Human form of lord worshipped

BALASORE: In a departure from Puri and elsewhere, the idols of Lord Jagannath and brother Balabhadra are worshipped in human form in a temple at Nalapatana village in Balasore district. This is perhaps the only temple in the world where the deities are found in human form. In Puri and elsewhere They are worshipped without palms and legs.The deities here are made of wood, as in other places, and stand about six feet tall. Peculiarly, besides legs and palms, lips and nose have also been carved out on the idols. The makeshift palms, however, have been damaged due to lack of care but Their sister, Devi Subhadra, is worshipped in an incomplete form here as in Puri. Even as there are numerous folk tales to justify that Lord Jagannath, Lord Balabhadra and Devi Subhadra are formless, the residents here have been worshipping Them with much devotion for over 200 years.   Though there is no written history about the deities and the temple, old timers of the village say They were installed by a renowned saint Hari Golam Das after being directed to do so by some divine power in his dream 200 years ago.  “The place where the temple stands now was his hermitage. He had installed the three deities before establishing a Durga idol here,” told Upendranath Puhan, former president of the temple trust.   The day-to-day rituals defer from that of the Puri temple as Hari Golam was a great follower of saint Raghubar Das of Chhatia in Jajpur district. Instead, all the rituals here are performed as per Chhatia Jagannath temple. Priest Pravakar Mohapatra said earlier the deities were worshipped in a thatched house. It was the saint’s daughter-in-law Chandramani Das, who took the initiative to build a temple with financial aid from the district administration and some devotees in 1994,” he said. Though this idol of Lord Jagannath is believed to be an incarnation of Kalki avatar, the tenth incarnation of Lord Vishnu, the temple’s uniqueness is still far from media glare. The other major difference is no Rath Yatra is celebrated here. The deities always stay in the temple and are worshipped regularly. The Rath Yatra was stopped after the saint, who had installed the deities, was arrested by the British for taking part in the freedom movement.