Birbal was jester, counsellor, and fool to the great Moghul emperor, Akbar.
The villagers loved to talk of Birbal's wisdom and cleverness,
and the emperor loved to try to outsmart him.
One day Akbar (emperor) drew a line across the floor.
"Birbal," he ordered, "you must make this line shorter, but you cannot erase any bit of it."
Everyone present thought the emperor had finally outsmarted Birbal.
It was clearly an impossible task.
Yet within moments the emperor and everyone else present had to agree that Birbal had made the line shorter without erasing any of it.
How could this be?
There is a box in which distinct numbered balls have been kept. You have to pick two balls randomly from the lot.
If someone is offering you a 2 to 1 odds that the numbers will be relatively prime, for example
If the balls you picked had the numbers 6 and 13, you lose $1.
If the balls you picked had the numbers 5 and 25, you win $2.
In a picnic session, a footballer was practicing. During his play, he busted lips and ears and broke ribs and thighs. However, he was still able to play a professional match on the very next day.
A detective visits his friend John just to discover that John's neighbour Dr Jacob was murdered. Dr Jacob, who is a mathematician wrote the murderer's name in a code word "Hcqtfz". There were five suspects
1. Ajit
2. Pankaj
3. Ganpat
4. Deenu
5. Hariya
The Detective was instantly able to find the murderer.
Can you?
A boy was driving a car, a girl took a lift from her. She asked his name. The boy said - my name is hidden in my car’s number, find it if you can. After this, she got down Car number was [ WV733N ] Can you guess the name now?
John went to meet his friend Jacob, but when he was about to reach the main gate, John notices that Jacob had a mighty dog who was fastened to the tree. The chain is long enough that it allows the dog to reach the main gate.
Three men in a cafe order a meal the total cost of which is $15. They each contribute $5. The waiter takes the money to the chef who recognises the three as friends and asks the waiter to return $5 to the men.
The waiter is not only poor at mathematics but dishonest and instead of going to the trouble of splitting the $5 between the three he simply gives them $1 each and pockets the remaining $2 for himself.
Now, each of the men effectively paid $4, the total paid is therefore $12. Add the $2 in the waiters pocket and this comes to $14. Where has the other $1 gone from the original $15?