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बकवधपर्वन् (bakavadhaparvan)

 
Mahabharata
English
Bakavadhaparvan (“the slaughter of Baka, ” the 10th of the minor parvans of Mhbhr.). § 215: I, 157 ff.: The Pāṇḍavas for some time dwelt in the abode of the brahman, living on alms
Bhīma alone used to eat one-half of the alms. One day Bhīma and Kuntī overheard the brahman complaining (I, 157), and his wife (I, 158) and daughter asked to be sacrificed for him to a rākshasa, and their little son said that he would slay the rākshasa with a blade of grass. Kuntī approached (I, 159), and learned that the rākshasa Baka (“king of the Asuras, ” v. 6808), a cannibal, protected the town and the country, receiving as his fee a cartload of rice, two buffaloes, and the human being who brought them to him, from one after another of the householders, while the king, residing in Vetrakīyagṛha (see BR.), did nothing to protect the country against him. Now the turn had come for the brahman, and as he had no wealth to buy a man, and could not part with any of his family, he would go with all his family to the rākshasa, in order that he might devour them all (I, 160). Kuntī said that one of her sons would bring the food to the rākshasa. This the brahman energetically refused, until she had told him that on account of his strength and mantras her son would be safe
but he ought not to disclose this fact to anybody, for then people might trouble them out of curiosity, and if her son imparted his knowledge to anybody he would himself no longer be able to profit by it. Bhīma also consented (I, 161). When the others returned home with their alms, Yudhishṭhira blamed his mother for her rash act
but she relied on Bhīma (I, 162). The next morning Bhīma set out for the abode of the rākshasa, and approaching he began himself to eat the food he carried, loudly calling the rākshasa by his name. The rākshasa came out in a fury
but Bhīma, disregarding his yells and blows, leisurely ate up the whole of that food and washed his hands. Then they began to hurl trees at each other, and thereupon they clasped each other with their arms. At last Bhīma pressed Baka down to the earth, and placing one knee on the middle of his back, bent him double, while he (Baka) roared frightfully and began to vomit blood (I, 163). Baka died uttering frightful yells. The rākshasas, his relatives, came and promised never again to kill human beings, and from that day the rākshasas of that region were very peaceful towards mankind. Bhīma placed the corpse at one of the gates of the town, and went away unobserved. The brahman told the citizens that it was a brahman skilled in mantras (mantrasiddha) who had slain the rākshasa, and they established a Brahma festival (brahmamahaṃ) (I, 164).