Karva Chauth Vrat Katha · करवा चौथ व्रत कथा

The sister of seven brothers

There was a girl who was the only sister of seven brothers, and they loved her dearly. In many tellings she is a merchant's daughter; in others she is Queen Veeravati. On Karva Chauth she kept the fast, and would eat only once the moon had risen and she had offered it water (arghya). By evening she was faint with hunger and thirst, and her brothers could not bear to see it. They lit a fire (in some tellings a lamp) behind a tree in the distance, and told her the moon had risen. Taking the glow for the moon, she offered arghya and broke her fast.

As she ate there were ill omens: a hair in her food, a sneeze. Then news came that her husband had fallen ill, and in most tellings she found him dead. When she learned that the moon she had seen was false, she grieved, and resolved to keep the fast again with complete devotion. When she kept it again, her husband was restored to her, alive and well. The versions differ on which deity's grace restored him.

Karva and the crocodile

A woman named Karva was utterly devoted to her husband. One day, at the river, a crocodile seized her husband by the leg. He called out to Karva and she came running. She bound the crocodile with a raw cotton thread and went to Yama, the god of death, asking him to send the crocodile to his realm and spare her husband. Yama hesitated, but Karva warned that she would curse him. Afraid of the power of a devoted wife, Yama sent the crocodile away and blessed her husband with a long life. The tellings connect the Karva Chauth fast with her.

In some tellings the fast is also linked with the Mahabharata: Krishna told Draupadi of this vrat and its story.

The Karva Chauth katha is heard by women keeping the Karva Chauth fast, usually at the evening puja before the moon rises. It is a folk katha: there is no single fixed text, and families and regions tell it in different versions, some long and full of local detail. The two stories most often told are the sister of seven brothers (often named Veeravati), whose fast was broken by a false moon, and Karva, whose devotion made Yama spare her husband.

The retelling above keeps only what at least two of the published versions linked below agree on; where they differ, it says so. Your family's own telling may include more, and that is the version to follow.

The katha is read or told at the evening Karva Chauth puja, with the puja thali and karva (earthen pot) ready and a lamp lit, before the moon is sighted and the fast is broken. Customs vary by family and region.