Senji Janmejaya Eswaran Temple

Senji is a small, lesser-known village located around 60 km from Chennai. The nearest well-known site is Thakolam, which is a distance of 15 km from here. This village has two unknown ancient temples. Let us discuss on one of those temples in this article.

If I can Senji as the lesser known village, I would call the temple of Lord Shiva in this village an unknown site. The temple, which is in a dilapidated state, is called Janmejaya Eswaran temple. Janmejaya was Arjuna's great-grandson, one of Mahabharata's five Pandava brothers. There must be some legend related to Janmejaya and this temple. Janmejaya may have visited the site or mythologically built this temple. Similar to this temple, even the legend, if any, remains a mystery. Hence, we could not conclude the connection between Janmejaya, the first listener of the Mahabharata epic, and Lord Shiva of Senji, named after the Emperor. 

As per this temple's inscriptions, the deity's original name was Jayamadeeswaram Udaiya Mahadevar. So, there is a possibility that this village was initially called Jayamadeeswaram, and the deity's name was slowly changed to Janmejaya Eswaran. Not sure!

The east-facing temple does not have a tower. It has a small Nandi mandapa and bali peetha, which are not in good condition. The sanctum's entrance is in the southern direction and is erected on a raised platform. The moolasthana is in awful shape, and the ceiling can fall anytime. Hence, the principal deity, Shiva Linga, called Janmejaya Eswar, is moved to the Ardha Mandap area.

In the Maha Mandapa, the icon of the Goddess is found. It appears to be new and not part of the original temple. The name of the Goddess is not known.

The wall around the sanctum has the niche icons of Ganesha, Dakshinamurti, Lingodbhava and Brahma. Except for Lingodbhava, all other images appear to be newly sculpted. 

There are two sub-shrines behind the sanctum. They obviously belong to Ganesha and Subramanya. However, no deity is found in those sub-shrines.

There are inscriptions found on the walls of the temple. They belong to the period of Rajaraja Chola III and Kulotunga Chola III (12th/13th centuries CE). 

There are a few bas-relief sculptures, such as Uma Sahita Murti, Nataraj, Rishabha Arudana Murti, Kamadeva with his consorts, Kannappa with Shiv Linga and others, which are very beautiful.

It was initially a beautiful temple, which will not exist after a few years, as hardly anyone can preserve this site.

Happy travelling.

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