Kaliya in his past birth was the sage” Vedshira” who had performed severe austerities.

The rishi Vedshira lived in a beautiful ashram and once the “Ashvashira” muni entered in his ashram, seeing him coming, the sage Vedshira shouted on him and said” You are not supposed to perform any penance here, just get out of this place”.

Seeing envious and full of hatred behavior ashvashira muni cursed him and said” You are behaving like a serpent who is always angry and envious to others, therefore I curse you to become a poisonous snake”. So Vedshira muni became poisonous Kaliya snake.

Kaliya Naag has his original "dhaam" called "Ramanaka Dwipa", one day Kaliya Naag was feared from the "Garuda" in Ramanaka Dwipa because all serpe . In this fear Kaliya Naag came to the Yamuna river, he started living there for a while, knowing that Garuda would never come.

Once Shri Krishna and friends were playing ball, in playfulness the ball fell into the Yamuna river, then Bhagawan Shri Krishna dived to go get it. The big Kaliya stood up vomiting poison, and wrapped his self around Krishna.

Sri Krishna made himself so big, that Kaliya was forced to let him go, Shri Krishna beat and also danced on Kaliya, Kaliya became the one of the two people Bhagawan Narayan has ever set foot on! Kaliya began to die, then Kaliya Naag's wives came to Shri Krishna and with joint palms askedfor their husband to be saved, Sri Krishna stopped, then Kaliya asked for forgiveness and promised not to harass anyone.

Shri Krishna forgave him and let him go back to Ramanaka Dwipa