Rishabhdeo

About

Rishabhdeo, also written Rikhabdeo and known locally as Dhulev, lies about sixty-five kilometres from Udaipur along the Udaipur-Ahmedabad road in southern Rajasthan. The town takes its name from Lord Rishabhanatha, the first Tirthankara of Jainism, whose great temple here is among the most revered Jain pilgrimage centres in western India.

The Kesariyaji Tirth, often simply called the Main Temple, is honoured by both Digambara and Shvetambara traditions, and a 1966 judgement of the Rajasthan High Court confirmed it as a Shvetambara Jain temple. The presiding deity is called Kesariaji because of the great offerings of saffron, keshar, brought by pilgrims across the centuries.

The temple is regarded as one of the four principal religious institutions of Mewar, the kingdom long ruled from Udaipur by the Sisodia Maharanas. A traditional verse by Chatur Singhji Bavji invokes Eklingji, Girirajdhar, Rishabhdev, and Bhujchaar as the four dhams of Mewar, and the Shvetambara aarti by Mulchand sings of Dhuleva as a town made luminous by the lord's presence.

The Main Temple is said to have been raised in the eighth century. Its central image of Rishabhanatha, carved in black stone and seated in padmasana, rises about three and a half feet, set within an ashtadhatu parikar of twenty-three accompanying images. Above rise fifty-two pinnacles, raised in the symbolism of the fifty-two temples of Nandishwar Dweep, with 1,100 carved pillars and fifty-two devakulikas within.

History

Tradition dates the principal temple at Rishabhdeo to the eighth century. The town's other name, Dhulev, recalls a Bhil chieftain named Dhuleva who is remembered as a guardian of the shrine. The Rajasthan High Court confirmed the temple's Shvetambara status in a 1966 judgement, and management of the precincts is carried out by the state government today. After Paryushana Parva each year the town holds a two-day Rathotsav celebrating the marriage of Lord Neminath, in which eight-hundred-year-old chariots are drawn through the streets.

Significance

Kesariyaji Tirth is one of the four dhams of Mewar and a Jain pilgrimage centre honoured across both Digambara and Shvetambara branches. The fifty-two pinnacles of the temple recall the cosmic geometry of Nandishwar Dweep, and the saffron offerings to Rishabhanatha give the deity his beloved name Kesariaji.