On a balmy February morning some years ago, a group of us seeking peace, history, context, stories, inspiration, set out to the Pichavaram mangrove forest, a short 15 kilometres coastwards from Chidambaram. This is a magical place. Nestled between the Vellar River to the north and the Coleroon River to the south, separated from the Bay of Bengal by a solid band of sand, this coastal ecosystem is like no other place on earth. There are thousands of islands - it is impossible to keep count as the numbers shift with the tides - that dot the many channels, canals, and creeks that flow around and over them. The only way into the forest is by boat, or, on the shallower waterways, by foot. The place is a veritable maze, and only the local boatmen know their way around some of the parts of the forest and are intimately acquainted with the ebb and flow of the tides. They will take you around and are happy to point out the wealth of bird, marine, and floral life all around.
This is a forest unlike any other and is the world's second-largest mangrove (the Sundarbans of Bengal is the largest). The roots of the trees burrow into several feet of saline water and are visible above the water as well. The canopy is dense and deep inside the forest, it is a zone of permanent twilight with the sunlight barely making it through the thick leafy cover overhead. This mangrove forest is vibrantly healthy. During the terrible tsunami of 2004, it was the Pichavaram mangroves that saved the coast to the west. The thick forest absorbed much of the force of the water as it slammed into land; its strength and impact were further weakened as the water was channelled into the network of waterways. Had the mangrove forest been any less healthy and dense, the coastal towns nearby would have suffered the same devastation as those not fortunate enough to be protected by a mangrove forest. It is a unique ecosystem here, with trees that have aerial roots, seaweeds and seagrasses, rare varieties of aquatic life, and a healthy population of birds of over 200 varieties, including waterfowl, cormorants, egrets, storks, herons, spoonbills, and pelicans.
But Pichavaram is also steeped in ancient lore as the place where one of the most powerful gods of southern India, the patron deity of the mighty Cholas - the Dancing Lord, Nataraja - came into being.
The story begins in a forbidding environment, the thillai forest (our Pichavaram mangrove), where this eponymous shrub grows in a thick, impenetrable mass along the banks of the backwater channels of the area. Its branches, a tangled mess, exude a sticky sap that is highly poisonous. A long time ago, a wandering ascetic, in search of the harshest, most inhospitable environment to conduct his penance in, arrived at this thillai forest near where Chidambaram is today. Pleased with the inhospitable severity of the place, he settled down to worship. In order to be able to pluck the lovely flowers that grew atop the dense canopy, our ascetic grew claws like those of a tiger, that he might get a proper grip on the branches, and this earned him the moniker Vyagrapadar, or Tiger Foot. The tiger theme is echoed in the tale of a local goddess Pitari (Kali), who roamed the forests with her tiger. This might be why Chidambaram is also known as Puliyur, or Tiger Town. The tiger on the Chola flag most likely came from here.
In time,Vyagrapadar-Tiger Foot was joined by an exiled prince from Bengal who, similarly delighted with the spot, invited three thousand religious scholars to the spot to carry out their special worship. In due course, a small hut was built as a place of worship, and from this humble spot grew the massive temple complex that is the great Chidambaram Nataraja temple today. What was the hut is now called the Cit Sabha or Citrambalam, and the deity inside is the Dancing Siva or Nataraja, the only temple where this form of Siva is the deity of the central shrine.
Why the Dancing Siva, and why here, at Chidambaram? There are more stories, enchanting and confounding in equal measure. Many loosely linked story fragments come together here. The stories are fascinating in how they nudge aside, adapt, and incorporate deities and personalities into local lore. Tradition tells of two dances. In one, Siva challenges Kali to a dance contest. The two are evenly matched until, in a coup de grace, Siva raises his leg vertically upwards in what is called the urdhva tandava pose. Feminine modesty prevented Kali from continuing, and the contest was won by Siva. The story might well serve as a metaphor for how Kali was edged out and Siva assumed the position of prime deity. Cultural memory still lingers, though, and there are Kali temples that dot the area around Chidambaram, and her tiger lives on in the name that many locals still call the town, Puliyur or Tiger Town.
The second dance took place after Siva and Vishnu, watching from their perch in the heavens, decided that the sages of the thillai forest were becoming too proud of their asceticism, that their austerity was tainted with arrogance. The two descended to earth, Siva as a naked beggar, Bicchachanan, and Vishnu as a seductive young damsel, Mohini. Their presence wreaked havoc in the village of the ascetics as the men went on a lust-filled chase after Mohini, and the women did the same with Bicchachanan. Once some order was restored and the sages realised that they had been tricked, they flew into a rage and attempted to destroy Siva by conjuring up a fierce tiger, snake and demon. It was a mere moment’s work for Siva to subdue them all. Adorning himself with the tiger’s skin and the snake, and standing atop the demon, he terrified the sages with a wild dance which evolved into the greatest dance of all, the cosmic dance of life and death and the entire universe, the fearsome and wondrous Ananda Tandavam.
Our contact in Chidambaram had arranged our vehicle - a Toyota Innova - and driver; the drive to Pichavaram was smooth and not very long - around 20 minutes. I remember a friend saying that the roads were terrible when she went, but that was many years back. I was excited about going here since I'd read a good deal about it about it both from a nature and a historical perspective.
There was the typical kitschy tourist setup there but thankfully, nothing too terribly loud or gaudy. It could have been far worse. We were offered motor boats or row boats and we opted for the latter. Nobody was keen on the noise and fumes. Our boatman was one Natarajan who was near impossible to understand. He told us, with beaming pride, that his son had studied mechanical engineering at Annamalai University and was now in Singapore. This was followed by much-mumbled communication which we managed to understand as his telling us he would take us further into the mangroves than what we had paid for, if we would pay him Rs 300 directly. Of course, none of this was directly conveyed but with much innuendo and extra-incomprehensible muttering. Then he asked me for a pen. That was clear enough!
It was beautiful inside the mangrove forest, bathed in a gentle green light. So peaceful, with just the sounds of many birds and a soft humming and the gentle splash of oars on the water. A motorboat would have shattered the atmosphere. Natarajan took us into one of the canals deep inside which was magical with the canopy overhead. Here in the shade, it was cool. Once out, we were scorched by the open sun.
The tourism department’s pricing system was expectedly murky. They charged by the distance and time- 1 km in 1 hour; we covered 1 km in just over 15 minutes and then paid Natarajan extra (under the table). We could have spent hours in that gently rocking boat under that sun-dappled arboreal awning, watching the busy lives of the birds all around us. But like all good things, this, too, had to come to an end.
Natarajan the boatman was given his extra money and the pen and we left Pichavaram and returned to Chidambaram.
The paragraphs on the thillai forest, Vyagrapadar, and the dances of Siva are from my book, Rajaraja Chola, King of Kings.