#Thread on Rameshwaram: From the search of sita till the research of NASA.

Rameswaram a small city in Tamil nadu and, surrounded by bay of bengal and the Indian Ocean. Itis among 7 holy cities and 4 tirtha asthal of hindus.

According to Ramayana, this is the city where decisive decision was made by shree rama to built ramsetu to accomplish the search of his wife sita and a historical bridge was made from this city connecting lanka (today’s sri lanka).

Apart from this, various purana like shiv, ling, padma,skand purana mentioned different story about how shree rama worshiped shiva in Rameshwaram and requested him to attain a place there. As a result, shiva retain there in form of jyotirlingaa and became the 11th jyotirlinga.

In Skanda Purana, Chapter 3 of Brahma Kund it is mentioned that

While returning to Ayodhya, Sri Ram decided to perform the ‘Pratishtha’ of Shiva Linga at the most auspicious ‘Muhurat’ and commissioned Hanuman to bring the Linga from Maha Deva at Kailasa Mountain.

But Unfortunately, Hunuman could not meet the deadline of the Muhurat for the Consecration of the Linga. After that Sita prepared a Sand Linga which was set up as a temporary stop-gap but in reality that became the real Linga.

Meanwhile Hanuman returned from Kailasa but was highly disappointed & felt that all his efforts proved futile. Rama consoled Hanuman also did the Pratishtha of the Linga brought by Hanuma and made a rule the before worshiping the sand linga, hanuman’s linga will be worshipped.

This is the reason why today we know this jyotirlinga as Ramanathaswamy temple, which means ‘Nath (lord) of ram’.

Ramanathaswamy Temple is a beautiful dravidian style crafted temple which holds the position of largest corridor of the world. (a bit contradiction is there).

The temple was expanded during the 12th century by Pandya Dynasty, and its principal shrines sanctum were renovated by Jeyaveera Cinkaiariyan and his successor Gunaveera Cinkaiariyan of the Jaffna kingdom. Interestingly, the temple hold 24 tirtham within itself

Among the 24 Tirtham’s two are outside the Ramanatha swamy temple and the rest 22 are inside the premisies. It is believed that the 22 wells represent the 22 arrows in Lord Rama’s Quier. This could be the reason why Ramesawaram is said to be the kashi of south.

Apart from this temple, jada tirtham is considered as sacred pond where Rama is supposed to have washed his matted hair or jada, after killing Ravana and before worshipping Lord Shiva.

Apart from temples and tirtham, Ramesawaram is famous for its large and beautiful bridges.

One of them is Pambam bridge, a 100-year-old railway bridge which connects Rameswaram island to the mainland. It is not just a railway bridge but a tourist attraction as it is very beautifully crafted in the middle of the ocean.

Talk about bridges and if we dont talk about ramsetu then, the journey seams to b incomplete. Ram setu as told earlier, is a bridge connecting india with sri lanka by rama. Interestingly it is known as adams bridge these days, thanks to western world for once again for defaming

our scientific creation by considering it a nature made bridge. NASA too believe that this bridge is millions of years old but they love to play hide and seek with it. One of the NASA’s scientist agreed once that the bridge was artificially made.

But then, NASA officially denied this statement. Still scientists are all after this bridge.

Talk about scientist, then we can never forget our one of the greatest scientist and his contribution for making india a nuclear country.

Yes, Dr. APJ Abdul kalam was from Ramesvaram, which make this city, a must visit place in my travel list.

Thanks