Kantaji's Temple
Posted by Yaheia A. Sayed on Thursday, July 14, 2011
Under: North Bengal
Kantaji's
Temple is in Dinajpur district. It is the most ornate among the late medieval
temples of Bangladesh is the Kantajee’s temple near Dinajpur town, which was
established in the year 1722 by Ram Nath, son of Maharaja Pran Nath .The
temple, a 51' square three storied edifice, rests on a slightly curved raised
plinth of sandstone blocks, believed to have been quarried from the ruins of
the ancient city of Bangarh near Gangharampur in West Bengal. It was originally
a navaratna temple, crowned with four richly ornamental corner towers on two
stores and a central one over the third stored.

Kantaji's Temple is an earthquake at the end of the 19th century. In spite of
this, the monument rightly claims to bathe finest extant example of its type in
brick and terracotta, built by Bengali artisans. The central cells is
surrounded on all sides by a covered verandah, each pierced by three entrances,
which are separated by equally ornate dwarf brick pillars, Corresponding to the
three delicately cusped entrances of the balcony, the sanctum has also three
richly decorated arched openings on each face. Every inch of the temple surface
is beautifully embellished with exquisite terracotta plaques, representing
flora fauna, geometric motifs, mythological scenes and an astonishing array of
contemporary social scenes and favorite pastimes. The beautiful wall paints of
this temple tell us the story of Ramayan-Mohabharat, Krishna-Lila and
Dev-Devies.
In : North Bengal