Which pembayang is the correct one?
Easy answer: Semua boleh. (All are correct!!)
Not-so-easy answer: C) Dapat rusa bergelang kaki
The question one should ask is should there be fixed wording for a pantun? Pantun is originated from an oral tradition, and has been passed down by word of mouth from a person to a person and from a generation to a generation.
Until after scribing became relatively conventional, then people start to writing pantun down. Fast forward to now, we have what we could call an impressive written record of pantun; books, collection, articles, essay, online resources etc.
Since it's originating from an oral tradition, there'll be variation obviously in the choice of words, the arrangement, usage, etc. This variation when recorded in written form will produce a number of variations in its outlook. But it is still a pantun nonetheless. It will still carry the same content and message (though one may argue about this extensively).
Out of the 4 choices, it relatively revolves around the same thing. Differences are in which form of the verb 'dapat' should be used; the root form or the one with prefix meN-? And also which adjectives must be attached to 'rusa' (though strictly it's not a literal rusa we are referring to, but that's perhaps should be talked about in another occasion)?
The adjectives are a play of the word 'belang kaki' except for C, it's worded as 'gelang kaki' but all in all it portrays the same thing, striped legs.
So it's between dapat/mendapat and among belang/berbelang/bergelang. Simple maths will tell us there'll be 2x3 combinations that could be the pembayang. Given in the question only 4, so that's a relief.
Given the nature of how various a pantun can be, don't be surprised if the 2x3 combinations won't be the only combinations possible for that particular line. It's well known that usage of particle like –lah is not uncommon in pantun. Therefore, this particle could could be slipped into the lines in the pembayang, usually this is done just to ease delivery of the pantun.
So intead of Dapat rusa berbelang kaki it could be Dapatlah rusa berbelang kaki.
Now, one may argue that it won’t matter. With –lah or not, it means the same.
And another thing we should know, pantun as a literary tradition is never strict. It’s not a holy text that should be maintained from any variation or changes.
So there, the easy answer is all correct.
However, just to add some fun for this practice, let’s say that we are a bunch of strict pantun enthusiast and those who subscribe that even a small tiny change in wording or sentence structure will give a different feels to it (if not meaning, strictly). How are we going to tackle this question?
This pantun must come from somewhere, and thus we shall look at how one really constructs this “berburu ke padang datar” pantun.
Those really into Usman Awang, will realize that this pantun is once used by him in his famous poem “Guru oh Guru” (1979). The pantun is use as an opening for the poem. The pantun is
Berburu ke padang datar, Dapat rusa belang kaki; Berguru kepalang ajar, Ibarat bunga kembang tak jadi.
It’s clear that this pantun has the basic form. However, one should realize that the pantun differ from that in the question. The pantun in the question uses ‘macam’ but that in Usman Awang’s poem uses ‘ibarat’.
They serve the same meaning, thus either one will provide the same overall sense of the pantun. However, one could also argue (if one chooses to be semantically pedantic) usage of ibarat and macam will give different feels,which could be because of the syllables pattern, pronunciation, etc. And because we could pinpoint the pantun above to that of Usman Awang, we somehow attached authorship and specificity to the pantun used.
If we change ‘ibarat’ in the poem’s pantun to ‘macam’, we can’t really say it’s Usman Awang’s “Guru oh Guru”. By that, we somehow subscribe to the fact that a pantun in use, may it be orally or in text, especially when recorded and passed around, must be maintain else, it won’t be the original pantun as recorded just now.
And to cut things short, the pantun in the question is recorded, the same way how most of the pantun is treated now.
The pantun can be found in Kurik Kundi Merah Saga,
Berburu ke Padang Datar, Dapat rusa bergelang kaki; Berguru kepalang ajar, Macam bunga kembang tak jadi.
The one that recorded this, has a clear and conscious mind that the word used in the last line is “macam” and the recorder also realize that the adjectival phrase used in the second line is ‘bergelang kaki’.
If it’s universally accepted (and correct) to be berbelang kaki, than the recorder would have made the necessary correction.
The first and the third line remain the same. But the combination for the second and the fourth line are (bergelang – macam) and (belang – ibarat).
We list here more of this kind of pantun, to exemplify how when recorded, we could choose to be very particular of the combinations of diction used. We highlight the part that differs for the pantun in the question.
Berburu di padang datar, Dapat rusa berbelang kaki; Berguru kepalang ajar, Bagai bunga kembang tak jadi.
Berburu ke padang datar, Dapat rusa belang kaki; Berguru kepalang ajar, Bagai bunga kembang tak jadi.
Berburu ke padang datar, Mendapat rusa belang kaki; Berguru kepalang ajar, Bagai bunga kembang tak jadi.
So there you go. The rest of the collected pantun uses different combinations of words.
!!! This is just for fun. I myself subscribe to the believe that different choice of words in pantun shall be treated the same as long as it serve the same function. But at the same time, again, just for fun, there’s nothing wrong in treating pantun especially a recorded one in this strict manner. It will give you more insight to these little things and also allow you to be more efficient in studying pantun using corpus-based approach.
Till then.