Set in the Garhwal Himalayas on the bank of the Alaknanda, between the Nara and Narayana peaks, Badrinath enshrines Vishnu as Badrinarayan — a black-stone image seated in meditation beneath a golden canopy. It is the northern seat of the Char Dham and also part of the Chota Char Dham. Its name comes from the badari (jujube) tree: legend holds that when Vishnu sat in penance here, Goddess Lakshmi took the form of a badari tree to shelter him from the Himalayan cold, and so the place became Badari-van.
The Bhagavata Purana (3.4.22) describes Badarikashram as the place where Vishnu, incarnate as the sage-brothers Nara and Narayana, performed penance since time immemorial for the welfare of all beings. The Skanda Purana declares that among all sacred shrines in heaven, earth, and the netherworld, there is none like Badrinath, and the Mahabharata remembers it on the Pandavas' final path to Swarga. Tradition holds that Adi Shankaracharya, in the eighth century, recovered the self-manifested image from the Alaknanda and re-established worship here as one of his four Dhams.
Pilgrims bathe in the steaming Tapt Kund hot spring below the temple before darshan, near the Vyas Gufa where sage Vyasa is said to have composed the Mahabharata. Open only from spring to autumn, Badrinath is among the most visited of all Himalayan shrines, glorified even in the Tamil hymns of the Alvar saints as one of the 108 Divya Desams.
Badrinath's head priest must come from Kerala. The Uttarakhand government formally asks the Kerala government to nominate a Nambudiri Brahmin — one state writing to another to appoint a priest.
Source: Shri Badarinath Kedarnath Temple Committee (BKTC), Rawal appointment process
