India is a country with rich religious histories and a diverse cultural landscape. For this project, we are focused on the mountainous areas of northwestern India located primarily in Uttarakhand, along the borders of Nepal and Tibet. This area of northern India has been an important religious pilgrimage site for millennia, with religious aesthetics, priests, sadhus and ordinary Indians undertaking arduous journeys through the mountains to holy sites across the Himalaya. Many of these travelers have followed ancient pilgrimage routes that still exist today, and along the main route leading through our project area (Kailash Sacred Landscape) in Uttarakhand, the Indian Government’s Kumao Mandal Vikas Nigam (KMVN) manages a series of pilgrimage hostels and guest houses. Many of the travelers on this path are heading to Mount Kailas and/or Lake Manasarovar. As the KMVN website notes in regard to Kailas:
According to Hindu legends, Shiva, the god of devastation and rebirth, resides at the pinnacle of this famous mountain named Kailasa. Mount Kailasa is considered in many sects of Hinduism as heaven, the ultimate destination of souls and the holy center of the world. The narrative in the Puranas, Mount Kailash’s four faces are made of crystal, ruby, gold, and lapis lazuli. Refereed as the pillar of the world that rises 84,000 leagues high. From it flow four rivers, which stretch to the four quarters of the world and divide the world into four regions.
Uttarakhand alone has many important religious sites, including being home to one of the major Char Dam Yatra or “four abodes” sites of Badrinath (the other three being Dwarka, Jagannath Puri and Rameswaram). According to legends in the classical Hindu Sanskrit texts that form the Mahabharata, the Char Dam Yatra sites were believed to have the power to cleanse people of their sins. Uttarakhand is home to the important Chota Char Dam “four small abodes” Yatra sites, which besides Badrinath includes Haridwar, Kedarnath, Rishikesh, Jageswar, Devprayag, Gangotri, and Chitai (more tourism info).
This is a view from the trail along the Kailas Yatra route just north of Narayan Ashram near the town of Darchula. Narayan Ashram is an important local site associated with this part of Uttarakhand, and also with the Kailas Yatra. You can learn more about Narayam Ashram and see photos here.
