What’s in the box: Emboxed narratives, horror, and ethics in the Vetala Tales

The narrative popularly known as the Vetala Tales has unknown origins and prolific variations. Known in Sanskrit as Vetala Panchavimshati, this narrative can be found in four recensions, but also possesses forms in regional languages that have been attributed to the Sanskrit version. However, Zvelebil (1996) has noted that at least the Tamil Vikramaditya (Periya Vikkiramatittan katai; attributed to the early 19th century) has entirely different stories from the Sanskrit version, although it retains the “emboxing” style and the main framing story. In more recent times, the Vetala Tales have taken the form of children’s stories in Amar Chitra Katha comics and Chandamama magazines, two televised serials, at least three films (with a fourth in the making), and innumerable adaptations in print, including a Vikram and Vetala management training manual. In this paper, I ask two questions pertaining to this narrative: What makes this narrative possess such lasting influence and popularity? Secondly, why is a didactic narrative about ethics presented with the stylings of horror? I will explore two modern adaptations of the Vetala Tales to answer these questions – the long-running serialized children’s stories in the Chandamama magazines (specifically English and Tamil), and the Ramanand Sagar television serial Vikram aur Betaal (1985) telecast in Doordarshan.

The premise of the narrative is centered around a legendary king, Vikramaditya, who performs brave deeds and presents great wisdom. Various versions contain multiple levels of emboxings. For instance, in one version, a King Bhoja finds the throne of the long-dead King Vikramaditya and thirty-two statuettes of the throne each tell stories about the king, with the final story being the one about the king and the vetala. Most recent versions, however, begin with King Vikramaditya himself who takes on an arduous task of securing a vetala for a yogi out of gratitude. A vetala is a demonic being of death, ghosts, and cemeteries, but might have been derived from indigenous village deities. This vetala has possessed a corpse and is hanging upside down in a tree, and while the king attempts to carry it to the yogi, it narrates stories of virtue and vice requiring the king to make ethical adjudications in each case. If the king knows the answer, he must speak it or he will die. If he answers correctly, the vetala will fly back to the tree. The king has superlative prowess in determining superior ethics and it is only during the twenty-fifth story that he is stumped, rendering the vetala without the power to fly back. However, the vetala proceeds to tell another story in which the yogi is revealed to be a villain. King Vikramaditya is able to stop the yogi’s evil rite, and the vetala is freed. The gods are impressed by the king and bless him with many boons.

Chandamama was a monthly magazine founded in 1947 by Nagi Reddy and Alur Chakrapani, who were producers of Telugu films. Originally developed in Tamil and Telugu, it was eventually published in twelve languages until it was shuttered in 2012. While the magazine contained a gamut of stories from mythological to modern, the Vetala Tales became a staple running for fifty years, featuring more than six hundred stories retitled as “New Tales of Vikram-Vetala.” In contrast, the Sagar Films serial Vikram aur Betaal originally telecast on the national TV channel in 1985 and re-aired in 1988 after the success of the creator, Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan TV serial ran for a limited twenty-six episodes, staying close to its older origins. Starring Arun Govil who would go on to be cast as King Rama in Ramayan as King Vikramaditya, and respected theatre and movie actor Sajjan as the betaal, the show uses stylizations from horror, such as make-up, set design, and music, to present the narrative.

Through analyzing the variations of the narrative in Chandamama, I argue that the plasticity of the emboxed narrative lends itself to diversity in storytelling, which allows for the ethical lessons to change based on the context. Thus, as times change and values change, the lessons can also change; additionally, the complexity of ethical reasoning can also be shifted based on the presumed audience of the tale. Secondly, through a visual analysis of Vikram aur Betaal, I contend that the idiom of horror visually emphasizes the existential stakes of ethical decisions, and provides the alternative to civilized living when the right decisions are not made. Through analyses of both of these retellings of the Vetala Tales, I consider the work performed by narrative and horror in the service of ethical introspection.