Apara Ekadashi Vrat Katha

Yudhishthira asked Shri Krishna about the Ekadashi of the dark fortnight of Jyeshtha. Krishna said that it is called Apara, because its merit is boundless, and that it frees one from sins such as slander, false witness and cheating. Then he told this story.

Long ago there was a righteous king named Mahidhvaj. His younger brother Vajradhvaj was cruel and unjust, and hated him out of jealousy. One night Vajradhvaj killed his elder brother and buried the body secretly under a peepal tree in the forest.

Because of his untimely death, the king's soul could not find peace and became a ghost that lived in the peepal tree. He troubled everyone who passed that way.

One day the sage Dhaumya came along that path. He saw the ghost, and by the power of his penance he learned the whole story of the king's life and death. Moved with compassion, the sage brought the ghost down from the tree and taught him the way to liberation.

To free the king, Dhaumya himself kept the fast of Apara Ekadashi with devotion, and on Dwadashi he gave the merit of the fast to the ghost. By that merit the king was released from life as a ghost. He took a divine form, thanked the sage, and went to heaven on a divine chariot.

Shri Krishna told Yudhishthira that this fast brings merit equal to bathing in holy rivers and giving great gifts, and that whoever reads or hears this story is freed from sins.