The Chain of Blame
Akbar-Birbal Stories · 1 min read
An important messenger arrived at court hours late with urgent news, and Akbar, furious at the delay in matters of state, demanded to know exactly whose fault it was.
The messenger blamed his horse, which had gone lame on muddy roads. The stable master blamed the roads themselves, which had gone unrepaired for months. The road official blamed the recent heavy rains for washing out the repairs before they could be finished. Frustrated at a chain of excuses with no clear villain, Akbar turned to Birbal and demanded he find the true cause once and for all.
Birbal thought for a moment and answered simply. "Your Majesty, if we must trace the chain far enough, the rains were caused by the clouds, the clouds by the sea's evaporation, the sea by the nature the Creator gave it — and at that point, Your Majesty, I would humbly suggest we stop asking who to punish, and instead simply fix the road."
Akbar laughed despite himself, saw the sense in it immediately, and ordered the road properly repaired that same week — solving in one afternoon what a chain of blame had never managed to fix at all.
Moral of the story
Chasing blame far enough always leads nowhere useful — fixing the actual problem is faster.