Ethyl 1-(2-hy-droxy-eth-yl)-2-p-tolyl-1H-benzimidazole-5-carboxyl-ate.

The asymmetric unit of the title compound, C(19)H(20)N(2)O(3), contains two mol-ecules (A and B) with slightly different orientations of the ethyl groups with respect to the attached carboxyl-ate groups. Intra-molecular C-H⋯O hydrogen bonds generate S(8) ring motifs in both mol-ecules A and B. In each mol-ecule, the benzimidazole ring system is essentially planar, with maximum deviations of 0.023 (1) and 0.020 (1) Å, respectively, for mol-ecules A and B. The dihedral angle between the benzimidazole ring system and the phenyl ring is 37.34 (5)° for mol-ecule A and 42.42 (5)° for mol-ecule B. In the crystal, O-H⋯N and C-H⋯O hydrogen bonds link the mol-ecules into [100] columns with a cross-section of two-mol-ecule by two-mol-ecule wide, and further stabilization is provided by weak C-H⋯π and π-π inter-actions [centroid separations = 3.5207 (7) and 3.6314 (8) Å].