Madurantakam

Madurantakam
—  town  —
Madurantakam Location of Madurantakam in Tamil Nadu and India
Coordinates	12°30′42″N 79°53′8″E / 12.51167°N 79.88556°E / 12.51167; 79.88556Coordinates: 12°30′42″N 79°53′8″E / 12.51167°N 79.88556°E / 12.51167; 79.88556
Country	India
State	Tamil Nadu
District(s)	Kanchipuram
Nearest city	Madurantakam
Time zone	IST (UTC+05:30)
Codes • Pincode • 603306 • Telephone • +044 • Vehicle • TN 19-Z
Website	WWW.MADURANTAKAM.INFO

Madurantakam (Tamil: மதுராந்தகம்) is a town located in the Kanchipuram district in the state of Tamil Nadu, India. The town is situated 77 km south west of Chennai (Madras).

Temples

Sri Kodanda Rama, also known in this region as Aeri Katha Rama (the one who saved the village from flooding from Madurantakam lake), is enshrined in the Aeri Katha Ramar Temple. The temple is about 1300 years old. Sita resides in the temple as Sri Janaki Valli. The other deities enshrined are Sri Chakrathalwar, Sri Ramanuja, Sri Lakshmi Narasimha and Sri Hanuman.

The Kodandaramaswamy temple has two sets of utsavar idols of the presiding deity and His consort, and Lakshmana. While one deity is named Rama, the other is known as Karunakaran.

There is also a separate shrine for Goddess Sita, known as Janakavalli Thayar, which is claimed to be very rare. This shrine was built by an English Collector, Colonel Lionel Place who assured the people that he would build a shrine for Devi if the newly built surplus water weirs withstood the fury of monsoon rains. The huge tank with immense storage capacity would breach every year after the monsoon rains and wash away the rough stone-built outlet of the tank. While camping at Madurantakam during a monsoon night, the tank was full and almost overflowing. The Collector visited the tank bund and is said to have seen Rama and Lakshmana keeping guard at the tank. The construction of the shrine for the Goddess began the very next morning and the Lord is known as Aeri Katha Ramar as he saved the tank bund from collapsing.

Thiru-Venkateswarar Temple near Madurantakam railway station, too a renowned temples in the town. It is built by king who suffered form skin disease and then relived when he had bath in the tank; then he realized his wonder and built this temple during British raj; Similarly other temples includes renukapara-meswari ( Amman ) temple, siva temple adjacent to G.S.T road, Murugar temple's, chelliyamman temple and anjaneya temple near to substation Madurantakam. Northern-thiru-nallar and Sri ragavendrar temple and a vishnu cum anjaneya temple on the karunguzhi mountain ; then Prasana Venkateswarar temple in Padalam were in the perimeter of madurantakam.

Church

The Simpson Memorial Church belong to Church of South India, located on the GST road is one of the popular church in madurantakam. Next in St.joesph's School, "St.Mary's church" and another one is located near Arugunam Village 3km from madurantakm

History

Madurantakam is one of the holy places visited by Saint Ramanuja though it has not been sung by the azhwars. The place is also unique in that Ramanuja's idol is found dressed in white on all days while in almost all temples the saint is dressed in ochre.

In two of his poems, Saint Manavala Mamunigal asks everyone who wants to cast away his past sins to worship the Lord at this place. There are separate shrines for Lakshmi Narasimhar, Periya Nambi and Ramanuja, Andal, Sudarsana and Vedanta Desika. The holy tank is opposite the temple with a separate shrine for Anjaneya on its banks.

Geography

The reservoir near Madurantakam irrigates more than 1000 small villages in and around the town. The entire town was donated to Brahmins by Chola King, Uthamachola (Maduranthaka Chola) for chanting and preserving the four Vedas. Therefore the village is known as Maduranthakachaturvedamangalam.

External links

• http://www.madurantakam.info
• Story on how the Temple came into existence
• History of Aeri Katha Ramar Temple