Maa Kamakhya Temple

When I first heard about this temple, I was intrigued. It is a temple where there is no Murti of the Goddess. The yoni or womb is worshipped and the deity is known to menstruate. 

Menstruation is a symbol of a woman's creativity and her power to give birth. The temple celebrates this Shakti or power within every woman. In fact, the deity's period is celebrated as a festival, the Ambubachi Mela, once a year, and lakhs of pilgrims pay a visit.  

The temple is one of the 51 Shakthi Peethas and is in the Nilachal hills, also called Nilakuta, Nilgiri, and Kamagiri Hills, in the ancient texts and scriptures. It is around 600 feet above the plains. The  Brahmaputra river flows from these hills. 

The scriptures tell us Lord Shiva had asked Sati not to go to the Yagna organized by her father, Prajapati Daksha, as they were not invited. But Sati went. At the Yagna, Daksha insulted Lord Shiva. Sati could not bear the humiliation and took her own life. Lord Shiva was enraged and broke into a Tandav (dance of destruction) with her corpse on his shoulders. Lord Vishnu tried consoling him but in vain. He then dismembered Sati's body into 51 pieces with his Sudarshan Chakra. The place where each part fell is known as the Shakti Peetha. 

Kamakhya or Kubiika Pitha is the place where the Yoni (female genitalia or the Vulva) fell. Even today, in the month of June (Ashaada), the temple is closed for 3 days as it is believed the deity menstruates and the Brahmaputra river turns red. 

Kama or Kamdev, the God of Love, built the temple. The place is named Kamrup because Kamdev, who was cursed by Brahma, regained his beauty (rupa) after worshipping in this temple and the deity is Kamakhya, meaning one worshipped by Kama. Kamakhya stands for Goddess of Desire. 

When the mighty Ahoms came to power in the 17th Century, they took a keen interest in the upkeep of the temple. 

 

Offerings to the goddess include animal sacrifices. 

 

I wanted to start the Northeast tour of Assam and Meghalaya with the blessings of Maa Kamakhya. The temple was the first place I wanted to visit and it was clearly etched out in my tour itinerary too.

It didn't happen. Our first night in the city was in a hotel on Mirza Road, in Kamrup, 8 km from the airport but 25 km from the main city of Guwahati.  

Finally, on a Wednesday, four days after we landed in Guwahati, we left our hotel early in the morning at 7:00 a.m. Almost everyone we spoke to, had warned us about the humongous crowd at the temple, and had asked us to leave early. 

The temple was just 2 km from our hotel, 10 mins drive. We booked an Ola taxi. Fare shown was Rs 170. But the driver demanded Rs 250! Nowhere does an Ola driver demand more than the fare shown on the app. That fare by itself is high as it includes Ola's commission. In other cities, they ask to be paid in cash but they don't ask for extra. Here, they openly demand more. 

The distance and fare ratio is unimaginably exorbitant in Assam (AS). For a distance of less than 2 km, autos routinely ask for Rs 100 and Ola drivers Rs 250! In Bangalore, for Rs 200, I can travel 15 km in Ola auto or mini. 

We canceled the Ola and boarded a local bus. One good thing in AS is that the buses have destinations written in English. It is very easy for outsiders to use the local transport. In Chennai, it was a nightmare.  Everything was in Tamil. Oh! What a pain it was.  

The bus ride cost us just Rs 10 each. And we reached in 15 mins. From Rs 250 of Ola to Rs 10 of the bus for about the same time for travel, not bad we thought. Maa Kamakhya was making it easy for us to come to her. 

The bus conductor gave us Rs 10 and asked us to offer it at the temple. We were touched by his gesture. He helped us by pointing to a lady passenger and told us to follow her as she was also going to the temple. 

We got down at the main gate. The lady passenger smiled at us and very sweetly, pointed to the line of Maruti Vans. Having experienced the brusqueness of the Khasi women of Meghalaya, she seemed like she was dipped in honey!

The taxi, with 8 other passengers, took us to the top of the hill, to the temple, for Rs 30 each. 

The drive up to the hill is similar to the drive to Sri Chamundeshwari Temple in Mysore, only less scenic, and less enjoyable. The way everything is organized and maintained in Chamundi Hills is awesome. You will absolutely cherish the drive for a long time and want to keep going back. 

At 8:45 a.m, we reached the temple. And believe it or not, at 9:30 a.m, we were out of the temple and sitting in a bus to take us back to the main gate. Yes, in flat 45 mins we had finished the "darshan" despite the rumored "swelling crowd". 

How is that possible? We were surprised and felt something was wrong somewhere. Everyone had told us we had to keep an entire day aside for darshan at the sacred Maa Kamakhya Devalaya. It would take us a minimum of 5-6 hours in the queue. Yet, here we were, done and dusted in 45 mins. 

This is what transpired at the temple. 

When we entered the temple, there were some people waiting in the queue and some around the temple. We did not find any 'crowd.' A South Indian knows what an actual temple crowd looks like. Across temples in Karnataka, Andhra, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, we are accustomed to it. Lakhs of people visit Sri Venkateshwara Temple - Tirupati, in Chittor, Andhra, thousands visit Sri Meenakshi Amman Temple in Madurai, Tamil Nadu and hundreds visit Sri Manjunatha & Kukke Subramanya Temple in Dharmasthala, Karnataka and Sri Guruvayoor in Kerala. 

Compared to that, here, it looked like the kind of crowd we see every day in our neighborhood temple. In spite of that, we were ready to pay for special darshan because we wanted to save whatever time we could and get back to the hotel as soon as possible. Our kids were still sleeping. Since we had left so early, we didn't wake them up. 

The special darshan counter was closed. We enquired at the information center. The lady said regular darshan will take more than 4 hours. We couldn’t afford that time. 

By the way, the special darshan tickets are priced at Rs 500 per person. Yes, Rs 500! The highest I have ever come across in any temple in any part of India that I have visited so far. Even in Tirupati, which is literally the Father of Temple Crowds, it is Rs 300. There, people are locked up in huge rooms that easily accommodate 100+ people. Water and food are provided to the devotees as they wait, sometimes the whole day, for the rooms to open and be allowed to go for the darshan.

Anyways, here, since the special darshan counter was closed, we were clueless. We couldn't spend 4-5 hours in the queue. We were looking around wondering what to do. 

One person, a priest, or Panda as they call them here in AS, approached us. Clearly, our faces showed we were looking for a special darshan and we were not locals. He said, "Special darshan Rs 500 closed. I will take you for darshan, give the same Rs 500 to me. Plus what you are planning to give for hundi, you give it to me. How much are you planning to give for hundi? You will get the darshan but you cannot 'touch'. If you want to touch, pay the money I said and wait minimum 2-3 hours in the queue." 

We agreed. We were okay with just the darshan and did not want to touch or wait in the queue for 2 hours.

The darshan was over in less than 10 mins. He left. We walked around.

And that is when we got the shock of our lives. 

We realized he had taken all that money to take us to a place that was already open to all! It was an open place, from all sides, anyone could enter from any side and leave from any side! We did it and no one stopped us. We went back to the same place he had taken us. Many were doing the same. For free!!!!

My heart sank! I saw that the panda was already 'trapping' another family. I wanted to scream and shout at him. But my mouth was dry. I could barely hear my own voice. My eyes had started welling up. I could not believe we were duped in such a sacred place. This temple had such a history and lineage and significance and power! And the temple staff was looting devotees like this! Cheating - Openly and nonchalantly!

I thought of how much I had longed for the darshan of Maa Kamakhya and, how much I revered the temple. The trip was planned in April and I had been longing to see the temple since then. The devotion was replaced by despair, a sinking feeling. It felt like a stone was placed on my chest, the weight of which I was not able to bear. 

Even in Dwarkadeesh in Gujarat, the situation is somewhat similar. Priests wait for gullible devotees at the footwear stand. They scan you,  approach you, and smooth talk you into making donations at the thulabhara complex. But there, at least, he did not demand any particular amount. He said give whatever you feel like. And he showed the complete temple and explained the importance and history of each part of the temple. And he really helped us beat the crowd. 

Later, I read the Google reviews of the Maa Kamakhya temple. Many people had written of similar experiences. The temple management creates a fake atmosphere of panic forcing devotees to be alarmed at the manipulated crowd length and charging them Rs 500 and again making them wait in the queue for an hour or more. The line is kept waiting to make the oncoming devotees feel there is a big crowd.

And then some priests walk around trapping poor devotees promising them a darshan where they actually just take them to the open room. 

Sigh!