Saptarishi – Diti and Kashyap – {Ep.243}

Today’s episode is a story about Maharishi Kashyap, Diti, and her sister Aditi. It includes the creation of the state of Kashmir, and the creation of two of the most powerful Asuras – Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashapu

Welcome to “Stories From India”. This is a podcast that will take you on a journey through the rich mythology, folklore and history of the Indian subcontinent. I am Narada Muni, the celestial storyteller and the original “time lord”. With my ability to travel through space and time, I can bring you fascinating stories from the past, the present, and the future. From the epic tales of the Mahabharata and Ramayana to the folktales of the Panchatantra to stories of Akbar-Birbal and Tenali Raman, I have a story for every occasion.

The purpose of the stories is neither to pass judgment nor to indoctrinate. My goal is only to share these stories with people who may not have heard them before and to make them more entertaining for those who have.

Today’s Story

In this episode, we’re talking about two sisters, and a lot of problems that could have been avoided if they had just talked.

The story begins with the daughters of the goat-headed King. You may possibly remember the story of Daksha, who back in Episode 129 did something to offend Shiva. But if you don’t, that’s okay. That story doesn’t really have much bearing on today’s story. The main thing is Daksha had several children. And by several, I mean thousands! Yes, Daksha had about 6000 sons. Yes, 6000. No kidding. Pun intended.

Daksha also had 60 daughters. And each of those daughters was special. But Aditi and Diti are the special-est of the lot. Since I’m supernatural, I can totally make up new words. Call it just another of my many superpowers.

Both Aditi and Diti married the sage Kashyap. You may remember Kashyap as well. He’s one of the Saptarishi. You know, the seven hall-of-fame rishi, or wise men. They make up the Ursa Major or Big Dipper constellation. But besides being part of the Saptarishi, Kashyapa was the Ancient Indian equivalent of Genghis Khan. Largely because he was the father of most of the races – the Asuras, the Devas, the Maruts, the Rudras, the Vasus, and I’m probably forgetting a bunch more.

Diti was wandering around the home, in a very grumpy mood. In a fit of rage, she grabbed an apple and flung it far out of the window. The main reason for her grumpiness is something that parents may have experienced. Diti was comparing her children with those of her sister Aditi. 

And the chief difference between Diti’s children and those of Aditi’s was that so many of the former had passed away while the latter remained alive. That wasn’t fair, now was it? And come to think of it, most of those losses were caused by Aditi’s children. Diti naturally owed them no love.

She flung another apple angrily. This one went even further than the last one. She dwelled on how this had happened. The explanation was straightforward of course. Aditi was the goddess of motherhood. So it makes sense that every one of her children was special. As a goddess of motherhood she could channel some extra truckloads of motherly love into her children. All 33 of them. There were the 12 Adityas, the 11 Rudras and the 8 Vasus.

Aditi walked by and saw her, and even asked her – “Are you having an existential cry, sis?”

But Diti brushed her off. If she accepted a shoulder to cry on, Aditi’s shoulder would be the last one in line.

Much to Diti’s annoyance, all of Aditi’s children were winning every fight.

It just wasn’t fair. Her own children were far more in number, but how could they compete against all the special powers that even a single one of Aditi’s children had?

Take Surya for instance. Surya is the Sun himself! And I don’t mean that he is Aditi’s male offspring. I meant the star closest to Earth that the entire solar system goes around.

How could any of Diti’s children, the Daityas, compete against that?

Then take Varun for example. Another of Aditi’s sons with an extraordinary superpower. He wasn’t just the God of the oceans, he was also the God of Water! How could that help when the bodies were made of 70% water? It basically meant Varun could exert some kind of control on her children too. And then there was Indra himself. The King of the Devas, the ruler of Swarg, and with the power of thunder and lightning. He could incinerate a person with a single bolt aimed with precision.

It’s not that Diti’s own children were not powerful. The difference was that all her children had to work hard and acquire their powers. Diti had dozens of children – and we’ve met some of them on this show. Now I know what you’re thinking, Aditi had 33 kids, Diti had several dozen. In that respect the apples didn’t fall far from Daksha’s tree. Though 33 or 60 is still a far cry from 6060.

Diti threw another apple. She wished it would hit one of Aditi’s children somewhere. Though probabilistically speaking, it was more likely the apple might hit one of her own children, or worse, one of her 6059 brothers and sisters.

Kashyap walked in and beamed. “You’ll never guess what I did today!”

Diti said she couldn’t care less. And in case Kashyap forgot, he had been away for years now.

“Oh joy, I can hardly contain my excitement,” she said dryly.

Kashyap seemed not to notice the sarcasm. “Yes, dear. I was in this big battle! You got to hear this. You know this place north of the two states of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab?”

“Yes,” Diti replied. “Curious that we left that area unnamed for so long.”

“Well, there wasn’t much there. Just a lake you know and a mountain right next to it. The Lake is Satisar. Named after Shiva’s wife. And the mountain is Hari Parbat. There are a few people who live there. And they all live in this tiny strip of land between the lake and the mountain. There’s barely enough space for a single home, somehow they managed it with a multi-level.”

“Why don’t they just live on the slopes of the mountain?” Diti asked, stifling a yawn. Not that she cared why. The real reason was that if she didn’t ask, Kashyap would ask her why she hadn’t asked. And then the story would take longer to finish. 

“It’s a slippery slope. No, I mean that literally. I saw a little boy and his pet tiger slide down the mountain, in a sled or something and crash land into the lake below. So anyway, back to the villagers in the tiny strip of land between Hari Parbat and Satisar. You could say they were between a rock and a hard place. Because in Satisar lived Jalodhbhava. Kind of like the Loch Ness monster. Or if you prefer something local, a Yeti!”

Diti rolled her eyes, but said nothing.

“So this Jalodhbhava guy lived underwater there, and he terrorized the locals. Every single night.”

“What kind of terrorism? Did his kids beat up the villagers’ kids at school?” Diti was still thinking about her own problem.

“No, that’s not really terrorism is it? He ate up anything they tried to grow.”

“But you said there was no land other than for their homes? And the slope was slippery. So where were the villagers growing anything?”

“Underwater,” Kashyap clarified. “They tried raising Sea Cucumbers. And Cauliflower Jellyfish, and Tomato Clownfish. But Jalodhbhava just ate them all”

Diti didn’t think that Sea Cucumbers, Cauliflower Jellyfish, and Tomato Clownfish counted as farm produce, but she didn’t care. It would just prolong the argument.

“Imagine the plight of the poor terrified children in the single-building multi-storied village. Poor kids were starving all the time”

“Master of Melodrama,” muttered Diti. “Kalidas could learn a lesson or two from you.”

“I’m sure he would! Who is Kalidasa by the way? Not one of our kids, is he?”

“No,” reassured Diti “he’s going to appear on the scene many centuries in the future. Don’t worry about him. Go back to the underwater demon of yours. Did you fight him?”

“No,” admitted Kashyap. “I’m just a scholar. I’m not a fighter. But if there’s one thing I’ve got going for me – I’m somebody or the other’s father or grandpa or great-grandpa.”

“Did you pull in one of my children to help you?” Diti held her breath.

“I asked Vishnu,” her husband replied. And Diti sighed, yup – she shouldn’t have raised her own hopes. Aditi’s kids got their way here too.

“You should have seen him dear, what a magnificent creature he turned himself into. A wild boar. A very strong wild boar! He poked his tusk into the ground on the other side of the mountain, and just like that all the water drained out!”

So a boar had bored a hole in the ground. What was the big deal here? This was boring stuff. Bet her own kids could do better.

“But Jalodhbhava got crushed! A mountain fell on him.”

“And you’re proud of making an entire species extinct. That poor creature! It must have been the last of its kind.”

Kashyap protested that hey, Jalodhbhava had no reservations about trying to make the villagers extinct.

“Really? He doesn’t seem to have done much other than eat some food in his domain. And do you really consider it a smart move to drain the lake? So, the villagers got a little bit more real estate, but there’s no water left for them? Bet my kids could have done better.”

“But dear, the river that Vishnu created by draining the lake now flows into the Sindh River, which flows into the Jhelum River, which flows into the Chenab River, and that ultimately flows into the Indus River.”

“And your point is?” Diti asked

“Without the additional water output on the Indus River, it will take longer for the Indus Valley Civilization to flourish! And besides there is some water that remains, the villagers are using it for cultivating some crops. It’s a win-win all around!”

Diti still didn’t care. “Except for Jalodhbhava. Anyway, drop all that aside, file it all away in your mind palace under K for the Kashmir file. Now let’s go build our children’s nursery.” she told Kashyap.

Kashyap was surprised. “Are we expecting?”

“If we aren’t, we probably will be soon.” Diti replied. “With the number of kids and wives you have in this house, a new nursery is bound to get used.”

Kashyap was still reluctant. “We shouldn’t work on baby furniture in the evening. It’s considered inauspicious. The baby may turn out evil.”

“Nonsense, you and your suspicious self!” Diti dismissed. “If I don’t get hold of you and do this now, I think this nursery will never get built. And you’ll be off draining other lakes, and creating a new state somewhere else.”

So Kashyap gave in. The two of them worked tirelessly on the baby’s bed. And the next morning, Kashyap was gone just as Diti had predicted. And the baby’s bed proved ineffective. Because she had twins. They needed two beds, not one. 

She named them Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashapu. They were the apples of her eyes. Even though there were all kinds of warning signs with them snatching stuff from their cousins. Or maybe, because they were snatching stuff from their cousins.

It was no accident that Diti had had those two. Hiranyakashapu and Hiranyaksha had been Jaya and Vijaya in a previous life. Those are snappier names, but that’s not all. Jaya and Vijaya were gatekeepers at Vaikuntha, which is Vishnu’s home. Of course since I’m Vishnu’s number 1 fan, and visit his home often and all that, I am definitely on easy conversational terms with the chaps. They’ve always treated me well, and they’ve even let me in ahead of the other long line of visitors that Vishnu sometimes has.

I heard this from the two of them one day, as I was hanging around waiting for Vishnu to wake up.

Ironically, the story they told me also happened when Vishnu was resting. Jaya and Vijaya took their job very seriously. And if Vishnu was resting, they would see to it that he would not be disturbed. And most certainly not by children who were up to no good, no doubt. And yet, that’s precisely what happened. 4 children showed up and stood at the gates wanting to enter.
At least, Jaya and Vijaya thought they were children. Spoiler alert: they weren’t. They were several centuries old, they just looked very young. These were the 4 Kumaras, Brahma’s children and therefore my brothers. 

Jaya reacted first: “Run along kids. Nothing to see here.”

“We’re here to see Vishnu,” one of them said.

“Go look for him at your local temple. Go on, don’t hang around here.” Vijay interjected

When they showed no signs of walking away, Jaya grew a little impatient.

“Alright, I know just how to get rid of you. Here’s a shiny coin for you kids,” he began reaching into his robes for his coin purse. But he didn’t get very far. 

The Kumaras cursed Jaya and Vijaya. The gatekeepers would have to be born on Earth, and to overcome all the vices – greed, anger, envy, and many more. They would have to learn to overcome those before they could return to guard duty.

Jaya and Vijaya were terrified. It’s not that they were scared of being on the Earth. Not at all. Instead they were worried about being away from Vishnu, whom they were extremely devoted to. I can totally relate. I am, after all, Vishnu’s number one fan, and president for life of his fan club.

And speaking of Vishnu, he entered the scene, met the Kumaras and all that. Later, he had a conversation with Jaya and Vijaya. Yes, they would have to serve out the sentence that the Kumaras had cursed them with. But Vishnu could do one thing. He could make the curse less severe. Instead of a very open ended series of birth and rebirth, he offered two options. In the first one, they could be born and reborn 7 times and every life would be as devotees of Vishnu.

The other option was 3 lives, but in each life they would take the opposite attitude. They would  be looking to destroy the Preserver of the Universe. And in every case, it would be Vishnu himself who would appear and liberate them.

Without even an ounce of hesitation, Jaya and Vijaya chose the second option. Yes it meant they would spend their next three lives hating Vishnu and trying to destroy him, but their reason was simple and had to do with mathematics. 3 is less than 7. That meant they would return to Vishnu sooner!

And that’s how in their first rebirth they were born as Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashapu. Sadly for Diti, she didn’t have much luck with these kids either. She did get much more lucky with the Marutas, but that was after Indra’s intervention. That story deserves to be in an episode of its own.

So that’s the story behind how Kashmir was born, and then how two of the most famous asuras were born. We’ll end it here for now.

Some notes on the show

Diti also had other children. There was Vajranaka, Arunasura, Raktabija and Surapadman. We have seen some of them in previous episodes where they were all engaged in terrorizing innocent folks. 

Diti also had a daughter, Simhika or Holika. She’s the Aunt from Hell that tried to kill Hiranyakashapu’s son Prahlad. With the blessing and indeed, encouragement, of Hiranyakashapu. Talk about a rotten egg.

Episodes featuring Diti’s children:

Episode 20 – The Aunt from Hell – Stories From India
Episode 21 – Final Destiny – Stories From India
Kali – Attack of the Clones! – {Ep.163} – Stories From India
Tripura – Shiva – {Ep.146} – Stories From India 

Arunasura was part of the character of the week segment in this episode:
Of Mice and Men -Jataka tales Rags to Riches story – Episode 14

That’s all for now. 

Next Time

In the next episode, we’ll do a story from the Kathasaritasagara, or the ocean of the stream of stories.

Feedback

Thank you all for the comments on Social Media and on Spotify’s Q&A! I can’t directly reply to the questions there, but I’ll address them here on this show.

Thank you Divya for the support.

Thanks Aniv for the meaningful feedback. What do other folks think, should some of the intros be shorter?

Sakshi – we’ll be doing a Ramayana episode before and closer to your birthday.

Adi, I hope you had a great birthday! I couldn’t pivot to a Chandrakanta episode at such short notice, but I will be doing one in the near future.

Hiranmayee, thank you for the continued support!

Thank you as well HYSR. And yes, the Tenali Raman episode is lined up, I’ve a clash that week because of another request, but I’ll try and squeeze in all the stories right before or right after

Shalu, thank you for your support. Yes, the story was pretty straightforward and I agree the animals took the right steps to avoid the risk of being eaten.

Junior, thank you for the kind words! Yes, the Mahabharata is indeed lined up

And Aniv, the story of how Krishna passed away is a rather interesting one. We’ll cover it at some point outside of the main Mahabharata storyline.

Thank you for the support Abhishek, and thank you for the suggestion too. I will certainly explore that and aim to cover a story or two from that collection.

Parasasapbi, yes I have added a folk tale from that region to my backlog.

Libby, thank you for the support! And yes, Akbar Birbal will also be coming up soon

If you have any other comments or suggestions or if there are particular stories you’d like to hear, please do let me know by leaving a comment or a review on the site sfipodcast.com, or reply to the questions on Spotify Q&A. You can also find me on Instagram and Facebook. If you want to send me an email it’s stories.from.india.podcast@gmail.com.

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A big thank you to each of you for your continued support and your feedback.

The music is from Purple Planet.

Thanks for listening and I’ll see you next time!