A husband and wife had one son, who was married to a girl from another town. The girl’s parents had given her a proper marriage with jewels, so she wasn’t a burden. It turned out that her father-in-law was all right, but her mother-in-law didn’t like the new bride at all. Every day, after her husband went to work, the girl knew nothing but hardship: she had to clean, wash, cook, everything! And she wasn’t given any food.

She suffered terribly, but she bore it all patiently and said nothing to her husband. Even this wasn’t enough for the mother-in-law, however, who planned a little something extra. One day after her husband and son had left the house, she put the poor girl in a sack, lifted her onto a bullock cart and took her to the cremation ground.

She put the sack on a stack of wood and was about to light the pyre, when she realised that she had no matches, so she went back to get them.

Near the cremation ground, four watchmen who were supposed to guard goats were lying down half-asleep. Inside the sack, the girl realised her mother-in-law had gone and tried to get out. The watchmen thought they heard a strange sound, like a voice crying: “Help me! Someone help, me!” They searched around until they found the sack on the ground, opened it and saw the girl, which frightened them to death – since it was the cremation ground! But she reassured them.

Then the girl filled the sack with charcoal – there’s a lot around in cremation grounds, isn’t there? – and left with the watchmen. When the mother-in-law returned with the matches, she poured groundnut all over the sack, lit it and said, “That’s all for you, honey! I’ll marry my son to a rich bride now!” and went back home where she told her husband and son that the girl had simply run back to her parents’ house. The son accepted this and went to sleep.

Meanwhile the watchmen asked the girl what had happened and she said, “My parents married me off well, but my mother-in-law stopped me from speaking or sleeping with my husband and then did this to me!” “Well, it’s morning now; you can go safely,” they said. She left them and walked some distance in the early hours of the morning.

She came to a Ganesa temple and rested inside; soon four thieves arrived, as they often did, after looting the countryside. Seeing them with their cash, gold and other booty, she hid behind the statue of Ganesa. They emptied their sacks and said, “Lord Ganesa! Here’s your usual one-third,” and gave necklaces, cash and jewels as an offering to the god. After they left with the rest of the loot, the girl came out of hiding, dressed herself with this hoard of jewelry and walked back to her mother-in-law’s house.

Hearing a knock on the door, the old woman opened it and was stunned: “Who are you?” “It’s me,” said the daughter-in-law. “But how? I tried to burn you! What happened?” “Oh,” said the girl, “you burned me all right, but I went straight to heaven and met my parents. Know what they said? “You’re too young to have died; you’ve got years to go yet. Here, take these jewels and go back to earth and enjoy life.” Then I came back here.” “Really! You must burn me, too, so I can visit my parents and get jewels from them!”

The daughter-in-law consented to her request and, without telling her husband, tied the old woman in a sack, took her to the cremation ground and lit the fire. The old woman died, and the daughter-in-law came back home, where she told her husband the whole story. And they lived happily after that.

A folktale sourced from 22 Tales from Tamil Nadu.
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