01Guardian of the dhams
Garhwali families speak of Dhari Devi as the protector of the Char Dham road and of the hills themselves. Only the head and upper body of the murti are here, on a rock in the river; the lower half is worshipped at Kalimath in the Kedar valley. The local katha says the image came floating down the Alaknanda in a flood and stopped against this rock, where a voice from it asked to be installed. Her face is said to change through the day, a girl in the morning, a woman at noon and an old woman by evening.
02June 2013
When the Srinagar hydro-electric dam raised the river, the old shrine was to go under water. On 16 June 2013 the murti was lifted from its rock to a temporary platform. That night and the next day the cloudburst and floods of the Kedarnath disaster struck the whole region. Many in Garhwal took it as the Devi’s displeasure, and the demand to restore her to her own place grew strong. A new temple was raised on pillars directly above the original rock, and the murti was reinstalled there in January 2023.
The life of this place
- 16 June 2013The murti is moved from its rock for the Srinagar dam; the Kedarnath floods strike within hours.
- January 2023The murti is reinstalled in the new temple above the original site.
The temple is on the Rishikesh–Badrinath highway about 15 km beyond Srinagar (Garhwal); a footbridge leads down to the river.
