Jhula Devi Temple

he Jhula Devi temple is worth an entry into any list of our spiritual idiosyncrasies. The temple was built after the village prayed to Durga seeking her protection from the tigers and leopards that inhabited those hills; the Goddess then appeared in a shepherd's dream and suggested he dig up an idol from a specified patch of ground and build a temple over that spot. The villagers faithfully followed the instructions and, according to the legend posted outside the temple, "despite the presence of leopards and the occasional tiger in this area, villagers and their cattle roam freely inside the forest even today." What makes the temple fascinating, however, are the sheer numbers of bells in, around and over it. The bells are testimony to the "divine and healing powers of Maa Jhula Devi", which means your wishes can come true if you tie a bell at the temple. So many bells have now been strung up and clumped together that they've started piling up in one corner of the temple in what looked like, well, a junk heap of bells.