Place · Shakta pitha · India
Shakumbhari Devi, Saharanpur
Shakumbhari Devi is a Shakta shrine in Saharanpur district of Uttar Pradesh, roughly 40 kilometres north of Saharanpur town in the Shivalik foothills. The Goddess is worshipped here as the one who sustained beings during a hundred-year famine by producing vegetables, greens and fruits from her own body, an origin story preserved in the Devi Mahatmya and the Devi Bhagavata Purana.
- Date
- from c. 6th century CE (attested)
- Periods
- Classical and Puranic Age, Regional Flourishing, Islamic Age and Bhakti Traditions, Early Modern Age, British Colonial Age, Republic and Living Practice
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 30.143, 77.461
Worth knowing
The Chahamanas of Shakambhari, ancestors of Prithviraj Chauhan, took the Goddess as their clan deity from their earlier capital at Sambhar in Rajasthan, which itself is named for her. The tradition of the vegetable-producing Goddess links Shakumbhari to agrarian famine-relief cults across northern India, and the shrine remains a major destination during Navaratri.
Connections (2)
- PilgrimageKalika Devi, Kalka
Kālikā Devī at Kalka and Shākumbharī above Saharanpur are the circuit's last two and its easternmost, a hundred and forty kilometres apart along the Siwalik edge. Shākumbharī is the only one of the nine in Uttar Pradesh, and the pilgrimage ends where the Shivaliks run out toward the Ganges. Kalka is also where the narrow-gauge railway to Shimla begins its climb, built between 1898 and 1903 with a hundred and two tunnels, so the pilgrim halt became a colonial railhead.
- Pitha network withVindhyāchala / Vindhyavāsinī
Shākumbharī above Saharanpur and Vindhyavāsinī at Vindhyāchala are the two great goddess shrines of the upper and middle Ganges plain, and both are famine and harvest goddesses before they are anything else — Shākumbharī is named for the greens she is said to have produced from her own body to end a famine.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Saharanpur”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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