It is a polemical work written as a Jain rebuttal to the Buddhist criticism in the Great Tamil epic Kundalakesi.
According to the epic, when animal sacrifices of a temple of the Kali in Panchala were stopped due to the influence of the Jains, the Goddess dispatched the local deity Nīli to seduce and destroy the monk responsible for it.
She debates and defeats several Buddhist rhetoricians like Arkachandra, Kundalakesi, Moggallana (Tamil: Mokkala) and even Gautama Buddha himself.
Nīlakēci also defeats votaries from other schools of Indian philosophy, including Samkhya, Vaisheshika, Mīmāṃsā and Cārvāka.
Vamanar's commentary of Neelakesi shed light on the religious controversies of that period and also mention the names of many other Jain literary works (now lost) like Anjanakesi, Pinkalakesi and Kalakesi.