हिंदीOn this day
Standing

Mahalakshmi (Ambabai) Temple, Kolhapur

The Shakti Peetha of Karavira, where Mahalakshmi is worshipped as Ambabai. Twice a year the setting sun walks into the sanctum and lights her face.

Built: Stone temple of the Chalukya–Shilahara period (c. 7th–12th century), later additionsWhere: MaharashtraDeity: Mata Mahalakshmi (Ambabai) of Karavira16.70° N, 74.22° E
  1. 11th–12th century
  2. 17th century
  3. early 18th century
Photo: Lovelitjadhav · CC BY-SA 4.0

01Karavira, the Devi’s own city

Kolhapur’s old name is Karavira, and the Puranas’ Karavira Mahatmya calls it a city that Mahalakshmi never leaves, even in pralaya. She is counted among the Shakti Peethas and the three and a half peethas of Maharashtra. The murti is of black stone, crowned, with a cobra’s hood behind her head and a linga carved on the crown. Unusually she faces west. On a few evenings in January–February and October–November the sun’s last rays pass through the windows and fall on her feet, then her body, then her face: the Kiranotsav, which the town gathers to watch.

02Hidden and brought back

The oldest parts of the stone temple go back to the Chalukya period, with much of the carved work from the Shilahara kings of Kolhapur in the 11th–12th centuries; Jain and Hindu figures share its outer walls. In the wars of the 17th century the priests took the murti out and hid it in the town to keep it safe. It was installed again in the temple in the early 18th century, under the Bhonsle rulers of Kolhapur, and the temple has been in daily worship since. Navaratri here ends with the Devi carried through the city in a palkhi.

The life of this place

  1. 11th–12th centuryThe Shilahara kings of Kolhapur build and adorn much of the stone temple.
  2. 17th centuryThe murti is taken out and hidden in the town for safety during the wars.
  3. early 18th centuryThe murti is installed again in the temple under the Kolhapur Bhonsles.
Visiting

In the heart of old Kolhapur, near the Bhavani Mandap. Go at dusk on the Kiranotsav days, and keep time for Rankala lake nearby.

Nearby

Kolhapur (Karavira)Standing
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Kolhapur (Karavira)

The Devi’s city of Karavira on the Panchganga, seat of the Shilahara kings and later of the senior Bhonsle line that Tarabai founded. Under Shahu Maharaj in the early 1900s it became a workshop of social reform.

Jyotiba Temple, Wadi RatnagiriStanding
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Jyotiba Temple, Wadi Ratnagiri

A hilltop temple north of Kolhapur, kuladaivat of lakhs of Marathi families, where at the Chaitra Purnima yatra the whole hill turns pink with gulal. Jyotiba is held to have come to help Mahalakshmi of Kolhapur against the demon Ratnasura.

Panhala FortStanding
Cholas and the Southern Seas

Panhala Fort

The great Shilahara fort above Kolhapur, where Siddi Jauhar trapped Shivaji in 1660, and from which he slipped out on a rainy night while Baji Prabhu held the pass behind him.

Narsobawadi (Nrusimhawadi) Datta MandirStanding
Sultanates, Vijayanagara and the kingdoms that stood

Narsobawadi (Nrusimhawadi) Datta Mandir

At the meeting of the Krishna and the Panchganga, Nrusimha Saraswati, whom the Guru Charitra honours as the second avatar of Dattatreya in Kali Yuga, lived twelve years and left his padukas. When the Krishna floods, the river enters the shrine and bathes them.