Muktagiri Temples

Muktagiri, also called Mendhagiri, is a Jain pilgrimage centre in the forested hills on the border of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. Known as a Siddha Kshetra, a place where liberated souls are said to have attained nirvana, it holds fifty-two temples around a waterfall, reached by six hundred steps.

The oldest sanctuary is a rock-cut cave raised between roughly 1200 and 1400, its arched entrance carved with lotuses and small tirthankara figures and its inner hall holding some fifty-six Jain images, including a seated Mahavira at the gate.

Among the later numbered shrines, the twenty-sixth temple is famed for its seven-hooded image of Parshvanatha. Pilgrims gather for the annual fair held at Diwali.