Kannadi Kapuwa flees village after scam exposed

A middle aged man who had no permanent employment had left his village and worked as a helper of a ‘Light Reader’ (penakaru) of a devalaya in a distant village. He was entrusted with odd jobs but was barred from handling money that came as offerings to the devalaya. After some time, this man decided to start his own devalaya and came to back to his village with the required items like photographs of deities, bells etc. He opened a devalaya next to his house. The fragrance emanating from the lighting of incense sticks made people fall prey to his approach and soon people started flocking to his devalaya seeking relief or awareness on various issues.

Generally he positions himself facing the back to those present.

One day while in his usual trance, he had uttered that a Buddhist monk would come there in a short while. Within minutes a Buddhist monk walked in much to the surprise of the people gathered there. However, one suspicious man in the gathering had gone out and peeped into the area where the kapuwa was performing and found that he had placed a small mirror through which he could see anyone entering his devalaya.

From that day onwards, he was known as a ‘Kannadi’ (mirror) Kapuwa and soon he had to run away from the village for the second time.