Mahamastakabhisheka

The ceremony

Scaffolding is raised around the seventeen-metre monolith so that officiants can reach the head. From there the image is anointed in sequence with water, coconut milk, sugarcane juice, sandalwood paste, saffron, turmeric, and powders of sandal and vermilion, each poured over the head to run the full length of the figure. Petals and gold and silver flowers are scattered from above.

The event draws hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and takes place over several days. Anointings have been recorded at intervals across centuries; the ceremony in recent decades has become a major public occasion in Karnataka, with state involvement in the logistics.

Meaning and difficulty

The practice sits awkwardly with strict Jain doctrine, since a liberated being cannot receive worship or respond to it, and Bahubali is in any case not a tirthankara. Jain writers explain the rite as directed at the qualities the image represents and at the devotee's own orientation rather than at a recipient.

Its scale also reflects something about the Digambara community in Karnataka, whose patronage raised the image in the late tenth century under the Ganga minister Chavundaraya and has maintained it since. Smaller anointings are performed at the related colossi at Karkala, Venur and Dharmasthala.