In the invasion history of the Jagannath Temple, Kalapahad is infamously recognised among Odias for his cruelty and dastardly acts against the lords. Not only did he attack the temple, he burnt the deities.
Among 18 invasions occurred in the temple, the fifth one was by Kalapahad in 1568 AD. As information of Kalapahad’s coming to Puri reached temple, the then servitors secretly carried the idols to the Chilika lake and hid in the Parikud Island. After invading the temple and looting the wealth, Kalapahad could know of exile of the deities.
He then drove his army to Chilika and took away the deities to the Ganga river with help of an elephant. He fired them on the river bank.
Though the idols turned to ashes, but the souls (Brahma) within the wooden bodies remained unchanged.
One Bisher Mohanty, a Vaishnavite saint went to the Ganga and managed to collect the Brahmas in the ashes and bring back to the Kujanga Gada in Khurda and hid in the Mridanga, a type of drum. later, the ‘Brahmas’ were placed in the newly built wooden deities. During reign of Ramachandra Dev, the deities were then taken back to the Jagannath Temple.
As per ‘Madalapanji’, Kalapahad was a Bengali Brahmin whose real name was Kalachand Roy Bhadury. As Kalachand married Dulari, the daughter of a Bengal Sultan, the then Brahmin society never accepted him.
But Kalachand wanted to retain Hinduism. Thus he came to the Jagannath Temple for expiation. But the then priests rebuffed him.
It made Kalachand fiery and revengeful. From that time, he took a vow to exterminate Hindu religion, its idols and shrines.
During the reign of Mukundadev of Chalukya dynasty, Kalapahard joined as assistant commander of Bengal ruler Sulaiman Karrani.
The reason of Karrani’s attack on Jaganath temple was Mukundadev’s enmity. As Mukundadev gave shelter to Ibrahim Sur and kept good relation with Mughal emperor Akbar, it fumed Sulaiman Karrani.
The Bengal ruler was treating both Ibrahim and Akbar as his enemies. Ultimately, to teach a lesson to Mukundadev, Sulaiman sent his army to conquer Odisha led by Kalapahad. Mukundadev could not resist the expedition and ultimately surrendered before the Muslim army and was killed mercilessly.
