Kotilingeshwara temple hosts more than 86 lakhs Shivalingas and has the world's tallest ShivaLinga measuring 108 Ft height and Basava measuring 35 feet. It is surrounded by plush greenery amidst the Kammasandra village 5 km from Kolar Gold Fields.

TENS OF THOUSANDS The biggest linga in Kotilingeshwara is 108 ft tall

The adventurous foursome that we are, we set off to discover a few places we found in KSTDC pamphlets. With a load of hearsay and a couple of maps, we hit the road in a small family car to Chikka Tirupati via Whitefield. Most travelogues and guides flood you with dated info on popular tourist beeline ends, motorable beaten tracks and cushy spots to eat and sleep. For a change, we veered away from any such repeats and that is how we found our way to a Vaishnavaite temple in the middle of a handful of hamlets.

A homely but clean-on-the-inside mess nearby provided us with staple idlis, puris and avarekalu baath. We wended our way on routes frequented more by tractors than plush cars. We passed rose and marigold expanses, tomato, chilli, potato, cabbage, cauliflower, Bengal gram, mulberry plantations and mango and eucalyptus groves. Roses and tomatoes beckoned. We stopped to admire and even had a small chat with the locals.

Uniformly, they stand

On the way, Kotilingeshwara, we found, was one big park of lingas, lining pathways in all sizes amidst bilva and amla trees, but all in one single colour and shape, tens of thousands of them. The temple houses shrines for Manjunatha, Panduranga, Srinivasa, Panchmukha Ganesha, Panchamukha Hanuman, Rama-Sita-Lakshmana, Ayyappa, Annapoorneswari, Santhoshima and Kannika Parameswari, besides Navagraha and Raghavendra.

The biggest linga is 108 ft tall, matched by a huge figure of Nandi. Prasada lunch of anna, saru and majjige is served to all visitors between 12.30 p.m. and 2 p.m.

Then a short drive to Bangaru Tirupati. You can't miss the arch marking the entrance from the road to Mulbagal. The temple dates to Brigu Maharishi's days and is built on rocks. You reach the shrine after a climb of several hundred steps and see the deity through a chequered window. At a different level is the shrine for the consort Padmavathi, dating back to mid-19th Century.

Mulbagal lies just off the NH4. This taluk shows signs of rural progress. The well-known place here is the temple for Hanuman, said to be installed by Arjuna, one of the Pandavas, after the Mahabharata war. Sage Vasishta is believed to have installed the idols of the main deity Srinivasa, Padmavathi and Rama-Sita-Lakshmana.

Off the Srinivasapura road going north from Mulbagal, we reach Kurudumale. Two temples, within a hundred feet of each other, are now protected monuments. The Someshwara temple, where restoration work is under way, was built and dedicated to the locals by Raja Raja Chola. The priest patiently took us through the Chola king's times depicted on some of the pillar sculptures worked on by the king's sculptor, the legendary Jakanachari.

After military plunder some centuries later, just about 15 of the original 30-odd idols have been found and reinstated. The Ganesha temple has dates back to the Krta Yuga. The idol is said to have grown from a salagrama stone (originally from the Gandak river of Nepal) through the four yugas to attain its present size.

Legend has it that the Hindu trinity together installed the idol — hence the name Koodadri, now known as Koodumale or Kurudumale. The Vijayanagar king Krishnadevaraya built the temple around the idol at the request of the locals.

A recently built Prasanna Venkataramaswamy temple is located along a 1.5 km detour on the road back to Mulbagal. The place is called Doddaguruki/ Vedagiri.

Getting back to Mulbagal, it is a smooth turn into NH4 towards Bangalore. Five kilometres down the highway is a fairly huge Ayyappa Kshetram. Then Kamat group's Upachar, located after the Kolar bypass, is a good refreshment halt, 20 km short of Hoskote and is a standard stop for the KSTDC bus services. With an early start and a couple more hours in hand, it is possible to complete the day with a trip to Kaiwara, a forest department-maintained resort via Chintamani, travelling northwest from Mulbagal and get back on the highway near Hoskote.

How to get there

Chikka Tirupati (35 km from Bangalore): Turn right at Farm Cross, Whitefield; Kotilingeswara: On the right, three km short of Betamangala. Travel on Bangarpet-Betamangala- route via Malur, Tykal, Bangarpet; Bangaru Tirupati; Eight km from Kotilingeswara on the road towards Mulbagal. Entry marked by a stone arch; Kurudumale: Northeast from Mulbagal, off the Srinivasapura Road.

Surrounded by verdant greenery, Kammasandra is famous for its Kotilingeshwara temple. The temple houses 108 ft tall Shivling and 35 ft tall Basava. The shrine is surrounded by lakhs of small shivlings, which spread over an area of 15 acres. These icons are installed by the devotees to seek the blessings of the lord. The entrance from the highway to the central courtyard is majestic. Other major attractions here are ancient temples dedicated to Sri Manjunatheshwara, Trimurti, Ashta-Lakshmi, Subramanya, the Navagrahas and many other deities.

A three hour journey from Bangalore brings one to this place.

Formerly, Kolar was known variously as Kolahala, Kuvalala and Kolala. Kolar was called Kolahalapura during the middle ages, but later came to be known as Kolar. Kolahahapura in Kannada meant "violent city", as it was the battlefield for the warring kingdoms of Chalukyas in the north and Cholas to the south. It was the capital of the Gangas till 4th century AD when they shifted the capital to Talakad in Mysore. In 1004 A.D., the Cholas annexed Kolar till 1116 A.D,. Vishnuvardhana (1108-1142AD) freed Gangavadi from the Cholas, and in commemoration of his victory.

Gold was first mined in the area in the 2nd and 3rd century AD by the digging of small pits. During the Chola period in the 9th and 10th century AD the scale of the operation grew, but large-scale mining only came in the 1850s under the British with more manpower and sophisticated machinery. In 1873, M.F. Lavelle, a resident in Bangalore, applied to the Mysore Government for the exclusive privilege of mining in the Kolar district. His request was granted and he commenced operations by sinking a shaft near Urigam (Oorgaum) in 1875

There is a legend about why the Kolar Gold Fields are so full of gold. The story goes back to the Tretha Yuga, the time of Lord Rama. During his 14 years of vanavasa, Rama along with his wife Sita and brother Lakshmana wandered through the dense forests of the present day Avani village, which is about 10 miles from the gold fields, where they set up their hut and lived. Surpanaka, sister of Ravana, one day happened to see Rama and asked him to marry her. He refused, as he was already married, so she approached Lakshmana.

People from many different places are settled in the Kolar Gold Fields today, with the majority of them being tamil speaking people from the north and south Arcot districts of Tamil Nadu. There are also Telugu speaking people from Kuppam, Ramakuppam, V-kota and other places in Andhra Pradesh. Given the mixture of population, many festivals are celebrated; the most famous and popular one being the Lakshmi Venkateshwara Jaatre.