Once there lived a person named Chokamela in Pandaripur, who belonged to a low caste. He was a great devotee and after doing all his daily chores and duties he would sit and meditate on the Lord. He would go near the temple daily and go round it and always desired to have the darshan of the Lord. The priests of the temple who noticed this and observed that it was chokamela's daily routine, they scolded him and threatened him if he again came near the temple. But Chokamela stood and argued with the priests saying that, "In the eyes of the Lord everyone are equal and anyone can approach him with a pure heart". The priests didn't reply because they knew that what chokamela had said was the truth. But Chokamela left the place, since he didnt want to have a conflict with them.
On reaching his hut, he started praying to the Lord to give him darshan, since he wanted to be free from all the troubles of this material world. His pure love and prayer made the Lord come over to his hut. Chokamela was very happy to have the Lord himself in his hut. The Lord asked him, what his wish was. But Chokamela said that apart from the darshan of the Lord he didn't want anything else. The Lord was also pleased with his answer, so he took Chokamela to the temple and sat and talked with him inside the sanctorum or garbagudi till early morning. In the meanwhile the priests, as usual, opened the door of the temple in the early morning and were shocked to find Chokamela sitting inside the temple. In their anger they asked him to vacate the place immediately without telling anyone about him entering the temple. Chokamela told them that it was the Lord who had brought him inside, but they wouldn't listen to him and asked him to vacate his house and go elsewhere. Chokamela tried his best to explain them but since no one was prepared to listen to him, he went home and told his wife about it and they vacated the place and crossed the river chandrabhaga and built a nice little hut on the other side of the river and started living there.
Though Chokamela had shifted his house, his thoughts were always immersed on the Lord. One day when Chokamela was sitting outside his house, his wife brought him food and started serving him, when the Lord suddenly appeared and expressed his desire to have food with him. Chokamela was extremely pleased, he took the Lord near a tree and made him sit on a rock and started serving food for the Lord. Chokamela's wife brought some curds which happened to slip and fell on the Lord's yellow robe. Chokamela felt sorry for what happened and immediately cleaned it. When all these things were happening, a brahmin happened to see it and became extremely angry and jealous. He came and slapped Chokamela, for having served the Lord, with food made by a low caste or untouchable. Immediately the Lord's Cheek swelled and the finger marks were printed on the cheeks of the Lord. The brahmin was shocked and questioned himself on how such a thing could happen. He realised his mistake of thinking Chokamela to be only a low caste, whereas he was a great devotee of the Lord. A devotee whose pure heart and prayer could bring down thenLord to his hut. He at once fell at the feet of the Lord and Chokamela and begged them to pardon him for his mistake. He felt sorry for having slapped the cheeks of Chokamela. Chokamela pardoned the brahmin and touched the cheeks of the Lord, immediately the swelling on the cheeks of the Lord disappeared.
Later the brahmin went to the village and explained the whole incident to the other villagers, who came running to Chokamela and prostrated in front of him and asked for forgiveness for all that happened and took him to the temple . From that day onwards Chokamela was allowed to enter the temple. Chockamela used to come to the temple daily and offer his prayers to the Lord and finally he reached the feet of the Lord
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