Mālyavat and Pushpadantī

This is the account of Mālyavat and Pushpadantī, the example given for the Jayā Ekādaśī. Jayā Ekādaśī is the eleventh tithi (lunar day) of the bright fortnight (śukla paksha) of the month of Māgha. Bhagavān Kṛshṇa tells it to Yudhishṭhira in the Uttara Khaṇḍa of the Padma Purāṇa.

Mālyavat and Pushpadantī were a gandharva couple. Gandharvas are celestial musicians. They fell under a śāpa (a curse), became a piśāca and a piśācī, and were freed when they spent the night of Jayā Ekādaśī, without meaning to, fasting and awake near a pīpal tree.

The śāpa

Mālyavat was a gandharva, a celestial musician. Pushpadantī was with him, and she too was of gandharva and apsarā stock. During a divine festival the two were found together in intimate union. The devas present gave them a śāpa (a curse).

By the śāpa, Mālyavat became a piśāca, a flesh-eating being of the lowest order. Pushpadantī became a piśācī, the female form of the same. They fell from their high place. They lived as piśācas, hungry and wretched, in forests and cremation grounds. Their old beauty and grace were gone.

The night of Jayā Ekādaśī

The couple wandered through the forest in their piśāca bodies. On the night of Jayā Ekādaśī they took shelter near a pīpal tree (Ficus religiosa). They found nothing to eat, so they fasted. The cold kept them from sleeping, so they stayed awake all night.

Without meaning to, they had spent the whole night as the Ekādaśī vrata (vow) asks: fasting, awake, and near a sacred tree. They did not know that the day was Ekādaśī, and they did not keep it out of devotion. It came to them only by chance.

Freedom from the śāpa

Jayā Ekādaśī ended, and the couple were still alive and unharmed. Then the puṇya (merit) of that unplanned vrata showed its power. Their piśāca forms fell away, and their own gandharva nature came back. The śāpa was over.

They returned to svarga (heaven), with their old beauty and standing restored.

What Bhagavān Kṛshṇa teaches

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa gives this account to show the power of Jayā Ekādaśī. The couple kept the day without the right frame of mind, without devotion, and without knowing it was Ekādaśī. Even so, it freed them from a śāpa that had turned celestial musicians into flesh-eating piśācas.

Sources

• Padma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 43