01The spring of milk
Ksheera is milk. The sthala purana tells that Shiva struck the ground here with his trishula and a spring of milk rose, and the place was called Ksheerapuri; Palakollu, the Telugu name, says the same thing, palu being milk. Bhagwan Vishnu installed the linga here as Rama, which is why the Bhagwan is Ramalingeswara. The linga is small and milk-white, and unlike the other four Pancharamas the shrine is of a single storey. Vishnu, Lakshmi and the Navagrahas have their own shrines in the courtyard.
02A gopuram over the paddy
The great gopuram of Ksheerarama rises in nine storeys to about 120 feet and can be seen across the flat paddy of the delta long before the town appears. Tradition ties the temple to the Eastern Chalukya king Vijayaditya, while the earliest inscription found on its walls is of 1156 CE. The temple is a centre of the Kartika month in the Godavari districts, when lamps are floated and the Bhagwan is bathed in milk.
The life of this place
- 1156 CEThe earliest dated inscription on the temple is recorded.
Palakollu is about 25 km from Bhimavaram and has its own railway station. Kartika Mondays and Mahashivaratri are the great days.
