Sulocanā the Viṣakanyā
Sulocanā was the wife of Citragīva, a gandharva (a heavenly musician). A muni on Mount Gandhamādana cursed her to become a viṣakanyā, a woman whose gaze kills. She was shut away in Kāñcanīpura, a city of the nāgakanyās (serpent maidens), far from her husband.
Bhagavān Kalki entered that city alone. His gaze was like amṛta (the drink of immortality), and it dissolved her curse. She then rose to her husband’s loka in a shining vimāna (a flying chariot).
The curse
Sulocanā was the wife of Citragīva, a gandharva. His name means “speckled-throated”. She was a gandharva woman, young and beautiful, and she was proud of her form and her youth.
One day she and Citragīva were flying in a vimāna. They came down to play at the foot of Mount Gandhamādana. This is one of the great Himālaya ranges where ṛṣis perform tapas (austerity). As they wandered in a grove, a muni was meditating nearby. He looked like a yakṣa, with an unusual form that was not beautiful. Sulocanā was playing without a thought, and she laughed at him. She mocked his looks.
The muni was furious at once. He cursed her. From then on she would be a viṣakanyā, a woman with a poisonous gaze. Every creature that looked at her with desire would die on the spot.
She was separated from Citragīva and placed in Kāñcanīpura. This city lies in the mountains. Only serpents and nāgakanyās can reach it. Its walls cannot be broken, and poison snakes guard its roads.
Life in Kāñcanīpura
In Kāñcanīpura, Sulocanā lived in deep loneliness. The city was beautiful. It was decorated with work in jewels (maṇi) and gold, and it was lined with haricandana trees. But no one from outside could enjoy it. Devas, asuras and humans who came near had all died by her gaze. The city had become her prison.
She knew her condition and how cruel it was. When she first met Kalki entering the city alone, she said:
“Many great warriors, kings, devas and asuras, have been killed by my very gaze. This is why I live in constant grief. There is no one in all the three worlds whose gaze I could meet with love and who would live. But now something like amṛta flows from your lotus-petal eyes. I bow before you.”
Liberation by Bhagavān Kalki
An ākāśavāṇī (a voice from the sky) had warned Bhagavān Kalki to come into Kāñcanīpura alone, without his army. He rode in on horseback with only his Śuka, the divine parrot. Inside the city he met Sulocanā.
The Kalki Purāṇa speaks of his amṛta-dṛṣṭi, his gaze of nectar. When his gaze met her poisonous eyes, her curse was dissolved. The text sets the two side by side. Her eyes were viṣa (poison). His eyes were amṛta (nectar). The amṛta overcame the viṣa.
Sulocanā knew at once what had happened. She said: “My curse is dissolved by your darśana (sight of you). I will now go up to the loka of my husband Citragīva.”
As she spoke, a shining divine vimāna came down from the sky. She boarded it and rose, freed from her long captivity. She went to her husband in the gandharva world.
What Sulocanā says about her curse
Sulocanā herself says that the curses of ṛṣis and munis always lead to good. Her own curse brought about the very conditions in which she received the darśana of Bhagavān Kalki.
Sources
- Kalki Purāṇa, Tritīyāmśa, Chapter 14