Krishna and the Fruit Seller
One day a fruit seller, a simple woman, old and poor, comes to the village of Vrindavan. The child Krishna hears her call and, with desire aroused, he runs out to her with a handful of grains to trade for her produce. As he runs, the grains spill out between his little fingers and by the time he makes his offer, there are hardly any left with which to compensate for the fruit he so desires. The old lady is so taken with his beauty his innocent disinterest in the commensurability of the exchange and, despite her own poverty, gives him her all. On the way home her empty basket seems heavier than it ought to be and when puts it down she sees that it is full of celestial jewels.
In folk representations of this allegory of desire (kama), love (bakthi) and sacrifice (thyagam), as exemplified by the terracotta statue in the photograph above, the mango stands, for the cornucopia of desires and pleasures of material life and, ultimately, for the possibility of salvation through the offering up of these delights to the Lord.