Indira Ekadashi

Indira Ekadashi is closely connected with ancestral remembrance because its traditional katha tells of King Indrasena and his deceased father. Indrasena was a devoted ruler when Sage Narada visited his court with news that the king's father was suffering in Yamaloka because an earlier religious obligation had remained incomplete. Narada advised Indrasena to observe Indira Ekadashi carefully and dedicate the merit of the fast to his father. The king prepared from Dashami, worshipped Vishnu, observed the Ekadashi fast with his family and transferred the merit of the vrata for his father's release. The story says that this devotion freed his father from Yamaloka and enabled him to ascend to a higher realm. Because the Ekadashi falls during the ancestral fortnight in many calendars, its story naturally joins Vishnu devotion with gratitude toward one's forebears. Worship, fasting, charity and remembrance of ancestors therefore form important themes of the observance.

Falls inside Pitru Paksha, and is kept for the ancestors rather than for the keeper - the merit is assigned to the dead of the line, which is why it sits in that fortnight.

Bhadrapad's dark fortnight, inside Pitru Paksha. The merit is offered to the family's dead, and it is kept alongside the shraddha rather than instead of it.