Lord Ganesha, the son of Supreme deities Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati is one of the most worshipped deities in the Hindu religion.

It is considered auspicious to worship Lord Ganesha first before starting any Puja or performing any religious ritual.

Lord Ganesha is also popularly known by the name of Ganpati, Vinayaka and Viganharta. It is believed that Lord Ganesha removes all the Vighan (obstacles) in a person's life.

One thing that is conspicuous about Him is his broken tusk. It seems to be a popular subject because there are three stories as to the reason why it is broken. Read on to find out:

The story as in Upodghata Pada in the Brahmanda Purana

According to the story in Upodghata Pada in the Brahmanda Purana, Lord Parshuram, the sixth avatar of Vishnu, went to thank Lord Shiva for blessing him with the power to fight his enemy, Kartavirya Arjuna and some other kings.

However, Lord Ganesha didn't allow him to meet Lord Shiva, claiming that His father was busy, and that He didn't want Parshuram to disturb Him. This made Parshuram enraged and He started fighting with Ganesha.

When it looked like Ganesha was about to win, Parshuram threw His axe at Ganesha. Ganesha, however, didn't fight back because the axe was a gift from his father, Lord Shiva.

He allowed the axe to hit Him and He received it with his left tusk which got chopped off and fell on the ground.

The story as in the Mahabharata

The story that is included in the Mahabharata is that Ganesha broke his own tusk off to continue writing the Mahabharata as Vyasa was dictating it to him. Maharishi Ved Vyasa wanted to pen down Mahabharata, but he knew that he would not be able to do this alone. So he approached Lord Ganesha to help him to write it.

Ganesha agreed on one condition that He would only write if Maharishi Ved Vyasa would recite it fast and in an continuous flow without stopping in between. Maharishi Ved Vyasa agreed to it but had his own condition- that Lord Ganesha has to understand everything before penning it down so that Maharishi gets to rest in between the recitation.

It is believed at that when Lord Ganesha was writing, his pen began to wear away and as He had always proclaimed that He would not be disturbed, He pulled out his left tusk and used it to complete writing the great epic Mahabharata. That's why Lord Ganesha is also called Ekdantaya.

The story as in Ganesha's & Moon

It was said that Lord Ganesha was riding on a mouse after coming back from the feast at Kubera's place when a snake appeared from the forest. By seeing the snake, the mouse on whom Ganesha was riding ran away and Ganesha fell but not before catching the snake and holding his belly.

The Moon witnessed this and laughed at Lord Ganesha, which made Him angry, and cursed the moon and threw his tusk on him, which broke the moon.

Ganapati also cursed it to be dark and said whosoever sees the moon on Chaturthi day would be laughed at. This is why viewing Moon on Ganesh Chaturthi is considered inauspicious and is believed to create Mithya Dosham.

Source: Postcard News
Photo Credit: Temple Purohit & Wiral Feed, Amar Chitra Katha