Small brick temple an architectural marvel

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Source: The Hindu (http://www.hinduonnet.com/2010/01/09/stories/2010010958510200.htm)
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Small brick temple an architectural marvel


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It was built by Jeypore king Vikram Deb Verma


KORAPUT: Maulima temple, a small brick temple amidst high rising mountains all around near Dudhari in Semiliguda block of Koraput district, attracts people for its architectural marvel. While the ever-flowing stream nearby, the shade of huge banyan tree adjacent to the temple gives more reason to visit more than once for any visitor.
The temple was built some 200 years back, Raghu Mandal Nayak, grandson of the then Mustadar of the king of Jeypore kingdom said.
While it was little known even to the family members of Raghu on the significance of the illegible papers they had in their house as a symbol of inheritance from their forefathers, it was certainly in relation to the land and property related to the temple, M.Tatalu, headmaster of the village school said.
It is believed that the temple was built by Vikram Deb Verma, king of Jeypore kingdom, for facilitating his men, who were staying for days in the area for collecting taxes. The huge banyan tree was planted to tie the elephants they brought along with them while a pond was dug to bathe them, he said.
The temple was first made of stone. But during the course of time, the stones had begun falling one by one causing severe damage to the temple, Raghu said.
There was one Matal Gotia Nayak, the village head during the British period who had taken steps to reconstruct the temple with bricks. While the entire temple was made of bricks placed one above the other using a paste of mud and curd, the small stone idols of different deities exhibited in varieties of postures in the grooves of the temple were the same ones that were there in the old temple, he added.
The neatness of the work reminds one of the temples of greater importance in other parts of the country.
Dudhari is now getting connected with PMGSY road and with more and more people coming for picnic, the message of this temple was increasingly reaching to the people not limiting to any particular boundaries and soon could become a good place of tourist attraction, Sanyasi Pujari , district tourist officer of Koraput, said.






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