Parasuram Kund Yatra (Kamakhya Mandir Darshan) - Day 7

Purva Tirupati Sri Balaji Mandir

We yatris arrived at Guwahati at 7 in the morning. Here, we were picked up by a couple of buses and transported to our destination which is the beautiful Purva Tirupati Sri Balaji temple. This was located approx 18 kms away and nearly took us 45 minutes to reach. 

We were accommodated on the second floor of their residential building meant for yatris - men & women were given separate large halls with attached 4 bathrooms & toilets. This place was significantly cleaner than PK lodging and the beds (on the floor for men and regular cots for women) too were covered with fresh clean sheets. The only drawback was that this place was swarming with mosquitoes - PK has none. We quickly got into the business of having bath etc. The bathrooms were better than PK and we didn't feel the need for hot water as the weather was not too cold. After finishing our morning prayers, we proceeded to the temple for darshan.

The Balaji temple complex in Guwahati is a must visit place for anyone travelling there. Located in a sprawling parcel of land of about 17 acres, it has a Veda Patasala and a Goshala beside the temples. There are 4 marble temples - a small one of Sri Ganesha which has a beautiful idol, two medium sized temple for Padmavati Devi & Maa Durga and one large temple of Sri Balaji. The temples, constructed in South Indian style, are clean and well maintained. Unfortunately, photography was prohibited and, hence I am attaching photos sourced from the internet. All the idols here are exact replicas of the original deities and even the decoration / alankaram is similar. The priests are educated from South Indian patasalas and hence they were easy to converse with.

After the darshan, we came to a nearby building, within the complex, where we were served hot pongal Prasadam from the temple. It was piping hot and very tasty. Later, we came back to the temple where we had the formal Vaideekas Sambhavanai ceremony. All the Vaideekas who had accompanied us for the yatra, were duly honoured and thanked and were given a small token of appreciation / gratitude by the yatris.

Then, we visited the Veda Patasala located within the complex, and met the students there along with their Guru. The students were from different parts of Assam and were staying here during the duration of their studies like a typical Gurukul. Upon the bidding of their Guru, they chanted some part of the Shukla Yajur Veda in unison. It was so heartening to listen to this and getting reassured that our traditions are being preserved so well in this part of the country too. We then proceeded towards the Goshala but couldn't see the cows close up as they were out grazing in the distance within the complex. It was good to see the cows getting some exercise by walking around - most goshalas that I have seen don't have the luxury of space for this.

After this, we had our lunch - Vaideekas were served first on banana leaves and, then the rest of us were served on our plates - for the first time we ate at the same time. Lunch was superb as usual. The catering staff had better kitchen facilities here as compared to PK and they churned out a superb spread- rice, vegetables , sambhar, rasam, papad, curd rice et al.

Maa Kamakhya Temple

Post lunch, around 2.30 pm we got into 2 buses and left for Kamakhya Temple. This Temple, located on Nilachala hill, is believed to be the site where the yoni (genital organ or womb) of the goddess Sati fell. Maa Kamakhya or Kameswari is the renowned Goddess of Desire, is considered one of the most sacred Shakti Peethas, symbolizing fertility, the creative power of women, and the center of Tantric practices. Maa Kamakhya Devalaya is one of the oldest of the 51 Shakti Peethas on earth.

It took us about 45 minutes to cover the distance of 20 kms. After alighting from the bus, we had to walk a short distance to reach the temple. As our organisers had made arrangements for a special darshan, we were asked to go into a waiting room where everyone who has purchased the special ticket has to wait. The wait time was long, nearly 1.5 hours but as we had seating arrangements it was ok. Most of the yatris were busy chanting various stotras including Lalitha Sahasranama during the wait time. 

Maa Kamakhya Temple

We moved into the shorter queue meant for people with special darshan tickets. Alongside was the regular darshan queue where people had been waiting for over 7-8 hours. It look us another 45 minutes before we could move into the sanctum. Just outside the sanctum there is an idol where people made offerings of flowers and clothes. The sanctum is a cave at a lower level which was dark – only some lamps were there to go by. We had to climb down some narrow steps to reach the main sanctum. There was an idol here but fully covered with clothes offered by the devotees. At the feet of the idol, there was a thin layer of water. The priest asked us to go down on our knees and touch the water. We did that and sprinkled the water on our heads. We also collected the water in small containers purchased outside the temple. As the water level was only about an inch or so, we could only collect little water. We were then pushed out to make way for the large number of devotees still in the queue.

Maa Kamakhya Temple

Once we came outside, we took some photographs. We also got small piece of red cloth from a local priest which was part of an offering made to Maa Kamakhya. Apart from the main temple of Maa Kamakhya, there are temples of the Dasamahavidya (ten incarnations of the deity) namely Kamakhya (i.e. Tripura Sundari, alongwith Matangi and Kamala), Kali, Tara, Bhuvaneshvari, Bagalamukhi, Chinnamasta, Bhairavi, Dhumavati, and five temples of Lord Shiva namely Kameswara, Siddheswara, Kedareswara, Amratokeswara, Aghora and Kautilinga around the Nilachala Hill which is also called as Kamakhya Temple Complex.

The main temple closes early here at 5.30 pm and the last aarti is at 7.30 pm. When we started moving out, it was around 6.30 pm and quite dark. Most of the numerous shops outside the temple had closed for the day. We walked back to our bus and returned to the Balaji temple for our evening prayers & dinner.

The mosquitoes here were waiting for us. We tried our best to keep them from biting us by keeping the fans on and covering ourselves with the blankets. As we were tired, we soon drifted to deep sleep and were blissfully unaware of what happened next. Thus ended our penultimate day of the yatra.

Pillars of Maa Kamakhya Temple