Miracle Durga Temple offers 'strength' to soldiers

[Guest guest]

Miracle temple offers 'strength' to soldiers

 

You could miss Tanot in the blink of an eye as you drive down the

road that cuts through the forbidding Thar Desert on the way to the

border with Pakistan.

 

A few rickety wooden stalls selling an assortment of cheap snacks on

the bend of the road, a collection of low sandstone buildings that

house a detachment of paramilitary Border Security Force and Tanot is

gone.

 

But on a slight rise in this tiny outpost, almost hidden from view to

the uninitiated and nondescript from the outside, stands a small

temple to goddess Durga.

 

The shrine to the deity has become a place of pilgrimage for Indian

soldiers passing through Tanot to and from battle-ready positions

facing Pakistani forces along the nearby frontier.

 

For, the soldiers say, a miracle they attribute to the powers of

Durga took place in Tanot in 1965 during one of the three wars India

has fought with Pakistan since their independence from Britain in

1947.

 

Outnumbered by Pakistani forces, who had Tanot pinned down from three

sides, Indian troops holed up in the temple held out for three days

until relief arrived from the air and over land from the city of

Jaisalmer, 130 km to the southeast.

 

More wondrous than that, so the story goes, none of the 3,000 shells

and mortars that the Pakistanis rained down on Tanot exploded within

the temple confines and none did any damage except for one that

clipped the tail of an unsuspecting camel.

 

The temple, with its red-painted inner walls, is maintained by the

Border Security Force and has a powerful resonance for Indian

soldiers deployed along Rajasthan.

 

" We derive strength from this, " said one soldier visiting the

sanctuary, where some of the artillery shells and mortar bombs that

fell harmlessly into the soft sands around Tanot nearly 37 years ago

are on display in a dusty glass case.

 

" We still feel that if something goes wrong and there is a war, we'll

be safe here. God is always with the right people, " said the man, a

41-year-old sergeant who declined to give his name on security

grounds.

 

Soldiers in camouflage dress visit the temple in a steady stream,

pausing after prayers to Durga to marvel at the unexploded ordnance

and peer at fading black and white photographs of the battle of 1965.

 

Barefoot and wearing nothing of leather in temples in keeping with

Hindu observance, many bring offerings to the deity of fresh coconut,

incense sticks and small white sweets made from a sugary paste.

 

They ring brass bells that hang from the beams of the temple, donated

by grateful devotees, and clasp their hands together in prayer,

standing or prostrate before the shrine.

 

" Soldiers have had a lot of faith in this temple since what happened

in 1965. Its history is that it saved the lives of Indian soldiers, "

said Sunil Bhatt, an artillery officer who visited the shrine to pray

with a friend. " That faith will continue irrespective of what

happens. "

 

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