Mandasa 2012

My friend Madhusudana who is the main archaka for over seeing the special puja functions and is the main teacher in Agamas and Pancaratra in the Gurukula school in Vijayawada. A really special person and great wellwisher of mine!

Mandasa Brahmotsava spring 2012

The Utsava with the Murthy aroud the village was wonderful and i had the chance to be one of the carriers to help and assist. Actually the Lord do carry us all the time, but we attend to forget those good point...! HH Chinna Jeeyar swamy attended the festival and we all enjoyed his company!

Mahendra giri next to Mandasa village

Mahendra Giri is a mountain range described even in the epic Mahabharata and is identified to be the part of the mountain ranges in the east coast of India in Orissa. It is here were Lord Parashurama did his tapasya and did his worship and got the boon to stay up to the next pralaya (destruction of the universe). Later on he moved to Kerala and it is said that he is still visiting those mountains on shivaratri days (the festival of lord shiva, his personal Guru). Also it is said that the Pandavas did visit this place and ordered to built temples and places of worhip here. Not much is left and only one can find ruins in and around Mahendra Giri. I did walsk a bit around inside the jungle area and have found some stone pillars, carvings on rocks and even some carved lions (see pic). A very mystical place indeed!

Mandasa temple, andhra pradesh

The temple is made from red sandstone and granit and is made beautiful carved with artistic vastu view in perfection. Each digpalaka Devata is seating properly in his right direction, and even some kamasutra carvings are there. At the backside of the temple one finds a 4 handed Ugra Narasimha murthy. Ther daily puja is mantained with trikala upasana (on 3 different times of the day with 16 upacaras worship) and the Vasudeva Murthy is around 2 meters in size. He as a beautiful set of Utsava deities in a seperate shrine and they come out for special functions and ceremonies like the Brahmotsava which took place middle of february 2012.

Mandasa temple 2

This plate shows some historical background for the temple Vasudeva Perumal in Mandasa, and he is the priest who is doing seva there. he has one son and one daughter who are all living only in one room falt next to the temple. very simple lifestyle to austere for westerners and modern indians as well!