At Dewri Mandir at Tamar, Goddess Durga is worshipped as
Solahbhuji – Mother Durga with sixteen arms. Dewri Mandir is located on Ranchi –
Jamshedpur National Highway 33 in Jharkhand and is around 70 km from Ranchi.
Another unique aspect of the shrine is that Mother Goddess is seen sitting on a
lotus and not on a lion. In the temple, tribal priests offer prayers along with
Brahmin priests. The two communities conduct the rituals together.
According to a legend, an erstwhile king of Tamar saw a
dream. The goddess told him that there was a temple in Dewri, where she must be
worshipped. Villagers, as directed by the king, cleared a forested patch to
find a small temple with a stone murti of Mother Goddess. Ever since, the deity
is worshipped here.
Belief is that Lord Vishwakarma, the divine architect,
constructed the original temple. The present structure was built around 8th
century AD.
A narrow entrance lead to the sanctum sanctorum, in which Mother
Durga is seen sitting with sixteen arms on a lotus pedestal. Maa blesses her
devotees with one of her hands. In rarity, She is also seen holding Earth in one
of the hands. On the right side of the murti, there is a small murti of Goddess
Saraswati. On the left side, there is a small murti of Goddess
Lakshmi.
The temple is famous for mannat as many devotees have had their
wishes fulfilled after offering prayers here.
The architecture of the temple is unique – main part of temple
is made of stones, kept one on top of another, the big rocks cut to small sizes
and joined without using any kind of adhesive material like cement etc.
The old temple is kept intact and new bigger structure are
built around it.
On the dome of the main temple one can see various
incarnations of Goddess Durga.
Animal sacrifice is still performed in the shrine.
The most important festival here is the Durga Puja.
A rare engraving of Hansavahini Devi on rock can be seen in
the temple complex. Some people refer to the goddess as Manasa devi.