Marvels of Gujarat Part 1
===> Suntemple - Modhera
Hello Cupids, - J
So how many of you guys have visited many places but haven’t
yet explored the place where you have lived? How many of you haven’t yet
explored the hidden gems found in your home state/city.
Sometimes we visit many different places but we do not have
any cognizance of our own place where we have been brought up.
Same happened with us. Until one day when one of my cousins
came to see us, we decided to see three
precious jewels of Gujarat, not known to many.
A trip to :
1) Sun Temple-(Modhera), ( Part 1 of Visiting marvels of Gujarat )
2) Rani Ki Vav ( The queen of the step wells of India ) and
3) Adalaj Ki Vav ( A step well with a tale of love and
enmity behind it ) - ( Part 2 of Visiting marvels of Gujarat )
Recently one of our cousins came to spend a couple of days
with us and we decided to visit Sun Temple which is at Modhera – about 25kms
from Mehsana and 102kms from Ahmedabad.
I have been born and brought up in Ahmedabad and hence it’s one of my favorite
cities.
It’s not for the first time I visited this temple. I did
visit when I was in my second or third grade. But as I did not remembered much
I decided to see it once again.
Well the Sun temple is the temple of the Hindu Sun God built
before about almost 900 years ago by the King of Solanki dynasty.
Immediately after reaching there we hired a guide who took
us to each and every corner of the temple and explained us most of the details
which he could and from all the knowledge bank he had. We asked his fees and it
was only 150 Rs. So we were glad and immediately agreed to be his students for
some time. Also he showed his ID card and hence we were assured that he is
worth to be hired.
Now in this temple there are no prayers done for the God and
now it is under the observation of Archeological survey of India.
I am fond of great architectural work and hence this place
left me mesmerized.
There are beautiful carvings done on the pillars of this
temple and on the tomb of the temple.
This temple is divided into Surya Kund,Sabha Mandap and
Sanctum sanctorum.
The tour guide informed us that the idols and carvings were
destroyed by Mughals who looted the temple. He also informed us that inside the
temple there was idol of Sun God and which had a diamond on its forehead. When
suns first rays used to hit this diamond the rays used to reflect the diamond
and used to get scattered all the place inside the room of the temple. This
idol was even looted by Mughals and no one knows where this idol is now.
Inside the temple there are beautiful carvings of different
idols which depicts the way to live life and different stages/parts of life
including Kamasutra.
You can find more details in this link:
Meanwhile just have a look at these beautiful pics and keep
us following until our part two of the trip to Rani Ki Vav ( queen of step
wells ) and Adalaj Ki Vav ( A step well in Ahmedabad ).
 |
| Sun Temple and its reflection in water. |
 |
|
Me……posing on the stairs. In the same place there are about
108 small temples. It is said that if you do Circumambulation (or parikrama) around these small temples
then you would be free from sins.
|
 |
|
Pillars with beautiful carvings.
|
 |
| The tomb of the temple. |
 |
| Just see the beautiful carvings. |
 |
| Entrance of the temple. |
 |
| The great Indian Kama sutra |
 |
| Wonderful carvings. These pillars depict the way to live a life. Just imagine the amount of effort put in by the people who built these kind of monuments at the time when there was no technology and the special tools that we now use to construct buildings. |
 |
| One of the small temples from the 108 temples. |
 |
| One of the stones engraved and removed from the temple. It is believed that this temple was destroyed by a cruel Mughal King. We are very fortunate that the temple is supervised and preserved by the Archeological Survey of India. |
 |
|
Dipika offering prayer to God “ Oh lord please give some
brains to my husband “.J
|
 |
Beautiful Sunrays falling on the pillars of the temple and on us -;) |
That's all cupids. Stay tuned for our next post on Marvels of Gujarat - Part 2 where we will take you to the Queen of water Wells ( Rani Ki Vav ) and also another well which has a story of love and enmity behind it.
Love
DevD and Dipika.
0 Comments