Padmini Ekadashi
Words on this page
- Paksha: Shukla and Krishna
- Half of a lunar month. In Shukla paksha, the bright half, the Moon grows. In Krishna paksha, the dark half, it wanes.
- Smarta rule and Vaishnava rule
- Two traditions' rules for the day of a festival or a fast. When they give different days, our pages show both and name each rule.
- Parana
- Breaking a fast at the time its rule allows. For Ekadashi: on the next day, after sunrise and Hari Vasara, before Dwadashi ends.
- Hari Vasara
- The first quarter of the Dwadashi tithi. The Ekadashi fast is not broken in it.
- Arunodaya
- The dawn before sunrise. In the Vaishnava Ekadashi rule, the 96 minutes (four ghatikas) before sunrise.
Shukla half of an extra (adhika) month, which comes about once in three years; the month it doubles changes from year to year
Padmini is the Ekadashi of the bright half of an extra (adhika) month, also called Purushottama month, which comes about once in three years. It is named after Queen Padmini, whose story it tells.
Written for Pujadeep and checked against the sources listed. See the sources
When it falls
This Ekadashi comes only in a year with an extra (adhika) month; none falls in the years this site shows yet. All Ekadashi dates
The story
The Ekadashi Mahatmya printed at Pune tells this story, which the sage Pulastya once told Narada. Narada had heard that King Kartavirya had held Ravana captive, though Ravana had beaten the gods themselves, and he asked how such a king came to be born.
In the Treta age King Kritavirya of the Haihaya line ruled at Mahishmati. He had a thousand queens but no son, and no sacrifice brought him one. At last he went to the Gandhamadana mountain to practise austerities, and his chief queen Padmini, daughter of King Harishchandra of the Ikshvaku line, went with him, putting aside her jewels and wearing bark cloth. For ten thousand years he did tapas, and still no son came.
Padmini went to Anasuya, the wise wife of the sage Atri, and asked for her help. Anasuya told her of the extra month, which has thirty days and two Ekadashis, Padmini and Parama, and taught her how to keep them. Padmini fasted on the Ekadashi without food or water, and kept the night awake with songs and dance. When the fast was complete, Vishnu came to her on Garuda and offered a boon. She asked it for her husband. Vishnu told her that the extra month was dear to him and offered the king a boon. The king asked for a son whom no god, human or demon could defeat, except Vishnu himself. In time Padmini bore a son, Kartavirya, so strong that he even defeated Ravana.
About this telling
The Padma Purana's printing (1894) names the two Ekadashis of the extra month differently: it calls the one of the dark half Kamala, with the story of Jayasharma (see Parama Ekadashi), and the one of the bright half Kamada, with rules for the fast but no tale. So the Pujadeep calendar gives the name Kamala Ekadashi to the dark-half day (Parama Ekadashi), not to this one.
Fasting is a choice. Anyone who is pregnant, nursing, diabetic, unwell, elderly or on regular medicine should talk to a doctor before fasting.
Where the story comes from
Sources
- Ekadashi name and month: the Pujadeep calendar's table of Ekadashi names.
- Ekadashi Mahatmya (Pune: Jagaddhitechhu Press, 1890). (folios 97–101 (leaves n196–n204))
- Padma Purana, Uttara Khanda, Anandashrama edition (Poona, 1894), chapter 65. (pp. 1378–1379 (leaves n160–n161))
More Ekadashis
Source and licence
- Our explanation
- Written for this site from the sources listed here, and checked against them. Free to quote with credit.
- Checked
- Checked against the sources listed, October 14, 2026.
- Updated
- October 15, 2026