A visit to Chausathi (64) Yogini Temple ,Hirapur, a 9th century A.D. Monument

My mom was with us last week and in the week end, she asked me to take her to nearby ancient place called Chausathi (64) Yogini Temple ,Hirapur. She heard about it from someone and was curious to go there. This place is at a distance of 22 km from my place in Bhubaneswar, which is the capital of State of Odisha. The weather is very pleasant now, as its Winter here. So I planned the trip and had a look at the route. If you want to visit , then here is how it looks on the google map (Assuming you are in Bhubaneswar).

We started at around 10.30 in the morning, and were there after a hour of driving. Though I had the map in mind, still I had to inquire about the route to the place at two junctions. After reaching there the first thing you see is the hoarding put by Archaeological survey of India which looks like this :

Recently Archaeological survey of India has taken care of most of the monuments which is certainly a good move to protect and maintain these monuments. I was delighted to see the Government taking such initiative and maintaining this monument with proper care. Here is how the monument looks from outside :

The temple does not have a roof following the hypaethral architecture of ancient times. WE found one person, who identified himself as a staff of Archaeological survey of India and works as Guide cum Care Taker of the Place. According to him, the Temple is a tantric temple, where people would worship the idols to gain some spiritual power that enables them to do anything that they wish. Hearing this made me little scary...

He also told the ancient history behind the temple : There was a demon king known as Raktabija and if someone would fight with him, then each drop of his blood shed on the ground, will multiply to another Raktabija . So to fight with him, Goddess Durga, created these 64 yoginis , so that they could drink all the bloods before they touch ground. And that is how he was defeated. Quite interesting, isn't it ?

Here are some pictures of the idols in the temple :

If you closely watch the images (especially last two) , you can see part of these idols are broken, and that made me curious to ask him the cause of why they were broken. And he said that there was a hindu king who converted to Islam and was named as Kalapahad or Kala Pahar and he evaded odisha and destroyed most of the temples. During his evasion, these idols were broken by parts, and they have been remained as is, since then.

WE took some time and stayed there for a hour and decided to come back as there was no arrangement of food near by. Before coming, took a picture of my Mom.

And here is how the overall place looks like (you can see Mom talking to the care taker) :

Coming back I was tempted to take a photo of the route that is filled with lush greenery and a river bank.

Hope you enjoy this post. All photos were taken using my cell phone.