Why the Vindhya Mountain Swelled? – Stories from Aranyaka Parva

The Vindhya Mountain Range is located in the west-central part of modern India covering portions of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, and the southern parts of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. There’s a story about why the mountain range has a partition in between.

Mount Meru, located in the Himalayas, had always been a sacred site for humans and gods. Its location was such that the sun’s daily path (from east to west) seemed like he was circumambulating Meru. Meru was also called the golden king of mountains (it shone like gold when sunrays fell on it). 

The Vindhya Mountain noticed this and was angry. He demanded the sun to explain why Mount Meru got such respect. The sun replied that he didn’t plan it. The mountain’s location made it seem that way. However, Vindhya wasn’t pleased with the answer. He swelled in size and grew bigger and bigger until it could overshadow everything else. 

This meant, Vindhya blocked the sun’s path and prevented him from traveling across the sky. The moon and the stars also faced the same issue. They could no longer move freely. This led to an imbalance in day and night, seasons, months, and years. Nature’s cycle went out of the loop. Humans suffered the consequences of these changes. The rishis were also troubled as they couldn’t perform their yagnas correctly. 

Something had to be done. The rishis and the gods tried to convince Vindhya but he wouldn’t listen. They went to Rishi Agastya and asked him to restore the balance on the earth. 

 Agastya went to Vindhya with his wife and asked him to create a path to travel southward. He said they had some work on the other side and the mountain could close the gap once they returned. Vindhya agreed. He split into two and opened a path for the rishi and wife to walk through. 

Agastya went through the path and never returned. The Vindhya Mountain had to keep the route open as per their agreement. This gap cleared the space for the planets and stars to resume their movements across the sky. Soon, everything got back into a proper cycle.