Chapter 119 - The Greatness of Kalhoḍī Tīrtha

[Sanskrit text for this chapter is available]

Śrī Mārkaṇḍeya said:

1-13. Thereafter, O great king, one should go to the excellent Kalhoḍī Tīrtha which is destructive of all sins. It is situated on the northern bank of Revā.

Formerly it was lifted up by sages through the power of their penance and established in the great waters of Narmadā for the sake of the welfare of all living beings.

Listen to the benefit that one attains by making a gift of a Kapilā (tawny-coloured) cow, after taking the holy ablution in the Kapilā Tīrtha and listening to the divine narrative from a Brāhmaṇa.

Of all the Dānas, Kapilādāna is the most excellent one. Even Brahmā had recourse to it formerly in the assembly of sages and Devas.

Listen to the meritorious benefit of one who eschews anger, observes fast and makes the gift of a splendid Kapilā cow immediately after it has calved.

There is no doubt about this that it is as good as, O mighty-armed one, the gift of the entire earth along with the caves and oceans, mountains, forests and parks.

O king, sins verbal, mental and physical, committed formerly in the course of seven births, perish by the gift of a Kapilā.

Gifts of plots of land, cash, food-grains, elephants, horses, gold etc. do not deserve even a sixteenth fraction of Kapilādāna.

A man who takes his holy bath there and makes the gift of a Kapilā cow, goes to Viṣṇu’s city on death after being sung about by groups of celestial damsels.

He sports about for a long time in Svarga, for as many thousand years as there are hairs on the body of that cow as well as that of the calf.

After descending down in due course, he is born as a human being in a large family full of wealth and food-grain.

He will be well-versed in the Vedic lore, an expert in all the scriptures, free from ailments and grief etc. He lives for a hundred years.

Thus the excellent Kalhoḍī Tīrtha has been fully described, by performing (the pilgrimage to) which one is liberated from all sins.