Nashik: Shree Kalaram Temple
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A backgrounder
Divya A, Jan 30, 2024: The Indian Express
The temple is also the site of a landmark agitation led by Babasaheb Ambedkar demanding temple entry rights for Dalits more than 90 years ago. Why have major political leaders come to this temple over the decades?
Panchavati has a special place in the Ramayana and, therefore, in the Hindu religion.
A number of important events described in the epic story of Lord Ram took place here. Ram, along with Sita and Lakshman, spent the first few years of their 14-year exile in Dandakaranya, the dense forest in central India of which Panchavati was a part.
The name Panchavati comes from the existence of five banyan trees in the area. According to the epic, Lord Ram, Sita, and Lakshman set up a hut here as the presence of five banyan trees made this region auspicious.
It is from the Panchavati region that Ravan, the demon king of Lanka, abducted Sita after drawing her out of the secure zone created by Lakshman by deceit, and set off the chain of events that led to Ram’s journey southward to Lanka, and the Ramayana war.
But it is also the site of an important Dalit satyagraha.
In 1930, B R Ambedkar and the Marathi teacher and social activist Pandurang Sadashiv Sane, known as Sane Guruji, led an agitation to demand access for Dalits to Hindu temples.
On March 2, 1930, Ambedkar organised a large protest outside the Kalaram temple. Dalit protesters arrived in Nashik in trucks, and surrounded the temple with a sit-in. Over the next few days, they sang songs, raised slogans, and demanded the right to enter the temple.
The protesters faced opposition, and there was an incident of stone-throwing when they tried to stop a Ram Navami procession from entering the temple premises. Babasaheb reached the spot and controlled the situation, according to an account of the satyagraha in Dhananjay Keer’s book, Dr Ambedkar: Life and Mission.
The satyagraha at the Kalaram temple continued until 1935, Keer wrote. Earlier, in 1927, Ambedkar had launched another satyagraha to assert the rights of Dalits to use the water in public places. Sane Guruji too, travelled all over Maharashtra to campaign for Dalit rights, and led a protest fast at the Vitthal Temple in Pandharpur.
On January 6, Thackeray had said: “…On [January 22], we will have a darshan of Lord Ram at the Kalaram temple in Nashik. This is the same temple in which Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar and Sane Guruji had to struggle to allow entry [for Dalits], saying Lord Ram belongs to everyone.”
The temple has an unusual statue of Lord Ram, which is black in colour.
The Kalaram temple derives its name from a black statue of the Lord — Kala Ram translates literally to “Black Ram”. The sanctum sanctorum has statues of Ram, Sita, and Lakshman, and a black idol of Hanuman at the main entrance.
The temple, which is visited by thousands of devotees every day, was built in 1792 with the efforts of one Sardar Rangarao Odhekar, according to the website of the Shree Kalaram Mandir Sansthan. It is said that Sardar Odhekar dreamt of a black-coloured statue of Lord Ram in the Godavari, and recovered the statues from the river and built the temple. The place where statues were found was named Ramkund, according to the Sansthan.
The main temple has 14 steps, which represent the 14 years of Ram’s exile. It has 84 pillars, which represents the cycle of 84 lakh species that one has to complete in order to be born as a human. The Sansthan website says there is a very old tree, with an impression of Lord Dattatreya’s footprints on stone beneath it.
