This is story about a child who just loves butterflies and as any young child wants to catch one............
But a kind servant boy shows how such a small living thing if bound or caught is completely unable to fend for itself if Man interferes by trying to capture it in a simple act of giving Happiness..................!!

There is a story of ten year old Madhuri living with her parents in Pune in Maharastra. She lived in the city all her life with her parents who were working individuals and she would go visiting her grandparents in the village Sajjanpur in the school summer holidays. She would feel very happy and excited as her grandparents would pamper and spoil her a lot when ever she went there unlike her parents who would rather have her to develop as a prim and proper lady living in the city. So she would just love the serenity away from the hustle and the bustle of the city life as well and also enjoy her care free time with her grandparents.

After she got promoted to her fifth class, she knew that she soon would be joining her grandparents in the village the very next day after her school gave them holidays. The summer vacations would last for a month and it would usually be heavenly time for Madhuri. She had summer school and there were going to announce the future dates of comming back to school after the holidays and they would then be left for the day after recieving some home work to be done during the vacations.

Soon it was the last day and she got up early to get dressed for school. Her mom was surprised but was pleased with her daughter that she was learning to be responsible. And Madhuri was also happy that it was her last day in school today as tomorrow morning she would be in her grandparent's house in the village. Her mother would be the one to accompany her for this trip but she was going to stay only for a day and then leave for Pune the very next day. She would be returning to Pune when her father would come to pick her up from the village while returning.They would be travelling by train for both the trips.

Madhuri soon arrived at her grandparent's house the next day after a very comfortable journey with her mother by train in the night. She had slept through the whole journey. She was very excited as she was going to meet them after almost a year. Jogharao the servant had come to the railway station to receive them. It was dark by the time they reached the village. Her grandparents were very pleased and said that she had grown since they had last seen her and Madhuri was quite glad. She was tired of the journey and went to sleep as soon as she had dinner and the first day passed off quietly.
Then her mother left after spending a whole day and a half with her parents and then caught the late afternooon train fron Sajjanpur back to Pune. Madhuri was thrilled that she had come back after a long time. She was very happy because she had lots of different things to do and they would be quite different from all that she was usually did. She could play with the sand near the pond, and she could catch butterflies and dragonflies in the garden.

On the next day after her bath she went to the pond and saw the fish dancing to the rhythm of morning sun light. She threw stones at the fish and thrilled to see the disturbed fish schools. She had her lunch and went to the garden. She found a lot of flowers, plucked them and made a garland with them. She collected a bunch of flowers for her mother.

She saw lot of butterflies there and tried to catch them, but couldn’t do so. She became very upset. Her grand parents noticed that she was upset and asked her why she was upset. She told them that she was unable to catch any butterflies. They consoled her and told her to try again. The next day, she went to the garden and tried, but she failed. Her grandparents felt sad seeing their granddaughter getting upset. Every day she would go happily into the garden but returned back unhappy. This continued for a few days.

On the seventh day, they sent Jogharao to assist Madhuri in catching the butterflies. Jogharao went with her but didn’t help her in catching the butterflies. He just sat under a tree and watched her chase the butterflies. The sun rose up in the sky and the shade grew dense and a cool wind blew, very soon Jogharao drifted into a sound sleep.
When he awoke after sometime, he saw her sitting beside him looking like a Princess defeated in war.

He got up and took her to the middle of the garden where there were many bushes full of different flowers around which many butterflies were howering all around them. He ran behind a butterfly and caught it by the wings. Madhuri came running towards him gleefully looking at the butterfly and pleading him to give it to her. He gave the butterfly to her, at the same time telling her to be gentle with it. Madhuri was excited as well as happy to finally catch a butterfly and so caught it very tightly so that it would not fly away. As soon as she caught it with her hand, than the part of the wings which she was catching broke off from the rest of its body and it fell down. It made huge streneuos efforts to fly up again but it could not. It was unable to fly but could not do so because of the absence of it's wings, it struggled for some time and then finally died trying to fly after some time.

Madhuri had watched it with such intensity and a sadness that only she could understand as all these days she had tried so hard to catch a butterfly but couldn't. When she finally caught one, it died due to her eagerness to catch it tightly so that it would not fly away.
Then Jogarao explained to her who was on the verge of weeping, by telling her and pointing towards the butterfly lying on the ground, that “By touching it you can kill, but by leaving it alone you are preserving life and beauty. You also have it in possession by admiring it's beauty with your eyes.”

From the next day onwards she went to the garden but never got upset again. Her Grandparents thought that Jogharao caught butterflies for her everyday but she had left chasing the butterflies. They never got to know what had happened on that day when Jogharao helped Madhuri to catch Butterflies as that was their little secret. They became the Best of Friends........................!!


The End.