Shri Chakreshwari Devi Temple (Sharika Mata Temple)

Sharika Mata Temple's history interweaves with the deepest strands of Kashmiri culture. The Nilamata Purana establishes the mythology; centuries of Kashmiri Pandit devotion have maintained the practice; contemporary politics and the community's exodus and return give the site its present emotional charge.

The Nilamata Purana, likely composed between the 6th and 8th centuries CE, preserves Kashmir's creation mythology. The valley was once Satisar, a vast lake inhabited by the water demon Jalodbhava, who would emerge to devour anyone attempting to bathe or perform rituals at its shores. The terrorized inhabitants prayed to Goddess Parvati for deliverance.

Parvati responded by taking the form of a haer—a myna bird—and flying over the lake. She dropped a pebble that, as it fell, expanded miraculously until it had become an enormous hill, crushing Jalodbhava beneath its mass. The goddess then established her eternal abode on this hill, taking the name Sharika. Meanwhile, Lord Ananta, Vishnu's serpent, cut through the surrounding mountains at Baramulla, draining the lake and creating the habitable valley. Rishi Kashyapa settled the drained land with humans, giving Kashmir its name.

The narrative encodes several truths that operate whether taken literally or mythologically. The valley does appear to have been a lake in geological time. The hill does rise with unusual abruptness from the valley floor. And the goddess does preside: every telling of Kashmir's origin story features her decisive intervention against the forces of chaos.