Thuravoor Ugra Narasimha Morthy and Sudarasana temple

Thuravoor  Ugra Narasimha Morthy and Sudarasana temple 

Compiled by

P.R.Ramachander

  Thurvaoor  ins located by the side of NH47 , 25 km south of   the city of cochin .This temple has two ancient temples within it. One is that of Maha Sudarsana Moorthy  , believed to be 1300 years old and athe Ugra Narasimha Murthy might have been built   in the 7^th centuary Ad. Nothing much is known about the origin of  the sudarshana temple   but there  is interesting story about the Ugra Narasimhamoorthy temple . It seems  there was a king called Keralendra   belonging to the Chera dynasty, His Guru was a great savant called Mutingottu adigal. Once when Adikal  was participating in a fuction to worship ancestors  , he realized that  he would soon die and be born as a dog. He instructed the king to protect him  when he is born  as a dog from doing  evil acts. The king agreed and he saw his Guru was born as a  dog  .He was taking care of it but one day he was forced   to kill the Dog. The sin of killing his Guru fell on him. To get rid of that , he consecrated a Lakshmi Narayana   temple near Angamali in a place called Naya thottam(Dog’s garden) . The Namboodiri who conducted the function told the king that  he would take his fees after  returning from his Kasi pilgrimage  . While in Kasi, A huge flame of light  appeared and told that , it would lead him to a place where an idol of Lord Narasimha  lay buried. It wanted to him to consecrate  that statue near a Sudarshana   temple. Then the light took him to a place  near Thuravoor. When he dug there, the Statute of Lord Vishnu  came out from there.With the money given by the king  , that Nambudiri built a temple in the compound of the Sudarshana temple itself.. There is a belief that  this place has very many temples and in ancient  days it was called  Surapuri..The King Brought  five  Brahmin families from THulu Nadu and settled them there.There is a peculiar practice in this temple regarding priests.  .Every two years, the chief priest (mesanthi)   would become assistant priest(Keezgh santhi)   and the assistant  priest become the chief priest. This is because the Chief priest should not leave the temple, should observe celibacy .

     The temple of Lord Narasimha   moorthy  is built in a very grand scale with lot of sculptures and paintings. The Sudashana temple has  an   idol has  four hands holding conch, wheel , mace and  the lotus flower. Unlike other Sudarshana temples , inside  it there is no Vishnu temple , which  is separate temple in the same compound. However the well  for both temples are shared with each  other. Though called Ugra Nasimha murthy  , the idol is that  of a standing Lord Vishnu. There is also small temples of Lord Ganapathi, Lord Shiva, Sastha, Nagas and BHagawathi  in the compound of the temple. The temples observe several festivals. The most important is the nine day festival   in the month of Thulam. There is a grand Palli Vetta festival   in Medam month . The Konkani Brahmins attend this festival in very large numbers.On Deepavali day  there is a festival called Valiya Vilakku.Ashtami Rohini. On pathamudayam day the  Gods are taken out for a procession outside. The temple is open from  3am  to 11 Am and then from   5,20 Pm to 7,30 Pm. Big gun like crackers (Vedi) are burst in the temple as the offering to gOds, because it seems when the Narasimhamurthy came out of the earth, it made that type of  sound.

     Though the temple’s land belonged to  Cochin state  , due to political reasons it was managed by Travancore kings under a condition that  when the Travancore king steps in to the temple, the temple would be transferred   to Cochin, It seems after  independence that last Travancore  king came to this temple but walked only on  carpets spread inside the temple .