Bhandasura

Bhandasur was a demon created from the ashes of Kamdev by one of Lord Shiva's men, who was then killed by the goddess Ambika (Tripurasundari).

Story

Once, when Ganesh was lonely and had nothing to do, he went into a cave and found the ashes of Kamdev, who was incinerated by the third eye of Lord Shiva, before he and Kartikeya were born. Ganesh started to make a demon figure out of it and brought life into it. The demon, Bhandasur, had the complexion of ashes. He was Bhandasur, born from the ashes of Kamdev (God of Love), he was Ganesh's friend and played with him for some time in Kailash. Later, he becomes bored and decides to cause atrocities. He starts tormenting Lord Shiva's men and turning the mountains in ashes. Seeing this, Nandi tries to stop him, so does Ganesh. Parvati appears, Ganesh tells her everything about Bhandasur's deeds and requests her to stop him. Parvati steps in and warns him, but Bhandasur mocks her. Ganesh warns Bhandasur not to insult mother Parvati. Parvati again warns him to leave immediately or get killed by her. Bhandasur charges at her. Nandi and his host yell. Lord Shiva appears and tells him that he will not protect him if he does not obey what Goddess Parvati says. Bhandasur flees and recalls Parvati's warnings. Bhandasur returns to Himalaya mountain. Scenes flash to him of what happened earlier. Bhandasur is annoyed on seeing Ganesh and reprimands him. Ganesh enlightens him and pleads for forgiveness of what happened due to his birth. He enlightens his about Kamdev. He apologizes to Bhandasur and vows to start a new life of friendship. Bhandasur rejects Ganesh's advances and turns into Ganesh's enemy instead of being his friend. He tells Ganesh about his true intentions. On Bhandasur's sayings, he again confronts Nandi and his hosts, Ganesh tries to stop him. Nandi warns him. Bhandasur intends to punish Nandi and his host for blocking his way. Bhandasur warns Nandi to move, but Nandi challenges him to move him. Bhandasur lifted his sword. He and Ganesh turned around when hearing Parvati's voice. She was furious. Ganesh requests her to calm down. He also requests Bhandasur not to intrude in Kailash and tries to make him happy. Bhandasur comes close to Ganesh's face and speaks to him harshly, infuriating Parvati and Nandi. Parvati becomes more angry when Bhandasur mentions her name. He intends to be extremely powerful. Parvati, warns him for the last time not to enter Kailash and threatens to kill him if he enters. Bhandasur pushes Nandi and his host. Seeing this, Parvati yells at him. Bhandasur tries to intrude into Kailash, he heard a loud voice that sounded like Goddess Parvati.She appeared in the form of violent Goddess Chandi. Goddess Chandi has three eyes, her divine black hairs were all locked, she has a face full of youth, beauty, and was glorious like countless sheens of rising suns, she was wearing red garments had the sheen of the rising suns, wearing on her hands, arms, ears, nose, and fingernails, all heavy jewels, gold armours, earrings, studs, anklets, a nose ring, rings, bangles, necklaces, gems, diamonds, armlets, a gold belt, ornaments and bracelets of all kind which were all lustrous and shining like gold on her. Her chest was decorated by a garland of fragrant lotuses, with divine pollen dust adorning her clothes. She wore henna decorations on her hands and feet, nail polish on her fingernails and wearing dazzling lipstick and smelled nice like various sprays of perfume. Her eight hands holding the discus, conch shell, bow, arrow, sword, shield, mace and trident. She is seated on the back of a fearsome tiger. The seven divine sages like Kashyap, Bhrigu, Atri, Pulastya and others arrived to see Goddess Chandi. Ganesh asked her not to kill Bhandasur out of his friendship with the demon. Bhandasur created many demons from his body, but Chandi succeeded in killing Bhandasur's demons. Finally, she throws him with lasers coming from her eyes. Bhandasur is frightened on seeing her. Goddess Chandi addresses him and makes him realize his misdeeds. She manages to kill Bhandasur with her trident. She became known as 'Bhandasur Sangharini' (The Killer of Bhandasur). Ganesh cries. But after killing him, she became furious and plans to destroy everything. The Gods and sages eulogize her, Goddess Chandi is pacified and returns to her Parvati form. She forgives the dying Bhandasur and he is destroyed.

The more popular version of the story says that Bhandasura had pleased Lord Brahma and gained the boon that he would die only at the hands of a woman who wasn't given birth to by another woman (Ayonija Lady). Lord Shiva, upon hearing the troubles caused by Bhandasura to the demigods reminded Goddess Parvati about Brahma's boon. Parvati realizes that she was the unborn universal power who alone could kill Bhandasura as she was Adi-Shakti. But as parvati she was still the child of Himavan and Menavati. So, Upon her and Lord Shiva's command, the demigods prayed to the supreme Brahman Sadashiva who manifested before them in two forms: Shambhu and Shakti. The Saptarishis were ordered to perform a fire sacrifice which would help Shakti manifest. During the sacrifice, all the deities entered the fire, and from their bodies, the body of the world's most beautiful being, Tripurasundari was created. She then recreated Vishnu and Parvati (Brother and sister), Brahma and Saraswathi and Rudra and Lakshmi in that order followed by all the other demigods. She further created Bhairava and Matangi who were her commander-in-chief and chief minister respectively. She also created various other sub-divinities who would assist her to kill Bhandasura. She also created a charriot for herself, called the Sri Chakraraja. She was given a palace to live in the Vindhyas.

Then, hearing of her opulence, Bhandasura entered her alace and challenged her. The Goddess decided to give him a final opportunity to save himself and does not respond. But seeing Indrani, he was smite with desire and attempted to abduct her, incurring the Devi's wrath. She herself challenges him to a fight, but after a fortnight. During that time, she marries Lord Shiva's incarnation Sundareshwara and has two children, Ganesh's incarnation Vinayak and Ashoka Sundari's incarnation Baala. When one fortnight was up, she attacked Bhandasura while his army was destroyed by the denizens of heaven. Bhandasura's lackeys attacked her and angered her even more than she was already. The goddess, in a great fit of rage, transformed into the Goddess Kali.

After destroying his demon lackeys, Kali proceeded to kill Bhandasura who had already escaped his abode and was hiding elsewhere. Kali retires for the night. She returns to the palace and orders Vinayak and Baala to accompany her the next day. At night, Shukracharya arrives at the cave in which Bhandasura was hiding and reminds him to use protective Yantras. He and his remaining demon cronies create such Yantras and plant them all around the cave. This prevents the entry of all the soldiers of the goddess. An angered Kali asks Vinayak to destroy the yantras which he does with great ease. Kali then arrives before Bhandasura's hideout and challenges him to come out and face her. Bhandsura, who was already traumatized by seeing the fearsome form of Kali asks his sons to fight for him. They come out of the cave and block the entrance with a huge rock which was jinxed. It could not allow any deity inside.

Baala destroys the 30 sons of Bhandasura and Ganesh removes the jinx on the rock, which was placed just so that the cave looked like it had no entrance. Bhandasura is forced to come out due to the energy bolts released from Vinayak's hands and faces Kali without any weapons. She immediately smites his head off and descends into hell in order to destroy all the other demons that lived there. To maintain the balance between good and bad, Kali had to be stopped, but she could not bear to see any more demons torturing the humans. Narada and Durvasa create a Sri Chakra and offer a lotus to the goddess. Kali is pleased with the simple offering and her heart brims with love for the human kind that she accepts the lotus as a gift and returns to her abode as Parvati, once again to reside beside Lord Shiva.