Champaner the city which became deserted by the curse of the goddess. Champaner is the city which is situated in Pavagadh which is considered to be one of the 51 ShaktiPeeths( 51 main temples of Hindu Goddess shakti) of goddess .
The history of Champaner city is glorious and mysterious. The legends and heroic stories here will win your heart.
Champaner Archaeological Site is located 47 km from Panchmahal district of Vadodara in the state of Gujarat.Champaner was the prosperity capital of the Sultans of Gujarat in the 15th century.Champaner was included in the World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2004.
Today the whole world knows the city of Champaner as a world heritage, but very few people know about its mysterious and glorious history.The history of Champaner Pavagarh is divide in to there parts ........
In the 8th century there was a great king in Gujarat whose name was Vanraj Chavda. His capital city was Ahilwan Patan, But Champaner was located at such a geographical place Where Vanraj Chavda felt that an observation point should be made here so that he could run his throne well, he built Champaner city in the memory of one of his generals, Champa and named it Champaner.
Champaner which was built on the Pavagadh mountain in the eighth century is now almost completely destroyed.
Today three temples are seen
here and the main one is the temple of Lord Shankar and it seems from the relics found in champaner That a city lived here 1000 years ago!
After about 500 - 600 years, The Rajputs arrived here and then Pavagadh and Champaner came to be known as the main state.
khichi Chauhan, who came here around the time of 1300, is believed to be descendant of Prithviraj Chauhan. These people conquered Pavagadh and built a capital here Champaner and ruled here for about 200 years.
The Khichi Chauhans built many buildings in Champaner and built huge walls to protect them.
Khichi Chauhan built these walls in seven layers using the natural plates of the mountain. According to the story of the local people, it is believed that these walls were seen sitting like a snake on the whole mountain.
In the 15th century Mohammad Begada attacked on Pavagadh to win this fort from the Rajputs, the Mughals laid siege to this fort with an army of 3.5 lakhs for 20 months. But the mughals failed to win this fort then the Mughals included cannons from Arab countries in their fleet.
The swords could not stand in front of the cannons and the Rajput women committed Jauhar( a ritual when royal women and women of city kill themselves to protect her from the enemies) and all the Rajput warriors attained martyrdom by wearing saffron clothes with basil leaves in their mouth .
Rajput king FatehRawal Singh was captured alive and promised to give his life if he converted to Islam, but he denied this and FatehRawal killed by the Mughals.
There is a famous folk tale connected with the fall of Champaner.
Fateh Rawal was the 9th ruler of the Chauhan dynasty,he was a fearless and people-loving king.during his time the prosperity of Champaner was on the top of the sky. A legend is prevalent here that during the time of King Fateh Rawal, KaliMata (Hindi Goddess) herself used to take the form of a normal woman and come to play Garba( famous folk dance of Gujarat).
Seeing the woman (goddess kali ) playing Garba, the king was so fascinated that he offered her to become his queen. The king was so fascinated by the beauty of the woman that he grabbed her pallu(a part of Indian dress) while playing Garba. Goddess Kali got very angry & came in her original form . goddess cursed on king that "you and your kingdom will soon be destroyed".
The fall story of Champaner is very hard to believe but the native people of pavagadh believe in their devotee of goddess Kali . may be there is some super energy or something which deserted Champaner or it is just a folk tale to hide the lose of Rajputs against Mughals .
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