1032. Mountains Ranges of Bharata...!

Himalayan Mountain Range and Vindhya Mountain Range along with Aravalli, Eastern and Western Ghats make the chain of mountain ridges in India. The Himalayan Mountain Range shares its domain with Nepal, China and Tibet. In this range the most talked peaks are Mount Everest and Mount Kailasa. Mount Everest grabs the title of the world’s highest peak while Mount Kailasa is undoubtedly the holiest peak.

Mount Everest which stands at 8848 metre (29,029 ft) in height has been scaled by over 4,000 people. Mount Kailasa is 6638 metre (21778 ft) it is short by 2210 metre (7250 ft) compare to Mount Everest yet none could reach its summit. We Indians know the reason; it is the abode of Maharudradeva. The mountaineers across the globe are baffled by this.      

An ancient Tibetan writing says thus: “No mortal can ever be able to walk atop Mount Kailasa, which is the abode of the Divine Beings. He who dares to scale the Holy Mount and come face to face with Gods will not survive!”

Colonel R. C Wilson, one of the many mountaineers who tried to climb the summit of Mount Kailasa explained, “Just when I discovered an easy walk to the summit of the mountain, heavy snow began to fall, making the ascent impossible.”

Mount Kailasa is believed to be the Axis Mundi, literally the ‘Axis’ of the world that provides a connection between the land of mortal and the Divine Land. It is a link to the physical realm and spiritual realm and the holiest place of the world. Legend says that the Mount Kailasa is the earthly manifestation of Sumeru parvatha mentioned in Puranas.

 

Interestingly our puranas tell us that mountains had wings and could fly and were causing havoc. Indra, the king of Devas chopped of the wings of the mountains with his Vajrayudha. The problem of flying mountains was stopped forever, but there was one mountain Vindhya which grew exorbitantly. Its towering height obstructed the movement of people on either side to cross over to the other side. Surya, the Sun god too had problem as the mountain would block and his movement.

Sage Agastya was assigned to do something to stop the growth of Vindhya. The Sage who lived in Himalayas started to go towards the southern part of Bharata. When he was to cross the central part Vindhya Mountain saw him and as a respectful gesture bowed down to him. Sage Agastya blessed Vindhya and told him that he was going down south and would return after sometime. Being a short man, it was difficult for him to climb and move to the other side. Due to the respect the Sage commanded, Vindhya promised that it would stay in bowed form, thus shortening his height till the Sage returned back. The Sage was happy and went south and settled down in south forever. Vindhya is still waiting for him to return from South of Bharata.

It was because of the Vindhya that Tamil speaking region of the south of Bharata are rich with the “Rasavattam” (Siddha Alchemy). Sage Agastya is considered the Guru of all Siddhas, and the Siddha medicine system is believed to have been handed over to him by Karthikeya, the son of Maharudradeva. Siddhas are the followers of Maharudradeva and Sage Agastya is the first among them. His disciples and other siddhas have contributed thousands of texts on Siddha literatures which are mainly on naturopathy.