Kaleesar at Kalaiyar-Kovil

The temple features:

This temple is located at Kalaiyar Kovil 18 kms from Sivagangai in Tamil Nadu. The carpet area of this temple is 1,96,992 sqrf and it has two towers in 9 and 5 stages respectivly.Both the towers are facing the eastern direction.The temple has two corridors .(Pragarams)

This temples speciality is that it has three separate sanctums in a row facing the eastern side and the deities are called Somesar, Kaleesar and Sunderaswar. They are installed in the respective sanctums. The consorts of the Lards are in the same sanctum ie1st Somasar-Sowndra-Nayaki, 2nd Kaleesar-Sowrna-valli and 3rd Sundaraswar-Meenakshi This temple has many theerthams called Sivagangai, Kali Teertham, Vishnu Teertham, Lakshmi Teertham, Digpalaka Teerthams, Sudarsana. Teertham, Rudra Teertham and Chandra Pushkarani.
There are Many stone inscriptions here giving details of the kshetram

This place is also known by many other names such as Dakshina Kalipuram, Jotirvanarn, Mandaravanam,Mokshapradam, Saiva Kshetram, Gandaram, Davasiddhikaram, Devadaru- vanam, Bhooloka Kailasam, Agastya Kshetram and Maha Kalapuram. At present it known as Kaliyar Kovil.

The saint who sang hymns on the Lord:
Thiru-gnana-sambadhar , Appar and Sundarar.

Legend: Once Parvati closed Siva's eyes in jest which threw the entire universe into complete darkness causing untold sufferings to the people of the earth. Lord Siva got very angry and cursed Parvathy for this. To over come the curse she had to spend her time on the earth worshipping Siva.

At that time, there was a demon called Chandasuran who was harassing all the devas including Vishnu, Brahma and Indra. All of them prayed to Lord Siva who appeared before them and advised them to pray to Kali in the earth to get rid of the demon. According to Siva's advice they prayed to Kali and the devi appeared before them. She killed the demon and saved them. Because goddess Kali incarnated and killed the demon in this place it is called Kaliyoor. Also the devi worshipped Lord Siva and reunited with him in this place. Hence the presiding deity is named as Kaleesar in this temple. 
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