Devalok
Legend · 2 tellings · Pan-India, South India

The release of the elephant king

An elephant seized by a crocodile lifts a lotus and calls on Vishnu, who arrives on Garuda and frees both animal and captor with the discus.

Who is in it

Places: Kabisthalam · Texts: Bhagavata Purana

The story, beat by beat

  1. Gajendra, lord of a herd, wades into a lake to drink and is seized by the leg by a crocodile.
  2. Elephant and crocodile struggle for years; the herd cannot help and the elephant's strength drains away.
  3. Alone, Gajendra plucks a lotus, raises it in his trunk and prays to the one who is beyond every god.
  4. Vishnu comes at once on Garuda and his discus strikes the crocodile.
  5. The crocodile is freed from the gandharva Huhu's cursed form, and Gajendra, once the Pandya king Indradyumna cursed by Agastya, is released as well.

devotion rescue curse surrender

How it is told, place by place

Base telling · Encyclopedia

Bhagavata Purana, canto 8

Pan-India Vaishnava

The eighth canto tells of the elephant Gajendra, who once ruled as the Pandya king Indradyumna until the sage Agastya cursed him for his pride. Leading his herd to a mountain lake, he is caught by a crocodile — the gandharva Huhu, himself under the curse of the sage Devala. The two fight for years. When the elephant's power is spent and his herd has left him, he takes a lotus in his trunk, holds it up, and prays to the supreme one who stands behind all the gods. Vishnu descends on Garuda and cuts the crocodile down with his discus; both creatures are released from their curses. The hymn Gajendra sang is read as an allegory in which the crocodile is sin and the muddy lake the round of rebirth.

Gajendra Moksha — Wikipedia; Indradyumna — Wikipedia

Temple tradition

Kabisthalam Divya Desam

South India · Kabisthalam, Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu Vaishnava

The Gajendra Varadha temple at Kabisthalam on the Kaveri claims the story for its own ground. The elephant, it says, bathed in the Kabila Teertham here, and the temple holds itself to be the only shrine where Vishnu is seen seated on Garuda granting release to elephant and crocodile together. The event is re-enacted as the Gajendra Moksha Leela in the Tamil month of Adi.

What is different here:

Localises the lake to Kabisthalam and adds the festival; the Bhagavata names no place.

Gajendra Varadha Temple, Kabisthalam — Wikipedia; Sri Gajendra Varadan Temple, Kapisthalam — templesinindiainfo.com

Sources: Gajendra Moksha — Wikipedia; Indradyumna — Wikipedia; Gajendra Varadha Temple, Kabisthalam — Wikipedia; Sri Gajendra Varadan Temple, Kapisthalam — templesinindiainfo.com

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