Puri

Puri stands on the Bay of Bengal coast of Odisha and is one of the great pilgrimage centres of South Asia. Its great temple of Jagannath, the lord of the universe, dominates the town, and every year the deity is drawn out on a vast wooden chariot in the Rath Yatra along the Grand Road to the Gundicha temple. Pilgrims fed on temple food, bought devotional goods and paid temple servants, and these visits supported lodgings, cooks and carters. Fishing and the rice lands of the coast fed the residents.

The Gajapati kings of Odisha were the protectors of Jagannath and endowed the temple. In 1510 the Bengali saint Chaitanya came to Puri and lived there until his death in 1534, singing and dancing before the deity. After an Afghan general from Bengal attacked Puri in 1568, the images were hidden and later restored. Ramachandra Deva of Khurda, whom the Mughals recognised as ruler of the temple lands in the 1590s, rebuilt the worship and commissioned new images. The temple servants moved the images to safety during later wars.

The Marathas took Odisha in 1751 and levied a pilgrim tax at Puri. After the East India Company conquered Odisha in 1803 it took over the temple administration and kept the tax, and in 1809 supervision passed to the hereditary raja of Khurda.