Legend of Heera Shankh
There is a beautiful story that exist behind the Heera Shankhs. Thousands of years back an old poor lady named Heera-ujwala used to stay in a village at North East India. Earlier River Ganges used to flow from there and falls at the ocean. She was an ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu and Goddess Laxmi. Once upon a time an epidemic spread in her village and the villagers started dying in high numbers. Her two sons and their wives too came in the grip of that epidemic and caught the disease. To save the lives of her sons, daughters in law and the rest of the inmates of the village and bring the prosperity again in the village, she was told in her dream to do penance, fasting and worship of Laxmi Narayan. Since she was as such an ardent devotee, immediately she decided to do severe penance to please Lord Vishnu and Goddess Laxmi. In the course of her doing the severe penance without eating anything, in front of fire ( Yajna), Lord Vishnu appeared and promised her that very soon the village will be free from all epidemic and all affected village inmates will soon be blessed with good health. But to bring prosperity she was advised to worship Dakshinavarty Laxmi Shankh as Goddess Laxmi can be pleased easily with the worship of Dakshinavarty Shankh. It is said that she was given a very big sized Dhakshinavarty Right side Laxmi Shankh by the Lord Himself. With the blessings of Lord Vishnu very soon the village was free from diseases. However, Heera-ujwala continued her penance to please Goddess Laxmi. It is said that since Heera-ujwala was gifted with the biggest Dakshinavarty Shankh by the Lord Himself, rest of the Dakshinavarty Shanks along with ....Read More