Sri Neelamega Perumal Temple, Garhwal,Uttarkhand

Good morning.

Sri Neelamega Perumal Temple is one of the famous Hindu temple. It is Situated in town Deva Prayag of Tehir Garhwal District,Uttarkhand. Out of the 108 divya desams, it lies in the 103th place.This is called as Thirukandam.

Thirukandam is also called as “Kadinagar” and “Devaprayag”. It is situated aroud 1700 feet from the sea level. Rivers Alaknanda and Bagirathi mingle here at Deva Prayag to form. Thus this place of Confluence is considered very Sacred and bath here in ganga is considered purifying.

About the Deity

The presiding deity of this temple is Lord Neelamega Perumal also called as Lord Purushothaman, found in a standing posture facing towards the east. And the goddess of the temple is Pundareega Valli Thayaar.

It is said that performing Annadhanam here is very Famous. A king by name of Swetha Kethu did a number of good deeds. After his death, his soul was possessed by an insatiable hunger. Swetha Kethu approached Bharma to solve his problem of hunger. Brahma told him that Swetha kethu was suffering because he did not perform any Annadhanam.Swetha Kethu at the advice of Brahma approached Agasthya Muni.
Agasthiya Muni told him to gift his punyams in the form of a gold ring. This gold ring was sold by  Agasthiya Muni and Annadhanam was performed at Deva Prayag. This Sorted the problem of Swetha Kethu. This is also the place where Pandavas bathed and prayed to the Lord to get rid of their sins of killing their relatives in the war.

The banyan tree located in the temple here would survive the pralaya at the end of  kali yuga. It said that Vishnu,Shiva and Brahma reside inside this tree. The Perumal would swallow the entire universe and as baby lie down on one of the leaves of this tree as Vadapathra Sayee and save the entire universe from destruction.

The king of this place came and workshiped for Purushothaman guidance.The Perumal appeared in the dream of the king and asked him to get Periyazhwar here. Accordingly, Priyazhawar came and praise this perumal by his song. This brought rain to this region. The Perumal on whom Periyazhwar sung Mangalasasanam is called Raghunathji. It is said that Rama, Dasaratha, Brahma did Penance here. Raghunathji is said to have been consecrated by Adi Shankara. A beautiful Hanuman is seen behind the temple.

Kartik Swami, Rudraprayag, Uttarakhand

Good morning.

Kartik Swami is a temple dedicated to God Kartikeya, elder son of Lord Shiva and is positioned at a high altitude amidst the serene beauty of Himalayas in the Gaharwal Region, in the Rudraprayag District of Uttarakhand. 

The temple can be reached by a 3 km trek from Kanak Chauri village, which is located on the Rudraprayag-Pokhri route, 38 km from Rudraprayag.

Kartik Swami is considered as “God for War and Victory” and is known as Murugan Swami in Tamil Nadu, Subramanya in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka and Kartikeya in Bengal.

Kartik temple is situated at the end of a narrow ridge with a deep valley and is perched at a high altitude Of 3,050mts above sea level. It doles our wonderful view To Himalayan range and nature’s sheen that Is entirely impeccable. The temple encompasses an idol of Lord Kartik Swami carved on a marble rock.

The temple of Kartik Swami is one of its kinds in the whole of northern India, with the view of snow covered Himalayas one gets to have from such height being indescribable. This sort of sight is very rare to come across.

The legend states that once Lord Shiva told their sons lord Kartik and lord Ganesha that one of them will get the privilege to worship first whoever comes first after taking a complete round of the universe. Kartik started his journey but lord Ganesha shows his intelligence and circles around Lord Shiva by saying that whole universe is in him. Lord Shiva impressed by his intelligence gave the privilege to be worshipped first to Ganesha. Lord Kartik got angry with this and gave his flesh to mother Parvati and bones to his father Lord Shiva. In this temple the bones of lord Kartikeya are shown in the idol.