Nalopakhyanam - A Katha one should hear to get rid of effects of Kali Purusha

There lived a king called Bhima who ruled a kingdom called Vidarbha. He was a great ruler. He had no santaan and wished to serve a great Rishi called DAMANUDU along with his wife in forests.

With the blessings of Rishi, king and queen were blessed with 3 sons and 1 daughter. Daughter was named Damayanti. She was very beautiful and graceful that even gods also wanted to have her as their Devi. In another kingdom called Nishadha, King veerasena has a son Nala Maharaja

Nala had a graceful body and he was Ajaanubaha like Shree Rama. He was a great chakravarti, gunvaan, and a great warrior who was an expert in Ashwavidhya. One day Nala catches a swan. The swan prays maharaja to leave it free and it will sing the glory of him to Damayanti

Damayanti heard a lot about the prince Nala from various sources and always have consciously mentally accepted him as a husband. Once Nala sends his swan to Damayanti and the swan praises Maharaja Nala and made Damayanti fall in love with him.

Similarly the swan comes to Nala raja and praises about Damayanti and both of them fell unconditionally in love. They were very happy. Meanwhile, king Bhima announces a Swayamvara for Damayanti. The news spread across various lokas.

Four Dikpalakas were getting ready to participate in the Damayanti swayamvara. They were travelling down to bhooloka. Devendra, Yamadharmaraja, varuna and agnihotra were the ones and they decided within themselves that it is okay if damayanti marries any one of those four.

They landed on pruthvi and saw Nala Maharaja and asked him for a help. They wanted Nala raja to do the Raayabaram(communicate the message personally) to the Princess. Nala was confused but haven't spoken anything and agreed to the dikpalakas request.

4 dikpalakas give Nala raja a boon that none can see him except Damayanti and he can go to her personally and give the message to the princess that she should marry any one of them four. Once Nala reaches Dmayanti, she recognizes him and gets into conversation

Damayanti says, she wouldn't marry anyone else except Nala as she has mentally already accepted him as her husband. She suggests that let the 4 of dikpalakas come and participate but she will only marry Nala in the swayamvaram, there would be no possiblity to say no her choice.

Nala remains confused, sad and returns and tells dikpalakas that the message has been communicated successfully. Swayamvara starts gracefully and to everyone's surprise 4 dikpalakas take shareera (body) of Nala and came to swayamwara. All 4 of them looked like 4 clones of Nala.

Now in the Swayamvara, all were confused that there are totally 5 Lookalikes. Within no time Damayanti came and the swayamwara had started. aayanti saw this condition and she prayed to maata with her apaar bhakti and asked god to show her a way to identify the right one among 5

When she opened her eyes after prayer, she found out the real Nala, differentiating with three characteristics. Devtas don't sweat, blink their eyes and they feet don't land on the ground. She observed one among the four to have not having these characteristics and others having

She moved forward and placed the flower garland around Nala Maharajas neck. Nala and Damayanthi got married and both were happy. Nala was surprisingly very happy and adored Damayanti for her sankalp shakti.

4 Dikpalakas resumed their original bodies and were very happy and gave boons to Nala. Some were, Indra would come wherever Dharma palan is practiced by Nala, Agnihotra says whenever sankalpa is done by king of Nishida he will give his own lusture to him answering his prayers.

Varuna Deva blesses Nala that wherever raja stays there would be no dearth of water around and Dharmaraja blesses may his heart always stay with Dharma. Four dikpalakas blessed them and disappeared. Nala and Damayanti were very much thankful and content for being blessed.

Dikpalakas on their way back to their lokas happen to see Dwapara & kali travelling to bhooloka. They ask him about his aagaman. Kali says he is on his way to Damayanti Swayamvara. Dikpalakas say the swayamwara has commenced and Nala Damayanti got married already.

Hearing this, in a missed out feeling kali gets into a jealous mode and says "let me see how would they live happily hereafter ". Kali decided to bother the couple with his effects on them. He said he would enter the body of Nala and destroy the happiness of the couple thereafter

Meanwhile Nala and Damayanti give birth to 2 Santana, Indrasena & Indrasenudu. On the other side, Kali seeks help of Dwapara and asks him to take the revenge. Kali tries a lot to enter Nala and doesn't succeed. Kali enters the maanas(heart) of the human and takes nivaas there.

Nala was a pious man, a punya murthy, never involved in paapa sambhashana, performed yagnyas and pujas. He was a blissful one and his nadi mandalas always were calm and blissful. He was an Agni aaradhaka too and all of these characteristics didn't allow kali to enter Nalas heart

One fine day Nala maharaja urinated and didn't wash his feet and left the place hurried up in something important. With this asauch ( impurity) he went to perform his sandhyavandanam rites. This impure condition gave kali an opportunity to enter the Maharaja heart finally.

Kali asked Dwapara to enter into the Gambling dice ( paachika in Telugu ) and he would enter into Nala and invite Nala's brother Pushkar to play gambling. He asked Dwapar to help him to defeat Nala through his brother. Both kali and Dwapar entered into the respective targets.

The kings starts gambling and Damayanti urges Nala to stop it beyond the point they lost. Nala wouldn't listen to her and lost everything gradually. Damayanti understand that he is under effects of kali and it wont end until they lost. She went off from the place with sorrow

Nala Dmayanti lost everything and they left to a forest. They started travelling all alone in the deep woods. They were having nothing and looked very tired and hungry. Meanwhile there came few birds flying above them. Nala saw them and had planned for trapping them to eat

Nala said, he would throw his dhoti above which would hit the birds and make them fall on ground thus they can eat them. Nala opened his dhoti and threw up above and suddenly a voice said "Hey Nala it is us Dices, we took the form of birds to make u go naked finally in the game"

Nala and Damayanti were so disheartened and Nala once thought he had married a princess and given her all sorrows, he should leave her to not suffer any further. He left ger and went forward and his conscious told, it is not a dharma of a husband to leave a wife so he came back

After sometime again he felt like he has to leave his wife, as he was being harsh on her life. He then took a part of his wife's draped saree, torned it draped and left away from there when his wife was sleeping.

He started walking away from the place where his wife was sleeping. On his way into the woods, he heard a voice saying "nalmaharaja please rescue me!". Nala saw that there is a snake trapped in fire and it is asking Nala to rescue him.Nala goes near and asks the snake wht happend

Snake replies, I'm Karkotaka among Nagas and he got trapped in fire due to a shraap(curse). It became very small in size & is buring down in the fire. It asks nala help and says him to remove it and throw into the nearby water.Nala rescues the snake & goes 9steps closer to water

Karkotaka says take one more step, and he gets bitten by a Karkotaka Vish. Nala says to Karkotaka Naga that he has rescued Karkotaka and he has cheated him by transferring vish into him. Karkotaka replies , no I haven't done any apakara, infact I have done Upakara.

I have given u a dwarf and ugly body so that none would recognize you. You are wantering as a lost king. It is better u wander with a new look. Naga suggests Nala to go to Rutuparna rajya and tame and train horses there.

He also said that whenever Nala would pray him, he will get a white vasthra and all the vish from the body will also get removed and finally he would get back his Rajya too. Karkotaka said go and live further with name called Bahukudu / Bahuka.

Damayanti woke up and saw none around her. A snake was about to bite her. She was rescued by a man called kiratudu. This man somehow had invoked sexual desire for her. He asked him to pleasure him and he would marry her.

She then stood and prayed to the gods that if she is pativrata may his body be burnt into ashes. Within no time his body got burnt in holy fire.Roaming here and there Dmayanti met a group of people traveling. She enquired them about Nala's whereabouts.

She started travelling with them to a safer place. On they way, a herd of elephants kill the people and out of them only 2 bhramanas were alive. Damayanthi along with them wandered trying to reach a kingdom crying and walking.

One day Bhima wanted to know whereabouts of Damayanti, and sent few soldiers to search for her. Soldiers were told that one can identify Damayanti as a beautiful woman who was blessed with a birth mark in between eyebrows. Soldiers identify and brings back Damayanti to her father

Damayanti sends a Bhramana out and asks him to find a man as "one who abandoned his wife in the forest by tearing our her vastra and leave off with the saree draped around him during their difficult times".

Bahuka stays silent wen the Bhramana openly tries to identify. Later bahuka comes and enquired how is the rani and where is she right now. Bhramana comes back to vidarbha and describe all the conversation happened with bahuka.

Damayanthi becomes confident that it is her Nala. She cleverly informs about a second marriage swayamvara to the kingdom in which bahuka stays. Bahuka gets confused and gets furious how would a pativrata announce for second marriage when he is alive.

King Rutuparna was informed to come for Swayamvara. Rutuparna asks Bahuka to do the "Radhachodanam" running a horse chariot in such a way that he should somehow reach to the kingdom before suryoday.

Bahuka / Nala was an expert in Ashwavidhya and he rode the chariot in such a way that even the space science would fail infront of it. Bahuka was one such gen who knew a magically awesome ways to cook great tasty food.

He was also called as "Nalabheemapakam" which originated from his proficiency in cooking.
A dish called Nalabheema pakam is quiet famous across south India which is cooked with all vegetable and pulses in it.

Rutuparna says he is very surprised with the way Bahuka is travelling. He is blessed to have Ashwavidya as a great boon. Rutuparna says he too has a vidhya called Akshahrudayam vidhya, which he can say how many leaves, branches constitute in a tree.

Bahuka seems surprised and asks him for testing. He asks about a tree while they were on their way to Swayamvara. Bahuka sees that the entire tree has exact number of details what is mentioned by Rutuparna.

Rutuparna becomes very happy and says he can give this vidhya to Bahuka on his own willingness. He says a man with Akshahrudayam vidhya would never fail in life, he would always have jayam.

Once he did the upadesha of this vidhya, kali couldn't stay in his body anymore. Kali came out and asked for forgiveness from Nala who was about to kill Kali. Kali said I'm the one who actually suffered because of Karkotaka visha in you body and to not punish any further.

Nala forced the Kali's trembling spirit into a Bibhitaka tree and Kali promises to never ever bother Nala in life. one should never sit under or take sharnagati under a Bibitaki tree as it is kalinivasa.

It is said that one who listens or read or story tells this Nalopakhyanam, all the people would be able to wash off the kali and sins attached from their heart and karma. This is how one way kali effects can be warded off from our lives.

We have cut short the story, please refer to Vana Parva of Mahabharata which described th Nalopakhyanam beautifully. There are individual books on Nalopakhyana available in various languages too.