Place · Thakur Krishna temple · India
Bankebihari, Vrindavan
Also known as Bankebihari, Bankebihari — Vrindavan, Vrindavan
The Banke Bihari Mandir in Vrindavan, Mathura district, Uttar Pradesh — one of the seven Thakur temples of the Nimbarka-Vallabha-Haridas Vaishnava traditions. The deity (a Krishna-Radha composite in Krishna's tribhanga pose — 'bent in three places') was discovered by the 16-century Haridasi sant Swami Haridas (c.1512-1607) at Nidhivan grove in Vrindavan, where he taught Tansen (the Mughal court musician under Akbar). The deity was installed in the current Banke Bihari temple built by Swami Hari Das's descendants in 1864. The temple is famous for its continuous curtain-lifting (the deity's gaze is said to be so compelling that the sanctum curtain is drawn and reopened every few minutes to allow pilgrims brief darshan). The annual Krishna Janmashtami festival each August-September draws over 500,000 pilgrims; the daily visitor count exceeds 50,000 during the main Vrindavan season.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 27.584, 77.699
Connections (2)
- Site withinVrindāvan
Bankebihari, Vrindavan sits inside Vrindāvan and forms one piece of its layered sacred, royal or civic landscape. The city carries this entry as one of the sites that make its urban fabric legible — a shrine, monument, institution or craft tradition specifically anchored at this location — and the city's broader history reads better when the stop is seen in its context rather than in isolation. The surrounding streets, markets and other heritage ensembles around it belong to the same single city.
- Site withinMathurā
Bankebihari, Vrindavan lies within Mathurā — the two sites sit about 11 km apart, well inside the city's historical boundary and part of the same urban or peri-urban landscape. Bankebihari, Vrindavan is one of the specific sites that give Mathurā its layered character, and reads differently when seen as a stop within the larger city rather than as an isolated monument on an open map. The surrounding neighbourhoods, roads and other heritage ensembles belong to the same single urban fabric.
Sources
Wikipedia, “Vrindavan”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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