Destination Features

A 90-minute (50 km) bus ride from Jammu took us to Katra, base camp of pilgrims bound for the highly venerated Mata Vaishnodevi Shrine in the Trikuta hills. From Katra a 12.5 km trek takes visitors to the temple sited at a height of 5,200 feet above msl (mean sea level). En route to the temple, several interesting landmarks and resting points for pilgrims offer spectacular vistas of the plains below.

As with several other temples and shrines of ancient India, there’s a paucity of recorded history of the Vaishnodevi shrine. However a geological study of the holy cave which houses the temple has revealed the age of its formations to be over a million years. The oldest recorded reference to the temple is of Guru Gobind Singh’s visit to the shrine in the 16th century.

Currently the shrine is governed and administered by a specially constituted board which has vastly upgraded the facilities available to pilgrims. The provision of resting points, cafeterias, clean and hygienic toilets along the 12.5 km trek route draws legions of pilgrims every year, with the number of visitors having increased from 1.4 million in 1985-86 to 6.5 million in 2004-05.

Legend is that several millenniums ago, Vaishno Devi, a devotee of Lord Vishnu had taken a vow of celibacy. Bhairon Nath, a tantric tried to stop her. Through his tantric powers, he visualised her going towards the Trikuta hills and gave chase. The goddess felt thirsty at Banganga and shot an arrow into the earth from where water gushed out. Charan Paduka, marked by the imprints of her feet, is one of the places of worship enroute to the summit of the mountain. The Goddess then meditated in the cave at Adhkawari, halfway from Katra to the top of Trikuta hill. It took Bhairon Nath nine months to locate her, which is why the cave is also known as Garbh Joon. When he finally found her performing penance, a battle ensued in which Vaishnodevi assumed the form of Maha Kali and cut off the former’s head which was flung atop the mountain. This is where the Bhairon Temple is currently sited.