How to play Gulam Chor
Gulam Chor, the jack thief, is the pairing game every family table knows. One card comes out of the pack, the rest is dealt, and everybody throws their pairs. Then you take cards blind from the next hand until one player is left holding the card that can never be paired.
- Players
- 2 to 6
- What you need
- One pack of 52 cards
- How long
- Five rounds, a few minutes each
What Gulam Chor is
Gulam Chor is the card game children are taught first, and the one the whole family plays together at Dashain. There is nothing to learn but pairs, and nobody wins: somebody loses.
The loser is the chor, the thief, left holding one card when everybody else has thrown all of theirs away. At a real table the chor pays a forfeit, a song or a dance.
The card taken out
Before the deal one card comes out of the pack and is put aside face down. Its rank is now one card short, so of its three that are left, two can pair and the third cannot. That third card is the one to be rid of.
The name says a jack, so here a jack comes out and everybody knows the card to fear. Many tables take out any card without looking at it instead, so nobody knows which rank is the odd one until the end. The table’s settings have both.
The deal
The rest of the pack is dealt round the table, one card at a time, until it is gone. Some players get a card more than others.
Every player throws their pairs face up in the middle straight away. Two cards of the same rank make a pair, whatever their suits. After that no hand holds two cards of one rank.
A turn
- Hold your cards so the next player cannot see them.
- On your turn, take one card from the next player’s hand without seeing it.
- If it pairs with a card of yours, throw the two in the middle. If not, keep it.
- The turn passes to the player you took from, who takes from the next hand along.
There is nothing to choose between the cards you are offered, and nothing you can do about the ones taken from you. The game is the waiting, and the face somebody makes when they take the jack.
Going out
A player whose hand empties is out, safe for the round. It can happen on your turn, when a card you take pairs your last one, or on somebody else’s, when they take your last card.
Players who are out are passed over, and the next hand along is the next one with cards in it.
The chor
Every card but one has a partner, so the round always ends the same way: every hand empties but one, and that one holds a single card of the rank that came out. That player is the chor.
The card set aside is turned over beside it, so everybody can see the pair that never could be.
The match
A match is a number of rounds, and each round deals again with the first turn moving on a seat. The table counts how many times each player was the chor.
Whoever was the chor least often wins the match. If two or more share the fewest, the match is a draw.
At this table
On your turn the next player’s cards are lit. Tap any of them to take it, or press Take a card, which takes one for you. They are all the same until they are turned over.
Your pairs are thrown for you, since a pair can only be thrown. Each seat shows how many cards it holds, and below that how many times it has been the chor.
Options
Every table here plays the rules above. These are what a family decides before the first deal.
| Setting | Standard | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Players | 4 | Two to six. With more players the hands are smaller and the rounds quicker. |
| Rounds | 5 | How many rounds a match lasts. |
| Taken out of the pack | A jack | A jack, so everybody knows the card to fear, or a card nobody sees, so nobody knows until the end. |
The words
- Gulam Chor (गुलाम चोर)
- The jack thief. Onlinekhabar spells it Julaamchor in its list of Dashain card games.
- Gulam (गुलाम)
- The jack. The other court cards are missi for the queen and badshah for the king.
- Chor (चोर)
- The thief: the player left holding the odd card at the end of a round.
- Jodi (जोडी)
- A pair: two cards of one rank.
Every rule on this page is the one the app plays by. Change any of them on the game's own page before you start.