The story:-

Once 'Shreeya', an untouchable woman worshipped Goddess Lakshmi by observing this festival. Being moved by her devotion Lakshmi left Her permanent abode, the temple which is situated inside the campus of the temple of Lord Jagannatha and visited Shreeya's house. When Lord Balabhadra, the elder brother of Lord Jagannatha came to know about this, She was declared defiled and was not allowed to come back into the temple. Lakshmi was deeply hurt and went to her father Sahara.

When Lakshmi went out of the temple all wealth in the temple started vanishing. Later the Gods Balabhadra and Jagannatha couldn't find food to sustain themselves. They came out of the temple in the attire of Brahmin beggars in search of food. Ultimately they landed at the door of the Goddess Lakshmi. Balabhadra apologised for the mistake and all of them returned to the temple.

The 'Purana' ultimately teaches all to pay extreme regard to Goddess Lakshmi and the person who disregards Her is sure to fall on evil days. This means that wealth should be well protected and properly used and misutilisation of wealth is sure to make a person suffer.

Dr. Harihar Kanungo in his article "Bibarttan Prakriyare Sri Jagannath" says that the Nagas and Savaras worshipped Lord Jagannath as Darudevata. Accoding to his article "Socialistic Consciousness in Jagannath Culture", Jagannath was later on subjected to an attempt at Aryanisation as a prelude to a monopoly, hold over him by the high-born Aryans. But it is doubtlessly clear that such attempts of the Aryans to monopolise on Jagannath culture from time to time had always been rendered futile in the teeth of vehement opposition of the local tribes of Orissa for whom Jagannath is still the symbolic summom-bonum of their culture. Out of this resistance was born a new culture, corroborated by tradition, in the Laxmi Purana of Balarama Das. The visit of goddess Laxmi to the cottage of Shriya, the Chandaluni (The untouchable woman), Jagannaths admonition for the same and later his repentance and realization, all these vivid incidents depicted in this Purana came to open up new dimensions for the temple traditions and establish Maa Laxmi as the symbolic head of a healthy egalitarian society, unaffected by the distinction of caste. There is no village in Orissa where the Laxmi Purana is not accepted by all the villagers. This further goes on to prove that Jagannath was equally accessible to all castes.

The articles of Dr. Harihar Kanungo are available in famous Odia magazines like "Jhankara", "Utkal Prasanga" and "Orissa Review".

 

Download /Read this :- Shree Mahalakshmi (Mahalaxmi) Purana

(Thanks to www.odia.org)