Indra visits Dwaraka on Airavata and reports that Naraka, son of the Earth and king of Pragjyotisha, carries off maidens and has taken Varuna's umbrella, the jewel peak of Mandara and the nectar-dropping earrings of Aditi, and now demands Airavata. Krishna flies there on Garuda with Satyabhama, cuts the nooses of Muru, kills Muru, his seven thousand sons, Hayagriva and Panchajana, and cuts Naraka in two with the discus. The Earth brings the two earrings, recalls that the boar's touch gave her this son, and asks forgiveness for him. Krishna frees the captive women, loads the umbrella and the peak on Garuda and goes to heaven, where he returns the earrings to Aditi in her palace. She hymns him; he asks her blessing; she says no god or demon will defeat him while he lives among mortals, and blesses Satyabhama with unfading beauty. The Parijata episode follows.
In Assam, where Pragjyotisha is placed, Naraka is remembered as the founder of the kingdom and ancestor of its dynasties, born of the Earth and the boar, at first pious and later corrupted, and linked to the goddess Kamakhya, whom he tried to marry by building a stair up Nilachal hill in one night until a cock crowed early.
What is different here:
Told from Naraka's side as a regional founder legend; the earrings are not the centre.
In a message to the Kaurava court listing Krishna's deeds, Arjuna recalls that Naraka, son of the Earth, kept Aditi's jewelled earrings in the Asura city Pragjyotisha, having taken them by force; the gods under Indra could not defeat him and employed Krishna. At Nirmochana Krishna killed six thousand Asuras, cut the keen-edged nooses, killed Mura, entered the city and killed Naraka, who lay like an uprooted karnikara tree. He recovered the earrings, and the gods blessed him never to tire in battle, never to be stopped by sky or water, never to be pierced by weapons.
What is different here:
A brief recollection, not a narrative: no Satyabhama, no Garuda, no speech of the Earth, no scene with Aditi; the blessing comes from the gods, not from Aditi.
Indra tells Krishna that Bhauma (Naraka) has taken Varuna's umbrella, Aditi's earrings and the gods' place on Mount Mandara. Krishna goes with Satyabhama on Garuda, breaks the fortifications of Pragjyotisha, kills the five-headed Mura and his seven sons, and beheads Bhauma with the discus. The Earth offers the earrings, a Vaijayanti garland, the umbrella and the peak, and prays. Krishna finds sixteen thousand captive princesses and sends them to Dwaraka, returns the earrings in Indra's heaven and carries off the Parijata tree at Satyabhama's wish.
What is different here:
Mura is five-headed and rises from the moat; his sons are seven and named; the Earth adds a garland; Aditi has no speech or blessing in this chapter; Satyabhama does not fight.
South India · Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, GoaFolk
As the festival tells it, Naraka had a boon that only his mother could kill him, and Satyabhama is the Earth reborn. Aditi brings her complaint to Satyabhama, who asks to go to war. In the fight Krishna lets Naraka's weapon strike him and pretends to faint; Satyabhama then fights Naraka, and he is killed (by her arrows, or by Krishna's discus with her beside him, according to the teller). Dying, Naraka asks that his death be marked with lights. The day is kept before sunrise with an oil bath, new clothes and lamps; in Goa paper effigies of Naraka are burned at dawn and a bitter berry is crushed underfoot; in Tamil Nadu this day is Deepavali itself.
What is different here:
Adds the mother-only boon, Satyabhama as the Earth incarnate, Krishna's pretended faint, Satyabhama's fight and Naraka's dying wish; none of these is in the Vishnu Purana or Bhagavata chapters read.
Sources: The Vishnu Purana, tr. H. H. Wilson (1840); Wikipedia: Narakasura; The Mahabharata, tr. K. M. Ganguli (1883-96), sections read for the Vedic layer; Srimad-Bhagavatam (Bhaktivedanta Vedabase); Wikipedia: Naraka Chaturdashi; Wikipedia: Satyabhama