Mandleshwar is a town and

nagar panchayat A nagar panchayat () or town panchayat or Notified Area Council (NAC) in India is a settlement in transition from rural to urban and therefore a form of an urban political unit comparable to a municipality. An urban centre with more than 12,00 ...

in the Khargone district of the

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

state of

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (; ; ) is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal and the largest city is Indore, Indore. Other major cities includes Gwalior, Jabalpur, and Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, Sagar. Madhya Pradesh is the List of states and union te ...

. It is on the banks of the

Narmada River The Narmada River, previously also known as ''Narbada'' or anglicised as ''Nerbudda'', is the 5th longest river in India and overall the longest west-flowing river in the country. It is also the largest flowing river in the state of Madhya Prade ...

, east of Maheshwar and south of

Indore Indore (; ISO 15919, ISO: , ) is the largest and most populous Cities in India, city in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The commercial capital of the state, it has been declared as the List of cleanest cities in India, cleanest city of In ...

. It is a "Pavitra nagri" as termed by the government of Madhya Pradesh, as it is an ancient town. It is the education centre of Maheshwar block, the location of the district court and district jail of Khargone, and also the political centre of Maheshwar block.

History

Mandleshwar is from Maheshwar, the capital of the

Holkar The Holkars (pronunciation: �o(ː)ɭkəɾ were the ruling house of the Indore State of the Maratha Confederacy, and earlier held the rank of Subahdar under Peshwa Baji Rao I of the Maratha Empire. When the Maratha Confederacy began to we ...

states. The eighth-century philosopher

Maṇḍana Miśra Mandana Mishra (; c. ) was a Hindu philosopher who wrote on the Mīmāṃsā and Advaita systems of thought. He was a follower of the Karma Mimamsa school of philosophy and a staunch defender of the holistic sphota doctrine of language. He w ...

reportedly lived in the town and debated with Aadya Guru Shankarachaarya at the Gupteshwar Mahadev Temple. The British Raj is memorialized in the

Sub-Divisional Magistrate A sub-divisional magistrate, also known as assistant collector, sub collector, revenue divisional officer, or assistant commissioner, is the administrative head of a sub-division in an Indian district, exercising executive, revenue, and magist ...

, PWD office, the district jail, fort and the 'ghat'. ('Ghat' means a flight of steps leading down to a waterfront). Mandleshwar was the headquarters for the Nimar Agency and cantonment from 1819 to 1864. In 1823, it became the headquarters for the District of Nimar (which, until 1864, was managed by the agent of the governor-general at Indore. River Narmada is considered by the Hindus to be a

holy river Sacred waters are sacred natural sites characterized by tangible topographical land formations such as rivers, lakes, springs, reservoirs, and oceans, as opposed to holy water which is water elevated with the sacramental blessing of a cleri ...

and Mandleshwar has tanks, temples and ghats. Hindu temples here include Shree Gupteshwar Mahadev Mandir, Chhappan-Dev, Shree Ram Temple, Shree Datta Temple, Ganga-Zira, and Kaashi Vishweshwar Temple. Dhawal-kunda and Hathani (islands), Sahastradhara, and Ram kund are other places of historical significance. A flight of 123 steps leads down to the river and expands into the Ram Ghat, where the Ram, Hanuman, Dattatraya and Ratneshwar Temples are located. Ghat is located at a narrow point of the Narmada River where, during the

monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in Atmosphere of Earth, atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annu ...

, the river often rises above its normal level, hence those many steps. Mandleshwar also has a temple dedicated to Brahmachaitanya Maharaj Gondwalekar. Vasudevanand Saraswati (a saint) lived in Mandleshwar for a long time.

Swami Vivekananda Swami Vivekananda () (12 January 1863 – 4 July 1902), born Narendranath Datta, was an Indian Hindus, Hindu monk, philosopher, author, religious teacher, and the chief disciple of the Indian mystic Ramakrishna. Vivekananda was a major figu ...

reportedly lived in the town on his way to

Raipur Raipur ( ) is the capital city of the Indian state of Chhattisgarh. Raipur is also the administrative headquarters of Raipur district and Raipur division, and the largest city of the state. It was a part of Madhya Pradesh before the state of Chh ...

Geography

Mandleshwar is located at , and has an average elevation of 153 metres (501 feet).

Demographics

In the 2001 India

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

, the town had a population of 11,345. Males made up 51 percent of the population, and females 49 percent. Mandleshwar had an average literacy rate of 68 percent, higher than the national average of 59.5 percent; male literacy was 76 percent, and female literacy 59 percent. Fourteen percent of the population was under six years of age.

Culture

Festivals celebrated in Mandleshwar include

Holi Holi () is a major Hindu festival celebrated as the Festival of Colours, Love and Spring.The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) p. 874 "Holi /'həʊli:/ noun a Hindu spring festival ...".Yudit Greenberg, Encyclopedia of Love in World ...

Diwali Diwali (), also called Deepavali (IAST: ''Dīpāvalī'') or Deepawali (IAST: ''Dīpāwalī''), is the Hindu festival of lights, with variations celebrated in other Indian religions such as Jainism and Sikhism. It symbolises the spiritual v ...

, Eid,

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating Nativity of Jesus, the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a Religion, religious and Culture, cultural celebration among billions of people Observance of Christmas by coun ...

, Gurunanak Jayanti, Narmada Jayanti, Gangour Navratri, and Ganesh Chaturthi. Gangaur is the most popular.

Access

Mandleshwar can be reached by road from Dhamnod, Barwaha, and Khargone.

Transport

The nearest airport is Indore.

References

{{Indore Division Cities and towns in Khargone district Tourist attractions in Khargone district Religion in Madhya Pradesh