The idol at Ambalapuzha is likened to Parthasarthi form of Vishnu, preserving a whip in his proper hand and a conch in his left. All through the raids of Tipu Sultan in 1789, the idol of Sri Krishna from the Guruvayoor Temple was brought to the Ambalappuzha Temple for safe keeping for 12 years.Payasam, a candy pudding made from rice and milk is served inside the temple and is thought that the Lord Guruvayoorappan visits the temple day by day to simply accept the imparting.

In step with the legend, God Krishna once seemed within the form of a sage inside the courtroom of the king who ruled the region and challenged him for a game of chess (or chaturanga). The king being a chess enthusiast himself gladly frequent the invitation. The prize had to be decided earlier than the game and the king requested the sage to pick out his prize in case he received. The sage instructed the king that he had a very modest declare and being a man of few material wishes, all he wanted become some grains of rice. The quantity of rice itself shall be determined using the chess-board inside the following way. One grain of rice will be located in the first rectangular, grains in the 2d square, 4 in the 0.33 rectangular, 8 inside the fourth square, 16 in fifth square and so forth. Every square may have double of its predecessor. The king misplaced the sport and sage demanded the agreed-upon prize. As he began adding grains of rice to the chess board, the king quickly realised the proper nature of the sage’s needs. The royal granary quickly ran out of grains of rice. The king realised that he will by no means be able to fulfill the promised reward as the range of grains turned into growing as a geometrical development and the entire amount of rice required for a sixty four-squared chess board is eighteen,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains, translating to trillions of tons of rice.

Upon seeing the dilemma, the sage seemed to the king in his authentic-shape, that of Lord Krishna and advised the king that he did not need to pay the debt right now however could pay him over time. The king would serve paal-payasam (pudding fabricated from rice) inside the temple freely to the pilgrims every day until the debt become paid off. The Amabalapuzha Temple pageant became established in the course of the fifteenth century advert. At this time, a part of the Travancore become dominated by way of the Chembakassery Devanarayana Dynasty. The rulers of this dynasty had been highly spiritual and decided that an idol of Lord Krishna became to be brought to the Amabalapuzha Sree Krishna Swamy Temple from the Karinkulam temple. The birthday celebration in commemoration of the bringing of this idol of Lord Krishna is the beginning of the Amabalapuzha Temple competition, additionally called the Chambakulam Moolam water pageant. This pageant is conducted every year at the Moolam day of the Mithunam month of the Malayalam era. The Aaraattu competition takes region on the Thiruvonam day in March–April.