2500 Artisans 50 years of work ! – Ranakpur Jain Temple

Ranakpur is 93 km from Udaipur and will fall in your trip of Udaipur to Kumbhalgarh fort.

Road trip of Ranakpur is worth watching . The place can be reached via National Highway-27 along the Aravali mountain range .You will be pleasantly surprised by seeing these hills full of greenery and will doubt whether this is really Rajasthan ?

Ranakpur is a small place but its Jain Temple is one of the five major pilgrimage sites of Jainism in Rajasthan.The famous Swetambar Jain temple is a popular attraction among tourists who want to venture out of Udaipur to see more of Rajasthan.

The lone hill station of Rajasthan , Mount Abu – famous for Nakki lake and Dilwara temples , is 180 kms away from this place.

History of Temple

Dharna Shah, a local Jain businessperson, started construction of the temple and late on supported by Rana Kumbha.This is the temple made in the honor of first Tirthankar of the present half-cycle (avasarpiṇī) according to Jain cosmology.

These temples were built during the ruling period of Rana Kumbha  in 15th century.The  name of this place called Ranakpur (i.e. Rana’s place)  goes by his name .

There is very beautiful temple here . The grand statues of Lord Adinath are made of white marble in this temple. The workmanship made on the stone is nowhere .

Ranakpur  Jain Temple architecture

The most important feature of this temple is that there are countless pillars .All the marble pillars are differently carved and you will not find any two pillars of this temple with same design.The number of pillars is approximately 1444 . Despite being so many pillars, it does not hinder the view of the main holy place from anywhere .

The architecture distinctly outlines four faces called Chaumukha.There are beautiful carvings on these pillars .Apart from other prized sculptures here the footprint of Lord Rishabhdev has been preserved on the piece of marble .

The marble rock with 108 snake heads with their tails is very interesting as you can not find their tails end.The temple, with its distinctive domes ascends beautifully from hill’s slope.