RAJGRIH

Name- RAJGRIH  25:5’::86:17                                                           

CONTINENT- Asia  COUNTRY-India  STATE-Bihar                 DISTRICT- Nalanda Distance from Delhi-1110km              Distance from  Patna- 96km  PINCode-803116StdCode956112                                                                                 

HASL-1500’ RIVER-Sarswati         CLIMATE-Tropicl                    

Approach-Air(up to Patna))TrainBus,Taxi   LANGUAGE-HindiMagahi               

LODGING-Hotel,Lodge,RH.Dharamsala,IB,Site campus restshed,

Railwayrest room.FOOD-Indian cooked rice,pulse,sabji,bhujia,litti

Chokha ,Jalebi,kachauri,puri,Singhara,nimki ,egg, chicken,mutton

Fishetc DRINK-Sweet  water  for  drinking purposes plus  hard  and  soft bottled or  pouched  packed  drink. TRANSPORT-Auto

Cyclerickshaw,minibus,trecker,horsecart.

ABOUT THE  SITE-The siteRajgir orRajgrih has importance from Historical,Archaeological,Religious,Pauranic,and natural angles.It was kingdom of old Magadh state,which was bound by  river in thr

-ee sides and one mountain range.In historical past its name appear

as Rajgiri,Giribraj,Magadhpur,Basumati,Kusagrapur,Bimbsarpur,B

-rahadrathpuretc .Present properRajgir is encircled by five hillocks

namely Vipulachal,Ratnagiri,Udaigri,Swarngiri, and Vaivawgiri.

So locally it is called Panch Pahari also.It has seen the activities of

Jarasandh during Mahabharat time .Bimbsar and Ajatsatru during their respective  Indian medival history  time. Important subsites

for general visits by the tourists are-1.Ratnagiri with Vishwasantist

-up and ropeway ride. Vishwashantisup a Bodhjc domal

architectural structure with rack pocket in .The hill is situated south of Brahmkund hot spring. Height of the stup is160’.It was constructed byJapanese Bodh Vickshu sangh in 1969.It contains remnants of LordBudha with 7 gems ia beautiful box. Small statues of lord Budha in four poses are kept in the wall pockets all around the stup in four directions A priest is apponted for daily worship of the lord For easier and entertaining reach on to the  stupthe state tourism department of the Govt has established  a ropeway project with 120 racks from foot hills of Gridh parwat

to top of Ratnagiri hill.Cost incurred is about 19 lakhs.A ticket fee

from Rs 10 to 15 is  charged to avail ropeway facility.There are mini markets and restaurant in the foot hill  at the base of the ropeway station.2.SECURITY WALL-During the time of lord Budha Rajgrih had population of about 18 lakhs It was bound by security wall and security gate. Half of the population remained inside the security wall durng the night after the security gate was closed  and half of the population used to remain outside the bound

-ry security wall.There were four security gates namely Sun gate between Vipulgiri and Baibhargiri2Elephant gate between Giribraj  and Ratnagiri andnUdaigiri4 Horse gate between Ratnagiri and ChakragiriRemnants of boundary walls are still seen on all the hills covering  about 40 to 50 km while going to Vishwashanti

stup or Ratnagiri. Height of the walls varies from 7’ to 12’.Slab co

-constructed walls  are vividly seen on Udaigiri near Banganga on

taking entry through roadways  from Gaya to Rajgir. Length  of the

stone slabs is about 3feet and thickness is about 8” to 10”.Accordin

-g to Mahabharat Bhim and Arjun with lord Krishna entered Rajgri

-h by breaking peak of “Chetak hill” to fight with Jarasandh. Udaig

-iri has  steep vertical rise. One has to trail  about 1000 steps to rise to  the top of Udaigiri.There is a very big and gigantic statue of lor

-d Mahabir on this hill.IthasbothDigambarandSwetambar jain temp

-le.

3.WHEEL  MARK-Wheel marks of  very 2 heavy vehicles(Rath of

Jarasandh) are also seen on Quartzite Phylite Schist rocks while going to Vishwashantistup.4.JAIL OF BIMBSAR-While going to

-wards Vishwashantistup a place is located bounded by stone slabs.

Archaeologists have located it as Jail of Bimbsar. Historical literat

-ure reveal  that king Bimbsar was kept  in jail by his son at that place.According to pauranic story of Mahabharat Jail was constructed byJarasandh to keep the Kshatriya kings who were defeated in war 5.JARASANDH KI  BAITHAK-While going upw

-ards to Baibhar hill  through Brahmkund Saptkund or Satgharwa a

big platform of stone is seen It is called Baithak of Jarasandh. Myt

-hological story goes that a meeting of all the Brahmins wwas  done at this place  by king Jarasandh who tookpart in Sradh of

the father of the king. Jarasandh donated lands to all the Brahmins

and gave riches to maintain the land.Lord Budha also did sangh sangtimeeting) at this place.6OLDEST SHIV TEMPLE OF MAG
_ADH-Upward  ahead of Jarasandh ki Baithak there is a very old

temple of lord shiv. It is made of block  and slabs of stones.Shivlin

-g is also very big. Myth about this temple is that by blessing of Ch

-andkausik muni lord Shiv had to come to Baibhar hill to bless Jara

-sandh.So he alongwith his subordinate kings did worship lordShiv

here .Devotees take water from Brahmkund and pour it on the Shiv

-ling here for Jalavisek on festive occasions these days also.7SAPT

PARNI CAVE-There is a cave on Baibhar hill with seven tunnel br

-anching. So it is called Saptparni  cave.It is said that one branch of the tunnel  opens in some mutth(residential gathering of saints)Entr

-y inside the cave is there but after few yards it becomes  to constri

-cted to go in Religious say is that during time of Malmass out of 33crore gods(devtas) of hindus, few get assembled in this cave. So

this cave is worshipped like a temple.  This place is also important for Budhist religions.Because this is the place where 500 Bodh Bhi

-kshus did Sangati( meeting) after death of lord Budha.This meetin

-g continued for about 7 months under guidance of Aysmanmaha –kasyap It was decided to record teachings  of Budha under the then

scripture And it was there that1.Vinay Pitak.2Sut pitak3Abhidham pitak.or tri pitak was  was written and kept in Rajgir.This hill has also been reffered as “Pitpal Guha”in Budhist literature. Further ahead of this there are Jain temples which are of recent nature.

8SURAJKUND  AND VIPULGIRI-  Vipulgiri is numberone hill

in jain literature. Locally it is called the eastern hill also.The hot spring Surajkund is in the foot hill slope of this mountain. Steps

to rise over the top of the hill are available from there.There are

four Jain temples on this hill. It is digamber jain in tradition. The

first Samosaran of Bhagwan Mahabir was done on this hill.Gautam

and other eleven Gandharwas were baptized here.On the occasion

of 25thcentenary of nirwan of Mahabir Samosaran temple has been constructed in 1986.Four statues of Mahairs of red stones in medita

-tion poses has also been established here.Theheight of the statue is

72’.The temple is made of white marble.The statues has been fixed

in all four dtrections. The cost incurred  was 50 lakhs.There are fo -ot prints of jain saints also on the Vipul giri hill. The hotspringSu

-rajkund is indicative of god of sun in Eastern hill.Taking bath inth

-e hot spring and worshipping sun god bestows good ishes on the d

-evotees.9SWARN GIRI-This hill has straightway vertical slope from the foot hill. So trecking over it is difficult.That is why much

is not known about it.However Jain religious literatures show that there are  two digamber and one swetamber jain temples  and one temple of lord Shiva on this hill.10.MANIAR MTH-After entering

the valley encircled by the five hills visitors come across a memori

-al old structure It has description in Mahabharat also.It is called “Maniar Math”  Close by visit to it and seeing the structure  by rising over few steps gives idea that the place must have been gath

-ering and residences of thick volume of population.11SWARN BHANDAR-Behind brahmkund and saptarisikund on Baibhar hill

itself, on a  little bit upper slope there is swanbhandar cave. It is also called treasury of Jarasandh or Bimbsar.There are number of

bullet or bombshell marks on it .It is said that Britishers tried to break it by bomb shell or bullets but it went in vain.12JARASANDH KA AKHARA OR BATTLE  GROUND OF JARASANDH-Ahead of Swarnbhandar a piece of land area ofabout 20’x2o’ bound by broken stone slabs and filled with fine

earth is called Jarasandh ka akhara. Description of this place is also found in Mahabharat where pt is mentioned that Bhim and Jarasan

-dh wrestled there for 28 days when Jarasandh was defeated and

murdered.It is said that Jarasandh used to water this Akhara with milk.13VIRAYTAN-It is Jain temple.There is museum of drftwo

-ood ,terracotta art and articles in its campus It is also calld Brasni

art temple.Tirthankar Mahabir lifestyle has been shown in 100 pannels from childhood to nirvana in this temple museum. 14VE

NUBAN-King Bimbsar had a big garden for his amusement and

Retreat. It was called Venuban After getting enlightened at Bodhg

-aya lord Budha came to Rajgir preaching people and begging on

way King Bimbsar was not only pleased by his philosophy but he

became deciple.He also donated Venuban to the budhist sangh for

their meeting and stay.Latter on it came to be known as Benuban

Mahabihar. It is located near Rajgir Gaya road and Ratnagiri hill.

It is full of katha and sami trees. Some furnaces of burning katha

Wood for making katha can also be seen.15AMRABAN OR MAN
-GO GARDEN of JIWAK-This is the site where Mahabir Tirthank

-ar addressesd the gathering meeting in a mango garden.The site is

km  away from the Venuban between Baibhar giri and Ratnagiri.Fe

-w mango trees can be seen in this bushy jungle with dear monkeys

and other zoological species.16HOT SPRINGS-All description of Rajgir remains half told if the tourists are not made aquainted and geta touch or take bath in the hot springs of Rajgir.As the  Ganges

is the life line of history and geography of India so are the hotsprings of Rajgir are remnantsof witnss to its  historical religious  and pauranic facts. There are about 14 hot springs here.

Out of these 7 are  on the NE foot hills of Baibhar giri.These are

1Saptrisikund2Brahmkund3Vyaskund4Markandeykund5Gaga6Ja

-muna kund7Anant risi kund. Similarly western hill slope of Vipul

giri has 1Sitakund2Suryakund3 Ganeshkund4Chandrakund5Ramk

-und 6Sringirisikund.7Makhdimkund. A mention has been  made in Vayu Puran about origin of hot springs.King Basu once did a Yagya  He invited Brahma his great grand father to attend  theYag

-aya Water of all the pilgrimages was required the ceremonies of the yagya. So Brahma by his occult power wished sacred water of all tirthas to appear through the havan kund of yagya .Brahmas command was  obeyed and water of tirthas appeared through the havan kund. So it became hot and the first kund was named Brahm

kund Similarly other kunds had been named after the name of the

saints and rishis of tthat period.Brahmkund is the hottest among all

with temperature of 45degree centigrade.It has sulphur and trace of radioactive elements which helps in curing skin and stomach diseases. OTHER SITES-Besides the above described sites few

more sites are worth visit . These are Burma temple,Temple of anand maee maa,Ramkrishna math,Pipla grih or Pipla cave,Kal

-shila or rishigiri Sapp saundic in Shitban etc.FESTIVE SEASON

-Hot springs of Rajgir and it being situated on state highway and

railway route gives it pliverage of 24 hour festive mood.But it has special festive occasions which can be narrated as 1 First January

or the first day of the year,when it attracts large number of local

visitors.2 Makar sankrantri on 14^th January.3Malmas fair after each three years  when one day is added to the smallest month, the February of the year4 Rajgir mahotsaw in the month of Nov-Dec .

       Malmass is festival of excess month.According to stories of

Purans demon king Hirankashyap ,the father of Bhakt Prahlad got

Pleased Brahma by his devotion and meditation and received His

Blessings that he should not be killed by up till now creation of Brahma That is neither by man ,or animal ,nor during day or night

not in the time division of month or year created by Brahma. After that Brahma felt his mistake and went to Lord Vishnu. Then Vishnu created thirteen month of the year  and took Nrisingha awtar  to kill Hirankashyap. This excess month is in auspisous for

shubh  karya(good works) like marriage, mundane, ygyopawit etc.

But according to religious traditions 33 crores gods of Hindus  come to reside at Rajgir during the period  and all the ceremonial

functions can be done here.. The fair is organized in May-June for

about a month.

GUIDEAnumberofguidesareavailablfromgovtagencies,privatetourism agency,and local people. Contact district public relation office for further details.

PRECAUTION-The area is badly naxal affecyed .

REMARKS-Saving law and order problem the site area has wonde

-rful future porospect for further development.