Sri Arkeshwara Temple, Hale Alur

While planning the weekend trip to BR Hills (link here), I also looked for the nearby places that could be covered during out visit. Chamarajanagar district had few nice old temples. One of them was Sri Arkeshwara Temple at Hale Alur. While there was information about the temple in the web, none of them gave any direction to the place. Search in Google Maps did not yield any result. Two things made the search difficult – “Alur” was a common name in Karnataka and the temple was named as “Ishwara” in Google Maps. Anyway, I found the exact location after some difficult search.

Once I managed to locate the temple in Google Maps, it was a simple task of driving to that place. We had to walk for about 100 meters on a narrow path in the midst of plantations. The temple makes a sudden appearance and it is in the middle of the coconut plantations.

History of the temple

The temple was built by Butuga II of the Ganga dynasty in 10^th century. It was constructed after the victory of Takkolam battle between Cholas and Rastrakutas. The Gangas were part of Rastrakuta contingent.

Details of the temple

It is a small temple with a garbagriha, Sukanasi and a navaranga. A nandi mantapa is in front of the temple. Unlike many Hoysala temples, the base (adhisthana) is very simple. The door is also very simple with small strip of dancing apsaras carved in the form of a creeper.

You can see the sculpture of drummers on either side of the door. The walls were simple and the temple seemed to be renovated. Considering that the temple was constructed 1,000 years ago, it is quite natural that many parts were worn out.

Sculpture of drummers at Arkeshwara Temple

The ceiling of the navaranga also has some nice sculptures. I could not find much information on this.

Each temple will have a feature that stands out. Here in Arkeshwara temple, it is in the form of the carved pillars in the Nandi Mantapa and Navaranga. They sculptures depict the subjugation of the Chola commander Rajaditya in front of Butuga II, who fought for Rastrakutas. Lot of information that enriches our knowledge on history.

As we circled around the temple, we saw several sculptures placed next to the compound . It looks like they were recovered during renovation.

It was cloudy day and the beautiful greenery surrounding the temple made it to just sit and relax for some time. We were the only people at that time and the caretaker was just sitting idle outside the compound of the temple. He seemed to be in his own thoughts.