King Krishnadevaraya of Vijayanagar had great respect for his mother. His mother was a very orthodox woman. She had given a lot of things in charity. In her old age, she thought that it would be perfect if she gave away fruits as gifts to others on an auspicious day. She told her son of her desire. Krishnadevaraya arranged to get delicious mangoes from Ratnagiri. But, on the chosen auspicious day, the king's mother died.

The king called the pandits and told them about his mother's last unfulfilled wish. The greedy pandits suggested that, his mother's soul will rest in peace, only if he offers mangoes made of gold, as gifts to the pandits, on the day of his mother's ceremony.Tenalirama came to know of this. The next day he went to the houses of those pandits. He told them that his mother's ceremony also falls on the same day as that of the king's mother and asked to come to his house straight from the palace.The pandits came to Tenalirama's house after receiving the golden mangoes from the king.Tenalirama's servants closed all the doors. Tenalirama told the pandits that his mother who was suffering from unbearable rheumatic pain asked him to burn her skin with a red hot iron bar so that she may be relieved of the pain. But, he could not fulfil her last wish, as she died. In order that her soul may rest in peace, I intend to burn your skin with red-hot iron bar.

At that time, a servant who was holding the red hot iron bar on his hand approached the pandits. The pandits got terrified and shouted that it was not good on the part of Tenalirama to do injustice to his guests. He told them that," if receiving the golden mangoes, to fulfil the last wish of Rajmatha is correct, receiving the burning with the hot iron bar, to fulfil the last wish of my mother, is also correct."The pandits felt ashamed and requested Tenalirama to forgive them. They also left all the golden mangoes and went away.When Krishnadevaraya enquired about this incident, Tenalirama replied that I, only prevented these greedy people from exploiting the public money. The public money is meant to serve the needy and not to feed the lazy.

So saying, he returned all the golden mangoes recovered from the pandits.