Siddhivinayak, Siddhatek

Siddhivinayak is the third halt on the Ashtavinayak circuit and, in one crucial respect, unique: it is the only shrine among the eight whose image has its trunk turned to the right. A right-trunked Ganesha is held to be especially potent but also especially demanding — jagrut, or 'awake' — to be worshipped with particular care and strictness.

The image is swayambhu and north-facing, seated cross-legged, sheathed in brass and flanked by figures of Jaya and Vijaya. Because the deity is thought so powerful, devotees traditionally make their pradakshina not around the sanctum alone but around the whole hill — a long circuit over rough, unpaved ground, said by custom to be walked seven times, that is itself an act of devotion and endurance.

Siddhatek is a small village on the northern bank of the Bhima river, set on a low rise once called the Siddha-tekdi, the 'hill of attainment', in Ahilyanagar district — long, and still widely, known as Ahmednagar. It is the only one of the eight Ashtavinayak shrines to lie in this district, and among the most secluded, historically reached across the Bhima by boat and today by road and bridge.

The name and the deity both turn on siddhi, spiritual attainment or power. By the tradition of the Mudgala Purana, when the demons Madhu and Kaitabha threatened creation, even Vishnu could not overcome them until he propitiated Ganesha at this spot; granted siddhi, Vishnu prevailed — and so the Lord here is Siddhivinayak, the giver of accomplishment, and the hill is Siddhatek.

The present temple is credited to Ahilyabai Holkar, the great 18th-century queen of Indore whose piety endowed shrines across India; the Peshwa commander Haripant Phadke is remembered for raising the Nagarkhana and a paved approach after, by tradition, regaining his post through prayer here. The outer hall, taken down in 1939, was rebuilt in 1970, and the shrine is administered by the Chinchwad Devasthan Trust.

The temple is a compact, north-facing shrine of black stone, its inner sanctum some fifteen feet high and ten wide beneath a dome-shaped stone ceiling; the Nagarkhana over the entrance and the paved path are the gift of Haripant Phadke, while the outer assembly hall is the 20th-century rebuilding.

What sets the place apart is less the building than its setting and its rite — the shrine on its hillock above the Bhima, and the pradakshina that carries the pilgrim in a wide loop around the entire rise. The approach across the river, once made by boat before the bridge, is part of what has kept Siddhatek quieter and more contemplative than the busier shrines of the circuit.