Cauvery Basin: Ranganatha Temple at Srirangam

By the time the cauvery reaches the sacred site of Srirangam, the river is an enormous one kilometre across and so it was only in the distance that I saw the light blue gopura of the Ranganatha Temple. It was not until I reached the island that I realised this was only the first of twenty one in the massive sixty hectare site. Several dynasties had a hand in constructing this complex, but what now stands are largely reconstructions by the Vijayanagars and Nayaks in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries after devastating Muslim raids.

The mythical origin of the temple is that Vibhishana was on his way back to Sri Lanka with a Vishnu shrine given by Rama as a reward for helping him defeat Ravana. He stopped to greet the Chola king at Srirangam but when he tried to leave found that he could not lift the temple because Lord Ranganatha wanted to stay.

Seven concentric high stone walls encircle the main shrine. The first three hold priests houses and shops selling everything from brass and steel kitchen utensils to guide books and brightly painted pottery animals. In the next four enclosures are shrine after shrine; the Venugopala with its high-relief sculptures of Krishna and female musicians and another where I thought I could see the eyes of the Deity, red and bulbous peering out at me until two priests beckoned me in. I had only been looking at its torso. "Garuda, Garuda." the priests told me, pointing up at the huge statue towering over us and then flapped their arms to illustrate. There were also tanks, the thousand pillared hall and the beautiful Sheshagirirayar Mandapa with its eight pillars sculpted into almost three dimensional rearing horsemen trampling tigers and European warriors. In the centre under a gilded roof Ranganatha lies on the serpent Ananta facing out across the mango topes to Sri Lanka as he had promised Vibhishana.