A lamp at the centre

Every town has its temples: one at the end of the street, one by the tank, one at the crossroads. In each is a small dark garbhagriha where the deity dwells in the light of a lamp. Around these shrines the town arranges its life. The temple wakes before the street does; it rings the hours and keeps the calendar; it feeds, it gathers; it keeps the town's vows, its treasures and its memory; it holds what no household could carry alone. For generations people have tended these lamps, and the lamps have kept them. As long as they burn, the town knows who it is.

Sthalam sets out to record this life, lived in full view and yet rarely written down. We begin with Pondicherry. Since March 2026, a small team under the auspices of the Centre for Shaiva Studies, led by Deepa Reddy, has been following some twenty of the town's temples, large and small, through a ritual year: their daily worship and festivals, the people who serve and sustain them, and the stories they keep.