Author: Kaustav Sanyal

(M.Tech(CSE), BUIE, Bankura), Purulia

Ancient Purulia: A Gateway towards the Less Explored Legacy

Introduction:

Darkness is not always an implication of ignorance. Sometimes it suggests an abstraction, a guard to

something that must not be accessible to all. A wise never breaks that darkness by his torch of
wisdom or break that silence in there with the scream of his arrogant knowledge. He explores the
dark world maintaining the silence, without disturbing its peace. Such places exist in this planet,
where darkness hides long forgotten heritage and Purulia is undoubtedly one of them. Most of the
time when Purulia is explored it has been seen from a far. That led the analysis of Purulia in respect
to some standard parameters. The parameters which never belonged to these lands are less
dependable. Being born and brought up at Purulia I got the opportunities to explore these lands and
reach to the people so closely. Thus this in this piece of work we have tried our best not to use the
foreign parameters for conscious or unconscious analysis. This work mainly focuses on two aspects
of the vast cultural history of Purulia. Primarily it discusses the ancient achievements of Purulia, the
history of acceptance of several cultures and the creation of a vast cultural background. Then it
discusses the temple architecture found in the provinces of Purulia in a brief. The elaborated
discussion has been tried to avoided as it itself is a vast area to explore. The remaining parts of this
case shall be included as the future work of this work. Without lengthening the introduction let us
proceed towards Purulia’s ancient achievements.

Ancient Achievements:

Purulia being the gateway of greater Bengal remains ever vulnerable to foreign invasion. The
danger of being geographical hazard zone Purulia used to be attacked by foreigners. The plateau
being in the shape of turtle’s back(कुर्मपृष्ठ) surrounded by great forests the forces that invaded this
strange land of Purulia by those forces which were really more and more strong and valiant. This
arid land thus being attacked instead of being weaker became more rich and vibrant in its cultural
aspects. Remaining really stead fast in its aboriginal culture it just assimilated the foreign culture
not accepted totally. Transcending the stone ages through the ages of Ramayana & Mahabharata era
upto the pre-muslim ages the history of Purulia is nothing just assimilation history of the culture
because the confluence of the Aryan Culture, Jainism and the aboriginal culture of Purulia. This
mixture has become so deep that now it can’t be separated by any means from one another. Purulia
didn’t accept the only culture that had ever tried to deviate its own culture in any way; sometimes
by silent refusal or some other times by infamous ‘Chuwar Mutiny’. There was once a time when
Aryavarta remained inaccessible by any means as it was the great hate-worthy land to the Aryans,
and if at all one returned one had to undergone for fresh purification rituals. Through Purulia
expansion and establishing the Aryan culture in true sense in greater Bengal was initiated. Later on
Bengal became a pulpit of culture and civilization so to say. Most of the branches of scriptures e.g.
Grammar, Astrology, Nirukta etc. had become a parallel trend in Bengal. Just like the forgetfulness
after grand entry through the royal gate similarly Purulia met same fate of oblivion quite strangely.
Only the remnants of the debris here and there in Purulia are telling this to sensible visitors of the
old time savage land of Purulia.

Although the Bramhinism is more ancient than Jainism in other parts of India, but in Purulia it is
just the reverse. The fragments of old Bramhinism is the actual Jainism as it is not at all a
substantive and original form of religion. Very well said by V.J.Mahajan in his book ‘Ancient India’
that, “it has rightly pointed out that Jainism, though a rebellious daughter, was nonetheless a
daughter of Bramhinism”. The first intrusion of Jainism in Purulia and flourishing of its rituals had
really inculcated the Aryaniztion in greater Bengal from this very less eminent land of Purulia. The
invasion of Aryan culture indeed had had been there in Bengal earlier as well. The middle Pandav
Bheem of the Mahabharata had had invaded this the then savage land of Purulia(Pashu-bhumi, the
land of animals) but actual Aryanization did not take place. Really Bheema attacked Bengal or not,
the story just suggests Aryan invasion over Bengal.

Now we may proceed to the creation of actual background of Jain cult here in these lands. It is
mentioned in the Jain scriptures that nineteen among twenty three Jain Tirthankaras attained
‘Kaivalya’, the highest consciousness at the Sammet Shikara. Twenty third Tirthankara
Paraswanath was the last one to attain Kaivalya in Sammet Shikhara and after then the peak is
popularly known as Paresnath hill, after His name. It is so obvious that the Jain culture must
flourish in and around this hillock and inevitably the provinces of a state named ‘Shikharbhum’ was
built and the province got the easy waterways of river Ajay and Damodar being a major trade route
up to Tamralipta harbor.
 Figure 1 Paresnath Hill

Paresnath Hill

Figure 2Location of Paresnath Hill and Purulia

The Paresnath Hill though now situated in the provinces of Jharkhand, in the contemporary times
whole of these lands were recognized as one highlands covered with dense forest and hilly regions.
After the rise of Shikharbhum state the lands here started populated with Jains. Now as the
Paresnath hill was already a pious and famous Jain pilgrimage, Jains found these lands perfect for
inhabitation. The inhabitants of this region had discovered the Copper mines in these forest
covered lands. From the proceedings of Asiatic Society of Bengal we know that the Sarak caste Jains
first found out these mines and started trading.

“… the more adventurous Saraks or lay Jains, having alone penetrated the jungles where
they were rewarded with the discovery of copper upon the working of which they must
have spent all their time and energy, as with the exception of the tanks above mentioned,
the mines furnish the sole evidence of their occupation of that part of the country. It is
scarcely conceivable that the Hos, when they drove out the Saraks could have utterly
destroyed all trace of buildings.” (Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, June-1869, pp
170-71)

So we got the names of the Saraks, who completely dedicated in the trades of Copper. Afterwards
they moved to trading irons as well. This flourished the trade and commerce by leaps and bound in
these lands. Thus we get the name of Lauhacharya, the master of irons in the Jain scriptures.
Sudharma was named the first Lauhacharya who was a direct disciple of Mahaveera. The second
Lauhacharya Bhadrabaahu was the author of Jain script Kalpasutra. This economic advancement
justifies the establishment of numerous Jain temples here. Most of the temples were built up along
the river banks which the Jain tradesmen used all the time. Gradually Shikharbhum arose as a
economically developed and culturally rich state in these parts of Bengal. Numerous temples were
build all around the state, most of it were along the rivers as we have said earlier.

While describing the expansion of Jain civilization in the lands of Purulia we often hear a very
popular story about Mahaveera. When Lord Mahaveera roamed around these lands the local
inhabitants set dogs behind Him and stoned Him. Now let us stop here for a bit. Whenever a great
person came into the realm of normal people like us with less potential and intellect all of them
faced some kind of difficulties always. Be it Buddha, or Sri Chaitanya, or Jesus or Mahaveera
Himself. It was always them who won all the odds and yet stood strongly and boldly with their hard
found/achieved truth as their weapon. Thus these persons won the hearts of million. When it
comes to Purulia generally it is not the prime focus that Lord Mahaveera faced odds here, but the
local inhabitants were barbaric and savage enough to misbehave with Him. We strongly oppose this
whole scenario. The people of these lands have always been different from rest of the places in
Bengal. They are the true sons of soil, the ones who won the odds of nature and survived in these
inaccessible lands and built a palace of a unique culture which remained true and nearer to the
ancient never changeable instincts of humans. At first as the people of these lands refused to accept
Lord Mahaveera, when they accepted it afterwards they took it so firmly to their roots that still in
villages Jain idols are being worshipped. The people who don’t even know the names of the idols
also visit and pay their daily homage to them. That is the beauty of the people of Purulia, the land of
applied universal acceptance.

It is really enigmatic to say the ancient religion and culture of land Purulia influenced the then
Jainism or vice versa. The Shikharbhum province and enunciator of this state is not beyond dispute.
During the regime of Chandragupta Maurya a great famine ravaged the lands of Aryavarta causing
Bhadrabaahu to proceed towards Southern parts of India i.e. Dakshinatya with a caravan of his
followers. After twelve years when this daunting famine was gone they returned. At this juncture,
when Paresnath Hill was already a pulpit and pilgrimage of Jainism whether they had established
their inhabitation is a matter of controversy. This theory justifies the mingling of Dravid cultural
influence over Purulia. Even the name Purulia is a slight modification of Dravidian term ‘Perulla’,
meaning the city surrounded and situated within the stone land. Many names like Arsha, Bandwan,
Puncha etc clearly signifies the relation between Purulia and Dravidian culture. The great centre of
Bramhinism in Purulia Telkupi, old name Tailakampa is also a Dravidian term. On the contrary
along with the Mahavamsha, a Sri Lankan Buddhist scripture Dinesh Ch. Sarkar refuses to give the
credit to Jainism in the way of Aryan cultural expansion in Bengal, but to Buddhism, which we
cannot completely deny. Purulia still has some of the leftovers of Buddhism as well here. The village
Budhpur is none other than Buddhapur, the city of Buddha and the famous Shiva temple there
named Buddheswar(Lord of Lord Buddha) reflect Buddhist influence over these lands also.

Then came the pure Bramhinism in the frame and the pace of Aryanization got faster with that.
During the reign of King Rudrashikhar, Telkupi rose as a capital of Bramhinism and ruled over the
lands of Purulia. The Aryanization in these lands which the Jain people initialized, got a complete
form with this Bramhin invasion. The natives accepted the concepts and teachings of Bramhinism
so smoothly that rapidly the Jain temples started transforming themselves into Bramhin
pilgrimages. This assimilation was beautiful. Jain people prepared the land where the seeds of
Bramhinism were sowed. A mixed culture with richness of all sprout out in order to continue the
flow of ancient mysticism. The pure tribal religions assimilated the concepts of Jainism and
Bramhinism together but the mixture was so perfect and homogeneous that it evolved itself
through centuries.

The Temple Architecture and Sculptures

Before moving into the specific temples of Purulia first let us recall what we know about the temple
architecture of this country; not from the temples we have found till date but from the scriptures,
that described the techniques and included the instructions to build up a temple. The word
‘Mandira’ is relatively new in the field of Temple architectures in India. We first get this name in
Baanbhatta’s ‘Kadambari’, a text from 7th century AD. In the scriptures ‘Deva-Griha’, ‘Deva-Prasad’,
‘Devali’, ‘Devalay’ etc temple-referring words have been used. There are several texts that included
the temple building techniques quite descriptively. The beauty of these texts is no matter how strict
rules have been given to the architects, the scripts always gave a clean chit to the architects to use
and apply their own creativity and art in it. Here we shall discuss only two among many of the
scripts that explains the temple making theories.

1. Garuda Puran: The ‘Purva khanda’(the 1st half) of Garuda Purana includes different ritual
processes, legends, medicines, economics and some other applied theories. The forty sixth
and forty seventh chapter of this part includes the ‘Vastu shastra’ in brief. 46 th chapter
includes the ‘Vastu Pujan vidhi’, where 47th chapter consists of the theories of temple
construction. The later chapter starts with a shloka that denotes the characteristics and
building techniques of a temple. Here we get some guidelines for a temple construction, like
 the amount and shape of the land, the height of the temple, number of peaks for a temple,
that should be followed. Here we also get different types of temple namely Vairaj, Pushpak,
Kailas, Malak and TripishTap. Even forty four subdivisions of these temples have been
explained in this chapter of Garuda Purana.
2. Agni Purana: This elaborated large text has the temple construction theory in its 42nd
chapter. Here Lord Hayagreeva explains the specifications to follow for a temple
construction. And in the next chapter the specifications of the Garbhagriha, where the main
deity resides have been described. But seeing the specific deities named during this chapter
it seems this instructions are specifically for a Vishnu Temple.

The incompleteness of these two texts denote the completeness in other texts. Be it Pancha ratra
Agama texts or something else, the temples in ancient India always followed the rules and to the
luck they are many in number. Now let us proceed to the specific temple architectures of Purulia.

Figure 3 Kalinga Architecture and Vastumandal

It is a well known fact that most of the temples found till date in Purulia followed the Kalinga
architecture with their Rekha Deul structures. Several Triratha, Pancharatha structures have been
made. Be it a stone temple or a brick one, the influence of Kalinga architecture is so prominent in
these temples that it’s hard to miss. A typical Kalinga architecture consists of mainly three types of
Deul, namely Rekha deul, Pedha deul and Khakra deul. In Purulia almost no trace of the last type
has been found till date. Most of the temples were of the Rekha deul structure. An example of
Peedha deul is situated in present Bankura district which was the old Basuli temple in the village of
Aatbai Chandi. All the Rekha deuls followed the exact Kalinga architectural standards. Just like the
Kalinga architecture the Rekha deuls of Purulia also had four distinctive portions from its ground to
the top, PishTa, BaaD, GanDi and Mastak. The PishTa is the base of the temple and resides
underground, where BaaD is the lower portion of the temple. For the Rekha deuls made of bricks,
various shaped bricks were used. Though throughout whole of the temple the variety of bricks
could be noted, the variety in the brick shapes in the BaaD portion is much distinctive. The upper
part of the BaaD is the GanDi, which included various art works and beautified the temples even
more. Though we fail to find intricate works in here in comparison to the Orissan temples, but
independently these ones are no less. In some of the Deuls, in this GanDi part in specific directions
specific courtier deities of the main residing deity of the temple are found. For example in a Deul of
Deulghata, on the Southern wall the idol of Ganesh, and other Ganas are found. That implies the in
depth knowledge of scriptures of the architects. The southern gate of Lord Shiva is guarded by
Ganesh, and so is depicted in the Deul. In the other three sides the idols are so severely damaged
that it is almost impossible to identify them. The topmost part of the temple is known as the
Mastaka which consists of four portions, Beki, Amalak, Kalas and the flag mast. In most of the cases
the Amalak is of the shape of a lotus. Four to five giant rocks had been carved and assembled
together to form the Amalak. In excavation works many Kalashas have been found till date, which
denote the number of even more temples in the sites. The hole on the top of the Kalashas made
clear that the flag masts had been used in these temples.

Another characteristic of the temples of Purulia is a substitute of the NaaT ManDap, a covered
corridor in front of the temple; that makes two distinct structures for the complete temple. The
Deul of Banda is the ideal example for this case today. Others have been destroyed with time, but
from the presence of stone pillars in front of some Deuls, it can be predicted that they had the
corridors too. On the north outer walls of the temples a water passage opens with a face of a
Makara, through which the water offered to the main deity inside the temple flowed out and stored
in a small tank like structure. For the Shiva temples this system is very common. Even in Garuda
Purana temple structure instruction this thing is included. But we can see such structures for the
Jain Tirthankara temples as well. The idols of the Jain Tirthankaras were installed over a platform
which looks like a rectangular Somasutra, which allowed the free flow of the water offered on the
idol. With this it is very obvious to assume that just like Shiva temple water offering ritual, named
Abhishekam, Jains also had the culture of Abhishekam over the Tirthankara idols. Such rituals in the
Jain temples smoothen its way towards Bramhinism assimilation. Beside the less decorated stone
architectural works the brick temples had rich carvings and decorations on its outer walls.
Figure 4 Temple of Banda with corridor in front
Figure 5 Makar faced Passage for water
Figure 6 Brick temple of Deulghata
 Figure 7 Entrance with distinct Vertical and Triangular structure

Coming to the main deities of the temples mainly three types are found, the Tirthankaras, their
ruling Goddesses and Shiva linga. Some scattered idols of Vishnu, Shiva-Parvati, Ganesha etc are
also found around the district. The idols follow the standard idol making procedures, with mostly
Samabhanga or Dwibhanga pose including a Chala o the back and attending figures of the deity. In
the cases of Shiva lingas the top of the structures are flat. Here we can stop by a little. We all know a
structure of a Shiva linga. It is so made that the offered water, milk etc easily trickle down the linga.
But when the top is made flat it doesn’t allow the same. Moreover the Shiva lingas found in these
parts have indistinct Gauripatta/Somasutra. This made me question the Linga worshiping culture of
contemporary people. Where the Tirthankara idols are so made that allows an easy flow of the
offered liquids, the Shiva lingas which are mostly worshipped with liquid abhishekam ritual doesn’t
offer the same convenience. The reason behind this is still unknown. I believe the answer to this
question may lead to more facts about contemporary cultures and rituals.

Figure 8 Flat headed Shiva linga

 Figure 9 Tirthankara Statue

Moving forward among the brick temples the typical Bengal architecture is found with Pancha
ratna, Jor Bangla, Chala temple structures here. But being comparatively less in number and
significant in order to establish the evolution of culture and religion in Purulia, we shall just
proceed with examples.

Figure 10 Pancharatna Temple Garh Panchakot

Conclusion:

As a brief preliminary work this work outlines the areas of Purulia’s ancient history. The future
work includes the political history and its influence on shaping the history of Purulia, the practice of
high planar Tantra and Samkhya, the local village rituals like Jhapan, Gajan etc, the Snake
worshiping cult etc. Though finding and recording the history of this ancient land is not an easy
work as most of the times we found missing links which are very hard and sometimes almost
impossible to connect again our work will be continued towards exploring as much as possible for
this land. Once Purulia was covered with dense forests, that made it tough to explore. Today it is
covered with the veil of unknown, again tough to explore. We hope to get proper attention towards
the history of Purulia from the wise historians out there so that some day we get to know our
motherland better.

Acknowledgements:

1. Sukumar Banerjee, Bankura

2. Dilipkumar Goswami, Purulia
3. Haripada Sahitya Mandir, Purulia

References:

1. Mahajan VJ, Ancient India, S Chand, 2016

2. Jana Devaprasad, Ahalyabhumi Purulia, Deep Prakashan, 2003
3. Roy Subhash, Puruliar Mondir Sthapotyo, Radh, 2012
4. Garuda Purana, Nababharat Publishers, 2012
5. Agni Purana, Nababharat Publishers, 2015