हिंदीOn this day
Standing

Kasba Ganpati, Pune

The guardian Ganapati of Pune, whose temple Jijabai built when she came to resettle the ruined town with the boy Shivaji. In the immersion procession of Ganeshotsav he always goes first.

Built: Temple built by Rajmata Jijabai, c. 1630sWhere: Maharashtra (Pune)Deity: Shri Ganesh, the gramadevata of Pune18.52° N, 73.86° E
  1. c. 1630s
  2. 1893
Photo: Gayathri menon · CC BY-SA 3.0

01Jijabai’s Ganapati

In the 1630s Pune was a burnt village; an Adil Shahi general had ploughed its ground with donkeys as a sign that it should never rise again. Jijabai came with the young Shivaji to the family jagir, had a golden plough run over the same earth, and began to rebuild. The town’s tradition says she found a small swayambhu Ganapati here and built a temple for him, near the Lal Mahal where Shivaji grew up. The murti is a small stone face covered over the centuries with layers of shendur, red lead, until it has grown to some three feet.

02First of the five

Pune honours five manache Ganapati, the Ganapatis of honour, and Kasba is the first: on Anant Chaturdashi his palkhi leads the immersion procession, followed by Tambdi Jogeshwari, Guruji Talim, Tulshibaug and Kesariwada. Every auspicious beginning in the old city, a wedding, a new shop, the first invitation card, is placed before him. The Thakar family has served the temple for generations.

The life of this place

  1. c. 1630sJijabai resettles Pune and builds the temple.
  2. 1893With the public Ganeshotsav, Kasba becomes the first manacha Ganapati of the procession.
Visiting

In Kasba Peth, a few minutes’ walk from Shaniwar Wada and Lal Mahal.

Nearby

Lal Mahal, PuneRebuilt
The Mughal era and the resistance

Lal Mahal, Pune

The red house Shahaji built in Pune for Jijabai and the boy Shivaji, where Shivaji grew up and where, on the night of 5 April 1663, he fell upon the Mughal general Shaista Khan in his own bedchamber.

Nana Wada, PuneStanding
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Nana Wada, Pune

The town house that Nana Phadnavis built for himself in 1780, a few steps from Shaniwar Wada, from which the Peshwa’s chief minister ran the Maratha state for a quarter of a century.

Shaniwar Wada, PuneRuined
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Shaniwar Wada, Pune

The palace-fort of the Peshwas, from which the Maratha confederacy was run for nearly ninety years. A fire in 1828 left only the walls and gates.

PuneStanding
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Pune

The town where Shivaji grew up under Jijabai’s eye, and for nearly a century the seat of the Peshwas, from which Maratha armies rode to Attock and Bengal. Later it became the workshop of Tilak, Agarkar and the Deccan Education Society.