page_title: Panchakanya
section_title: Ahalya
hierarchical_section_title: Panchakanya / From the Ramayana / Ahalya
caption_attribution_description: English: Ahalya, wife of the sage Gautama, from Hindu Mythology.മലയാളം: ഹിന്ദു പുരാണത്തിലെ ഗൗതമ മഹാഋഷിയുടെ ഭാര്യ അഹല്യ.
context_page_description: Panchakanya is a group of five iconic heroines of Hindu epics, extolled in a hymn and whose names are believed to dispel sin when recited. They are Ahalya, Draupadi, Sita or Kunti, Tara, and Mandodari. While Draupadi and Kunti are from Mahabharata, Ahalya, Tara, Mandodari and Sita are from the epic Ramayana.
  The panchakanya are venerated as ideal women and chaste wives in one view. Their association with more than one man and breaking of traditions in some cases are prescribed as not to be followed by others.
context_section_description: Ahalya, also known as Ahilya, is the wife of sage Gautama Maharishi. Ahalya is often regarded as the leader of the panchkanya due to the "nobility of her character, her extraordinary beauty and the fact of her being chronologically the first kanya". Ahalya is often described to be created by the god Brahma as the most beautiful woman in the entire universe, but also sometimes as an earthy princess of Lunar Dynasty. Ahalya was placed in the care of Gautama, until she gained puberty and was finally married to the elderly sage.
  The king of gods, Indra, was infatuated with her beauty and comes disguised as Gautama, when the sage was away and requests or orders sexual intercourse. In the Ramayana (the earliest full narrative of the tale), Ahalya sees through his disguise, but still complies out of "curiosity". In later versions, Ahalya falls prey to Indra's trickery and does not recognize him or is raped. In all narratives, Ahalya and Indra are cursed by Gautama. Although early texts describe how Ahalya must atone by undergoing severe penance while remaining invisible to the world and how she is purified by offering Rama (an avatar of the god Vishnu and hero of the Ramayana) hospitality, in the popular retelling developed over time, Ahalya is cursed to become a stone and regains her human form after she is brushed by Rama's foot. Some versions also mention that she was turned into a dry stream and that she would be condoned of her guilt when eventually the stream starts flowing and joins the river Gautami (Godavari). Indra was cursed to be castrated or be covered by a thousand vulvae that ultimately turn into a thousand eyes.
caption: Ahalya
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