The Narmada, in the course of some unremembered century, cut an island in the shape of the syllable Om, and upon it men raised a temple to Shiva that is counted among the twelve jyotirlingas. Omkareshwar is the rare place of pilgrimage that is also, quite simply, beautiful: steep ghats falling to green water, two bridges, boats crossing at dusk, and the sound of bells carrying from one bank to the other.
The linga here is divided, and the devout attend both halves of it. Omkareshwar stands upon the island in five storeys and sixty pillars; Mamleshwar keeps the southern bank, older and considerably quieter, and worth the crossing for its own sake. Gauri Somnath, raised by the Parmaras in the eleventh century, holds a linga of black stone six feet in height, while above the town the thirteenth-century ruins of Siddhanath stand carved, weathered and almost entirely alone.
Upon Mandhata hill there is now a newer reason to come. Adi Shankaracharya is said to have found his guru upon this island as a boy of twelve, and in 2023 a figure of him was raised above the river a hundred and eight feet upon a pedestal of fifty-four, at the heart of the Ekatma Dham built to his philosophy of Advaita. It stands visible from the water long before the boat has reached the bank.
The crossing may be made by either bridge, but the boat is incomparably the better. The devout walk the parikrama, a circuit of some seven kilometres about the island, which occupies a morning taken at the proper pace. Below the town the Narmada meets the Kaveri at a confluence where pilgrims bathe, and above the dam the backwaters open wide enough for a longer passage upon the water. At dusk the aarti is performed at both temples, and the river carries the light of it a considerable distance.
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