mAnasA in vanga

The vA~Nga cult of manasA has many unusual features not seen in the south. It is also rather unusual that she rose to be one of the most celebrated goddesses of the region. Some of those include:

    1. Her identification with an ancient goddess padmAvatI (shown with a snake in jina tradition.
    1. Her rivalry with the goddess chaNDikA who blinds one of her eyes.
    1. Her unusual companion netA the laundrywoman of the deva-s.
    1. Her rise to prominence involving the forcible conversion of a v3 of gAndhin (perfumer seller; like MKG) caste.
    1. Her role in reviving rudra after he drink viSha during the churning of the ocean. 6) Having a head like Channa fish.
    1. A late element of the vernacular maNgala-kAvya-s of the vANga-s: the subjugation of predatory Mohd sardar-s by manasA who sends a great horde of venomous animals to slaughter their forces and sweep them from their territories when the tried to suppress H worship.

A body similar to the maNgalakAvya-s is not available in the South Indian version of her cult. The Panjabi version is all but forgotten and reduced to obscure temples. My sources of folklorists have not supplied anything as detailed as the vANga versions for the andhra or karNATa forms of the cult. Yet one wonders if her initial spread was related to the rise of the chAlukya karNATa empire.

jaratkAru strand

There is the old jaratkAru strand of her tradition going back the mahAbhArata that is presented in a moral conundrum: When a v1 is relaxing in the intimacy of his wife & she tells him to get moving with his sandhyopAsa lest he miss time what is the right action. That part of the tale remains in later versions with her dysfunctional marriage with jaratkAru. That mishap is however attributed by the vA~Nga-s to chaNDIkA’s charmed frog deployed against manasA. She is worshipped within the jaratkAru frame by some coethnics with the mantra:

yo jaratkAruNA jAto jaratkanyAM mahAyashAH |
tasya sarpApabhadraM te dUraM gachCha mahAyashAH |

during their saMdhyopAsana and is extracted from a late khila appended to venomous animal sUkta of maitrAvaruNi agastya from the maNDala-1 of the R^igveda.