KTB – Face your fearsThe KTB trio aka Krish, the monkey, Trish, the cat & Baltiboy the donkey are back with yet another set of three stories based on the theme 'Face your fears'. Inspired from their own set of daily madness they narrate the stories with full fervor.BHOLU’S ACT OF BRAVERYTrish narrates the first story, which is from the state of Andhra Pradesh in the South-eastern coastal region of India. The art-form from this region is called as Togalu Gombeyaata, more commonly known as Leather Puppets. Togalu Gombeyaata translates to a play of leather dolls in the native language. It is a form of Shadow Puppetry The story is about a baby elephant named Bholu, who wants to be as strong and brave like his father. And to prove his bravery he wanders off to the other side of the jungle which in inhabited by humans. There he is captured by the men from the circus who lock him inside a cage. There Bholu sees other animals who have also been captured by the humans and are made to do tricks. They are beaten up if they fail to follow orders. Bholu is extremely saddened by this sight. Madari, a monkey becomes his friend and tries to cheer him up by giving him a banana to eat. Bholu gets into a fight with one of the humans who beats him for refusing to obey his orders. Bholu fights valiantly and takes on the humans bravely in the fight. Ultimately the humans somehow manage to subdue him by throwing a piece of cloth over his eyes to blind him. He is then again locked up in his cage. His bravery does not go unnoticed and a cunning snake, Damini hatches a plan to escape from the circus with Bholu and Madari’s help. The next day the humans come back to take Madari and Bholu for their daily exercises. Madari goes with the humans while Bholu acts tired and stays back in his cage. Finally he is left alone with only one human as all the others are busy execising the animals. Seeing this Bholu springs up and attacks the human as per their plan. Soon the other humans come to help their colleague. Taking advantage of this commotion, Madari steals the cage keys from one of the humans and gives them to Damini, who hides them. Madari also leaves her jar cover open so that she can escape. Seeing that their plan has worked Bholu promptly acts tired again and is subdued and locked up in his cage again.That night when all the humans are sleeping, Damini quickly sneaks out of her jar and gives the keys to Madari, who unlocks his cage door and also Bholu’s and the three of them get ready to run away from the circus. At this time, a young cub also pleads with them to help him escape too. Hearing this the other animals also plead with them to let them out of their cages. Damini being selfish refuses to help the other animals and escapes. But Bholu stays back to help the other animals. Madari is confused but also stays with Bholu. Bholu opens the animals cages one by one, allowing them to escape. Hearing the commotion one of the humans gets up and comes towards the animals cages. But inspite of the threat of being recaptured, Bholu stays back to help all the animals escape and only then does he escape with the help of Madari. They get back to the jungle where they meet Bholu’s parents who are looking for him. Madari tells them about Bholu’s act of bravery in the face of fear of being recaptured by the humans. Bholu’s father is extremely proud of him and tells him that he is even braver and stronger then him.THREE RIDDLES OF THE GHOSTThe second story narrated by Krish, is from the state of Odisha in the eastern part of India. The art-form used in this story is called Pattachitra. Pattachitra is a general term for traditional, cloth-based scroll painting. In the Sanskrit language, "Patta" literally means "cloth" and "Chitra" means "picture". Most of these paintings depict stories of Hindu deities. Gokul is a young boy who is obsessed with his Tab. He spends the whole day on it, asking question to GoGo who he thinks can answer any question. One day his cousin Shakti who lives beyond the hills comes to visit him. Shakti and Gokul are playing in the playground with a Frisbee when two of Gokul’s friends join them. All of them are enjoying playing with the Frisbee when the Frisbee flies off and lands inside the window of a dilapidated house. When Shakti says that they should go inside the house to retrieve the Frisbee, Gokul and his friends refuse saying that the house is haunted. Shakti refuses to believe them and says that he will go alone if they do not come with him. In the end only gokul musters up the courage to accompany Shakti into the haunted house. Once they enter the house they are cornered by a shadow who tells them that it is a ghost and that its going to eat them. Gokul is very scared and pleads with the ghost to let them go. In the end the ghost agrees to let them leave on the condition that they have to answer three of his questions. The boys agree to this condition. Gokul is very confident that he can answer all the questions with the help of GoGo. But at the same time his Tab runs out of battery. Shakti tells him not to worry and that they can still answer all their questions. Shakti answers the first two questions correctly. But Gokul answers the third question wrongly and the ghost threatens to eat them. Gokul is scared but still finds the courage to tell the ghost that he should eat him only as he is the one who has answered the question wrongly. Shakti is impressed by his cousins bravery and asks for one more chance to answer the question correctly. He does so and the ghost agrees to let them go. But Shakti challenges the ghost by saying that there are no such things as ghosts and dares him to come before them. The ghost turns out to be a frail old man who has lost everything and has been abandoned by his children. He has taken shelter in this abandoned house where no one disturbs him as they thinks its haunted. He implores them to keep his secret and they part ways happily.MITTHU’S FIRST FIGHTThe third and the last story narrated by Baltiboy is in the Madhubani art-form from the state of Bihar in East India, bordering Nepal. Madhubani painting (also known as Mithila painting) is practiced in the Mithila region of India. Painting is done with fingers, twigs, brushes, nib-pens, and matchsticks, using natural dyes and pigments, and is characterized by eye-catching geometrical patterns. There is ritual content for particular occasions, such as birth or marriage, and festivals, such as Holi, Surya Shasti, Kali Puja, Upanayanam, Durga Puja. This is a story of Mitthu the parrot who lives on a banyan tree and is scared of flying. Moti, a sparrow is Mitthu’s friend and is always trying to devise new ways of making Mitthu fly. But Mitthu always comes up with new excuses to avoid flying. Maya, the nightingale is always making fun of Mitthu and his fear of flying in her own unique sing-song way. One day Moti and Maya are trying to teach Mitthu to fly. He is barely hovering over the tree branch like a moth when suddenly he feels faint and falls down towards a pointed rock. Moti and Maya dive down to help their friend. Maya catches Mitthu just as he about to crash onto the rock. One day an Eagle approaches Maya and asks if he could take her to the other side of the hill. He describes the beauty of the hilltop. Maya refuses him.But then she asks Moti and Maya to accompany her to the hilltop as she always wanted to go there with her best friends. The nest day Mitthu who is afraid of flying comes up with an excuse that he is too sick to fly and so cannot come with them. Moti says that they should make the trip when mitthu is feeling well. But Mitthu and maya convince him to go ahead with the trip with Mitthu. So Moti and Maya fly to the hilltop. Maya is so happy to see the beauty of the hilltop that she starts singing and dancing. There is a lot of mist on the hilltop and Maya falls into a crevice. Her wing gets trapped under a rock and she can barely move. Moti tries to help her but is too small to move the rock all by himself. He says that he will go back and get Mitthu as he is strong enough to move the rock. Maya is not convinced that Mitthu will come as he is scared of flying. But Moti goes anyway and tells Mitthu to come with him to rescue Maya. Mitthu refuses at first but then agrees to go with Moti. Moti teaches him to flap his wings so that he can fly. Mitthu starts to fly and at the same time looks down and starts feeling faint. He starts falling down and at them time he remembers all the good time that he as had with his friends and how Maya had rescued him from dashing into the pointed rock. He feels a sudden burst of energy inside him and soars into the sky. Moti is thrilled by seeing this and both of them go to the hilltop. Once there Mitthu rolls over the rock from Maya’s wing in no time and rescues her. Maya is sad that her wing is damaged and she cannot fly. Moti tells her that she will get better soon and so she need not worry. Mitthu tells her that in the meantime he will carry her. All the three friends hug each other and are happy.Krish, Trish and Baltiboy are happy with the outcome of the story and sign off but promise to return soon with more stories for their friends.