History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v2.c47.72

v2.c47.72

The presence of indecent figures on religious edifices is still a puzzle. They are not confined to any particular sect or to any province. In Orissa they are to be found in the Śaiva temples of Bhuvaneśvara, the Vaiṣṇava temple at Puri and the Saura temple at Koṇāraka. They are found on some of the Khajuraho temples in Central India and many of the modern temples of Bengal, where indecent figures are found in terra cotta. Finally, they are still used in the painting and decoration of metal and wooden rathas of the Bengali Vaiṣṇavas. In the writer’s childhood there were numerous such figures belonging to the ratha of zamindars of Kunjaghata, who are descended from Mahārāja Nanda Kumar Rai, in the Murshidabad district of Bengal.