BAIHATA CHARIALI, Dec 28 � Madan Kamdev, the temple of love and a tourists� hot spot located on Dewangiri hill, only four kilometres from Baihata Chariali is ready to receive visitors on the occasion of the new year.
In order to welcome the picnickers and other pilgrims, the campus of the historic devalaya has been cleaned. A number of spots for preparing feast by the picnickers have been specially arranged. The white washing of the roadside trees and some other rocks are on to attract the visitors. To make available drinking water to the pilgrims and visitors, the tube wells installed at various locations of the devalaya campus have been repaired for proper functioning.
Besides the temple, there is a museum here maintained by the Directorate of Archaeology, Government of India, which is known for its rich archaeological artifacts. There is also the Assam Bio-Resource Centre adjacent to the Madan Kamdev Temple on the bank of Madan Kuri river where visitors can see an orchid aquarium and a cactus house which has huge varieties of colourful orchids and cactii of different types, shapes and sizes blooming in the green house. The in-charge of the Assam Bio-Resource Centre has already prepared several herbarium sheets of different indigenous species of plants for public show.
Similarly, there is a botanical garden where several medicinal plants and some other plants which are on verge of extinction are preserved orderly and the guards of the garden have arranged them in a series so that visitors do not have trouble seeing them. Likewise, the �Shiva Guha� (Shiva cave) located to the north of the Madan Kamdev main temple amidst teak trees where a tunnel existed which connected the Gopeswar mandir and �Parvati Kotha� has also been cleaned and the path to the spot spruced up.
Every year specially between the months of November to February, thousands of visitors come here to enjoy the panoramic beauty of the temple and its surroundings, but its seems that Madan Kamdev the �Khajuraho� of the north-east, has never been adequately focussed on by the government, even though there is unlimited potential to attract visitors to this historical place.
The citizens of the locality have requested the government to upgrade the infrastructure and initiate developmental schemes and special financial packages to the tourist hotspot. On the other hand, a section of people here alleged that due to lack of interest of the local MLA who is also the State Health and Family Welfare Minister, such a place of national importance and tourist interest in lying in a state of neglect.
