Samudra Mathana
Once the King of Devata Indra was taking a ride on his royal elephant . That time saint Doorvasa came on same way. He saw Indra and on the pretext of blessings, he gave a flower garland to Indra. But Indra threw that garland on his elephant. Garland fell down under the legs of elephant. Elephant stepped on that. Garland was broken into pieces.
Doorvasa was seeing all this. He got very angry as Indra insulted him. He gave a curse to Indra saying that he will lose his kingdom. But Indra didnt care for it and moved on. As per the curse, there was a big fight between demons and devas. Indra got defeated.
His kingdom was lost. He realised his fault and went near Vishnu and begged him for mercy. Vishnu told a plan. In the plan devas and demons must go for samudra mathana so that they can get divine syrup amruta. Vishnu said demons will surely agree for this as to achieve immortality by drinking amruta. Vishnu himself will help devas in order to get back their kingdom.
Indra went with the offer near demons. Demons readily agreed for that. Likewise they requested serpant King Vasuki to act as thread. They selected Mountain Mandara for grinding purpose. Demons held mouth of Vasuki and devas his tail.
Grinding of milk sea started. All things came as poison,elephant,pearl etc. Poison was drank by Lord Shiva, elephant was taken by Indra and pearl by Vishnu. Then came much awaited amruta. Devas and demons started arguing that they own it. Then Vishnu took the form of a beautiful girl Mohini.
Everyone were captivated by her beauty. Mohini said that she will distribute amruta between devas and demons equally. All agreed for that. But Mohini gave amruta to devas only. Demons didnt come know of it. Thus , Indra got rid of curse and got back his kingdom also.
Nice story, famous in our purana BHAGAVATHA, HariVamsha, yakshagana, etc. In fact Doorvasa was earlier given the garland by Shri Hari himself and the Rishi wanted to benefit Indra by giving that great garland to him. But due to "headweight" Indra threw it on the elephant.
ReplyDeleteThe asura leader at that time was Bali - same Mahabali whom we call on "Baleendra pooja" day called Balipaadya - next day of deepavali. He was grandson of Lord's great devotee Prahlad whose 4th avatara we consider is Shri Guru Raghavendra Swamiji