Location of Rameswaram
in Tamil NaduTamil Nadu is one of the 28 states of India. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu lies in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula and is bordered by the union territory of Pondicherry, and the states of Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh...
and IndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
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CoordinatesA geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on the Earth to be specified by a set of numbers. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represent vertical position, and two or three of the numbers represent horizontal position...
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http://toolserver.org/~geohack/geohack.php?pagename=Rameswaram¶ms=9.28_N_79.3_E_type:city(32224)_region:IN-TN_9°17′N 79°18′E / 9.28°N 79.3°E / 9.28; 79.3]CoordinatesA geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on the Earth to be specified by a set of numbers. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represent vertical position, and two or three of the numbers represent horizontal position...
: http://toolserver.org/~geohack/geohack.php?pagename=Rameswaram¶ms=9.28_N_79.3_E_type:city(32224)_region:IN-TN_9°17′N 79°18′E / 9.28°N 79.3°E / 9.28; 79.3]
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Country
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IndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
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StateIndia is a federal union of states comprising twenty-eight states and seven union territories. The states and territories are further subdivided into districts and so on.-List of states and territories:...
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Tamil NaduTamil Nadu is one of the 28 states of India. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu lies in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula and is bordered by the union territory of Pondicherry, and the states of Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh...
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District(s)A district is an administrative division of an Indian state or territory. Districts are further subdivided, in some cases into Sub-Divisions, and otherwise directly into tehsils or talukas.District officials include:...
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RamanathapuramRamanathapuram District is an administrative district of Tamil Nadu state in southern India. The city of Ramanathapuram is the district headquarters. Ramanthapuram District has an area of 4123 km²...
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Population
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32,224 (2001[//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rameswaram&action=edit [update]])
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ISTIndian Standard Time is the time observed throughout India and Sri Lanka, with a time offset of UTC+05:30. India does not observe daylight saving time or other seasonal adjustments, although DST was used briefly during the Sino–Indian War of 1962 and the Indo–Pakistani Wars of 1965 and 1971...
(UTC+05:30)
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AreaThe geography of India describes the physical features of India, a country in South Asia, that lies entirely on the Indian Plate in the northern portion of the Indo-Australian Plate. The country lies to the north of the equator between 8°4' and 37°6' north latitude and 68°7' and 97°25' east...
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10 metres (33 ft)
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Rameswaram (
TamilTamil is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of the Indian subcontinent. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and in the Indian union territory of Pondicherry. Tamil is also an official language of Sri Lanka and Singapore...
: இராமேஸ்வரம், is a
townA town is a human settlement larger than a village but smaller than a city. The size a settlement must be in order to be called a "town" varies considerably in different parts of the world, so that, for example, many American "small towns" seem to British people to be no more than villages, while...
in
Ramanathapuram districtRamanathapuram District is an administrative district of Tamil Nadu state in southern India. The city of Ramanathapuram is the district headquarters. Ramanthapuram District has an area of 4123 km²...
in the
IndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n
stateIndia is a federal union of states comprising twenty-eight states and seven union territories. The states and territories are further subdivided into districts and so on.-List of states and territories:...
of
Tamil NaduTamil Nadu is one of the 28 states of India. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu lies in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula and is bordered by the union territory of Pondicherry, and the states of Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh...
. It is located on
Pamban IslandPamban Island , also known as Rameswaram Island, is an island located between peninsular India and Sri Lanka. The island is a part of India and is governed by the administration of Ramanathapuram district of the state of Tamil Nadu...
separated from mainland India by the Pamban channel and is about 50 kilometres from
Mannar IslandMannar Island, formerly called Manar Island, is part of Mannar District, Sri Lanka. It is linked to the rest of Sri Lanka by a causeway.It has an area of about 50 square kilometres, mainly covered with vegetation and sand.Rama's Bridge or Rama Setu ,[1] is a chain of limestone shoals, between...
,
Sri LankaSri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
. Pamban Island, also known as Rameswaram Island, is connected to mainland India by the
Pamban BridgeThe Pamban Bridge is a cantilever bridge on the Palk Strait connects Rameswaram on Pamban Island to mainland India. It refers to both the road bridge and the cantilever railway bridge, though primarily it means the latter. It was India's first sea bridge...
. Rameswaram is the terminus of the railway line from
ChennaiChennai , formerly known as Madras or Madarasapatinam , is the capital city of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, located on the Coromandel Coast off the Bay of Bengal. Chennai is the fourth most populous metropolitan area and the sixth most populous city in India...
and
MaduraiMadurai is the third largest city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It served as the capital city of the Pandyan Kingdom. It is the administrative headquarters of Madurai District and is famous for its temples built by Pandyan and...
. Together with Kashi, it is considered to be one of the holiest places in India to Hindus, and part of the
Char DhamThe Chota Char Dham , is an important Hindu pilgrimage circuit in the Indian Himalayas...
pilgrimages. Hence, it is a bustling
pilgrimA pilgrim is a traveler who is on a journey to a holy place. Typically, this is a physical journeying to some place of special significance to the adherent of a particular religious belief system...
centre.
It is situated in the
Gulf of MannarThe Gulf of Mannar is a large shallow bay forming part of the Laccadive Sea in the Indian Ocean. It lies between the southeastern tip of India and the west coast of Sri Lanka. A chain of low islands and reefs known as Adam's Bridge, also called Ramsethu, which includes Mannar Island, separates the...
at the very tip of the Indian peninsula. According to legend, this is the place from where Lord Rama built a bridge Ram Setu (also known as Adam's Bridge) across the sea to Lanka to rescue his consort Sita from her abductor Ravana. Both the Vaishnavites and Shaivites visit this pilgrimage centre which is known as the Varanasi of the south.
Ex-president of
IndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, Dr. A.P.J.
Abdul KalamAvul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam usually referred to as A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, is a renowned aerospace engineer, professor , and first Chancellor of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology Thiruvananthapuram , who served as the 11th President of India from 2002 to 2007...
, hails from a fishing hamlet called
Dhanushkodi situated on this island.
Geography
Rameswaram is located at 9.28°N 79.3°E. It has an average elevation of 10
metreThe metre , symbol m, is the base unit of length in the International System of Units . Originally intended to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the Earth's equator to the North Pole , its definition has been periodically refined to reflect growing knowledge of metrology...
s (32 feet). The religious island is spread in an area of 61.8 square kilometres and happens to be in the shape of a conch. The Ramanatha Swamy Temple occupies major area of Rameshwaram.
The beach of Rameswaram is famous for its beautiful sea featured with no waves at all. The sea waves rise to a maximum height of 3 cm and the view looks like a very big river. Legend has it that Lord Ram of Ramayana prayed to the sea god to pave the way for Lanka. The sea god granted a boon saying that he will make the sea waves less to aid him in building a rock bridge.
Climate
Rameswaram has dry tropical climate, with average annual rainfall 94 cm, mostly from North East monsoon from October to January. The temperature is around 30°C to 35°C. The highest ever temperature recorded at Pamban station was 37°C and the lowest was 17°C.
Demographics
{{As of|2001}} India
censusA census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
, Rameswaram had a population of 38,035. Males constitute 52% of the population and females 48%. Rameswaram has an average literacy rate of 72%: male literacy is 77%, and female literacy is 66%. In Rameswaram, 13% of the population is under 6 years of age.
Rameswaram is significant for many Indians as a pilgrimage to Benaras is considered by some to be incomplete without a pilgrimage to Rameswaram. The presiding deity here is usually referred to as a Linga with the name Sri Ramanatha Swamy, it is one of the twelve Jyotirlingas.
This masterpiece of Indian architecture boasts of the biggest temple corridor in India. Different rulers built the Ramanathaswamy Temple over a period of time starting from the twelfth century.(Although this theory is devised by westerners which has been proven to be false). The temple comprises twenty two wells where the taste of the water of each well is different from the other. The grandest part of the temple is the 1219 m pillared corridor consisting of 3.6 m high granite pillars, richly carved and well proportioned. The perspective presented by these pillars run uninterruptedly to a length of nearly 230 m.
According to the
PuranasThe Puranas are a genre of important Hindu, Jain and Buddhist religious texts, notably consisting of narratives of the history of the universe from creation to destruction, genealogies of kings, heroes, sages, and demigods, and descriptions of Hindu cosmology, philosophy, and geography.Puranas...
(the historical records of ancient India), upon the advice of
Rishis (Highly respected sages), Bhagwan
RamaRama or full name Ramachandra is considered to be the seventh avatar of Vishnu in Hinduism, and a king of Ayodhya in ancient Indian...
along with Mata
SitaSITA is a multinational information technology company specialising in providing IT and telecommunication services to the air transport industry...
and Shri
LakshmanaLakshmana was the brother and close companion of Rama, and himself a hero in the famous epic Ramayana...
, installed and worshipped the
Sivalinga(A form of Lord Shiva) here to expiate the sin of
Brahmahatya (killing of a
Brahmin). (
Ravana' is the primary antagonist character of the Hindu legend, the Ramayana; who is the great king of Lanka. In the classic text, he is mainly depicted negatively, kidnapping Rama's wife Sita, to claim vengeance on Rama and his brother Lakshmana for having cut off the nose of his sister...
, the son of
VishravaVishrava was the son of Pulastya and the grandson of Brahma, the Creator, and a powerful Rishi as described in a scripture epic of Ancient India. A scholar par excellence, he earned great powers through Tapasya, which in turn, earned him great name and fame amongst his fellow Rishis...
and the great grandson of Lord Brahma). Shri Rama fixed an auspicious time for the installation and sent Shri
AnjaneyaHanuman , is a Hindu deity, who is an ardent devotee of Rama, a central character in the Indian epic Ramayana and one of the dearest devotees of lord Rama. A general among the vanaras, an ape-like race of forest-dwellers, Hanuman is an incarnation of the divine and a disciple of Lord Rama in the...
to Mount Kailas (Kailash parvat)to bring a lingam. As Bhagwan
AnjaneyaHanuman , is a Hindu deity, who is an ardent devotee of Rama, a central character in the Indian epic Ramayana and one of the dearest devotees of lord Rama. A general among the vanaras, an ape-like race of forest-dwellers, Hanuman is an incarnation of the divine and a disciple of Lord Rama in the...
could not return in time, Sita herself made a
linga of sand. When Anjaneya returned with a
linga from Mount Kailas the rituals had been over. To comfort the disappointed Bhagwan Anjaneya, Rama had Anjaneya’s
lingam (
Visvalingam) also installed by the side of
Ramalinga, and ordained that rituals be performed first to the
Visvalingam.
The above account is however, not supported by the original Ramayana as authored by Maharishi Valmiki, nor in the Tamil version of the Ramayana as authored by Kambar. Support for this account may however be found in some of the later versions of the Ramayana as penned by Tulasidas (15th Century) and others.
In Rameswaram Temple, a spiritual "Mani Darisanam" (Mani Darshan) happens in early morning everyday. This "Mani" is made of "spatikam"[a precious stone] and in form of "Holy shivling". According to some accounts, this is "Mani" of "sheshnag" (Bhagwaan Vishnu's bed).
Sethu Karai is a place 22 km before the island of Rameswaram from where Bhagwaan Ram is said to have built a Floating Stone Bridge Rama sethu from Rameswaram that further continued to Dhanushkodi in Rameswaram till Talaimannar in Sri Lanka as mentioned in the great epic
RamayanaThe Ramayana is an ancient Sanskrit epic. It is ascribed to the Hindu sage Valmiki and forms an important part of the Hindu canon , considered to be itihāsa. The Ramayana is one of the two great epics of India and Nepal, the other being the Mahabharata...
.
See also
- Ramanathaswamy Temple, Rameswaram
- Tirthas of Rameswaram
There are sixty-four Tīrthas in and around the island of Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, India. According to Skānda Purāṇa, twenty-four of them are important. Bathing in these Tīrthas is a major aspect of the pilgrimage to Rameswaram and is considered equivalent to penance. Twenty-two of the Tīrthas are...
- Rama's Bridge
External links
{{Commons category}}
{{Hindu holy cities}}
{{Tamil Nadu}}
{{Municipalities of Tamil Nadu}}