Haurihaat Jora Shiva Mandir, Mandirbazar - Diamond Harbour, S 24 PGS

 

Stuated in Jagadishpur village in Mandirbazar block, Diamond Harbour subdivision of South 24 Parganas district. It is one of the oldest Shiva Temples of South Bengal.

Founded in 1633 CE, these twin Shiva temples – Bhubaneswar in the western side and Jogeshwar in the eastern side are about fifty feet in height. Both the temples are south facing. Though the current temples have undergone complete renovation, as one of them collapsed almost half-a-century ago; but the strange thing is that nobody suffered any injury nor the Shiva lingam got damaged. The temple of Jogeswar collapsed while that of Bhubaneshwar got damaged. The masons who built this newly renovated temple have tried their utmost to maintain the design of the old temple as far as they can. According to David McCutchion, the temple is a “tightly ridged type with curved cornice and pointed shikhara”. The temple sanctum contains the Shiva lingam made of kasthi pathar or touch stone placed on a lotus. Each lingam is about four feet in height.

Bhubaneswar Shiva Mandir

Jogeshwar Shiva Mandir

Temples History: Once upon a time there lived an issueless widow named Hauri and she inherited a property from both her father’s and in-law’s side. She wanted to utilize this money for some noble cause and, accordingly, planned to construct twin Shiva temples in the area, and she was successful. She also decided to set up a village fair (haat) in the open adjoining ground twice a week – on Thursdays and Sundays. During that time there were no local fair in the area, and, naturally people from the neighbouring villages came here for trade. As a result, this area drew huge crowd specially on those two days. As Hauri set up this hat, this area came to be known as Haurihaat. Kori was the medium of exchange in those local fairs.

Hauri also had a large pond dug of about ten bighas dug in the adjoining hat area got a ghat constructed there so that not only the pilgrims but also the village folk can bathe. This pond was previously connected to a canal. The remains of that ghat still exists; but the pond has now become shallow.

Reference: 

(i) Brick Temples of Bengal – David McCutchion;

(ii) Banglar Tin Prachin Shiva Mandir – Radhakrishna Naskar.