Sri Sugandhesa Shiva Temple, Pattan

Address

Sri Sugandhesa Shiva Temple, National Highway 1A, Pattan, Baramulla District Jammu and Kashmir 193121

Diety

Shiva

Introduction

Sugandesha Temple is a Hindu Temple dedicated to Lord Shiva located in Pattan Town in Baramulla District in Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. The temple is in a dilapidated condition and worship is no longer conducted. It is listed as one of the most important temples for promotion of tourism in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. This site is one of the listed sites under Archeological survey of India.

Puranic Significance

Kalhana tells us that King Avantivarman (AD 855 – 883 AD), the first king of the Utpala dynasty had a foul mouthed son who didn’t have taste for high poetry. He tells us S’amkaravarman (Shankaravarman, A.D. 883-902), son and successor of Avantivarman founded a new town called S’ankarapurapattana and built two temples at the place dedicated to Shiva. The new king named one of the temples after his wife Sugandha as Sugandhesa. After early death of her two boy kings, Sugandha too got to rule Kashmir from 904 to 906 A.D. The entrance to the courtyard is in the middle of the eastern wall of the peristyle, and consists, as usual, of two chambers with a partition wall and a doorway in the middle. The temple stands on a double base, but it seems probable from the flank walls of the lower stair and the frieze of the lower base, in which the panels intended for sculpture decoration have been merely blocked out, but not carved, that the temple was never completed.