachanda, "The child was me."
"Oh thank you," said Nepal, trying not to let him know what a big problem he
had solved and brushed him aside, rushing off with a big smile to Baluwatar.
So Nepal got to Baluwatar he went rushing in to see the PM and he proudly
said, "I think I know the answer to your riddle. The child was PRACHANDA!"
"No, you idiot!" shouted the PM in disgust, "You can not even solve the
riddle how can I count on you… The child was MANMOHAN SINGH!!!"
