{"id":68447,"date":"2026-05-09T12:56:23","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T07:26:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=68447"},"modified":"2026-05-09T15:17:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T09:47:00","slug":"somnath-temple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/somnath-temple\/","title":{"rendered":"Somnath Temple"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Somnath Temple Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prime Minister is set to visit the iconic Somnath Temple in Gujarat to mark the 75th anniversary of the restored Hindu temple\u2019s inauguration by President Rajendra Prasad in 1951. <\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Somnath Temple<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is a <\/span><b>Hindu temple<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> dedicated to<\/span><b> Lord Shiva.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is located in Prabhas Patan near Veraval in <\/span><b>Saurashtra <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">on the <\/span><b>western coast of Gujarat.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is the <\/span><b>first of the 12 jyotirlinga shrines<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in India that are regarded as the manifestation of the Lord Shiva Himself.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The site of Somnath has been a<\/span><b> pilgrimage site from ancient times <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">on account of being a <\/span><b>Triveni Sangam<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: the<\/span><b> confluence of three rivers, namely Kapila, Hiran, and Saraswati.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>ancient temple\u2019s timeline <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">can be <\/span><b>traced from 649 BC<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> but is believed to be older than that.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The temple <\/span><b>faced several invasion<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s, the most <\/span><b>notable being by <a href=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/upsc-exam\/mahmud-of-ghazni\/\" target=\"_blank\">Mahmud Ghazni<\/a><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in the <\/span><b>11th century.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Reconstruction Efforts:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Rebuilt multiple times by different dynasties, including the <\/span><b>Paramaras, <a href=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/upsc-exam\/chalukyas-of-badami\/\" target=\"_blank\">Chalukyas<\/a>, and the Marathas.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>present temple<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> was reconstructed in the <\/span><b>Chalukya style<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of Hindu temple architecture and completed in <\/span><b>May 1951.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>reconstruction <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">was<\/span><b> completed by Vallabhbhai Patel.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Somnath Temple <\/b><b>Architecture<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The temple features an elaborate and extravagant architecture marked with many <\/span><b>rich, intricate carvings.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The temple is<\/span><b> seven-storied <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and reaches up to a height of 155 ft.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The temple\u2019s <\/span><b>positioning is quite unique<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. The temple is positioned in such a way that <\/span><b>not a single piece of land<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is visible <\/span><b>from the Somnath seashore until Antarctica.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A magnificent<\/span><b> Kalash or pot vessel tops<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the temple Shikhara and weighs up to 10 tons approximately.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The summit is adorned with a flag whose mast is 37 ft in length. <\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Source<\/b><strong>:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.opindia.com\/2026\/05\/as-pm-modi-is-set-to-visit-somnath-read-how-islamic-invaders-destroyed-the-ancient-temple\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>OPI<\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Somnath Temple is located in Prabhas Patan near Veraval in Saurashtra on the western coast of Gujarat. Read more about Somnath Temple, Location, Architecture, History, Latest News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":68556,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[21,3221,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-68447","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-prelims-pointers","9":"tag-somnath-temple","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68447"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102704,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68447\/revisions\/102704"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}