At Jajpur on the bank of the Vaitarani river in Odisha, the Goddess Biraja — also called Girija — is worshipped as one of the eighteen Maha Shakti Peethas named in Adi Shankaracharya's stotram, "Odyane Girija devi." In the tradition of the Peethas, the navel of Sati fell here, and the region is revered in the Skanda Purana as the Viraja Kshetra, so sacred that it is said to cleanse the pilgrim of all sin.
The Devi is worshipped in a distinctive two-armed Mahishamardini form, spearing the buffalo-demon, her image ancient and deeply venerated. Jajpur, an old capital on the Vaitarani — a river itself held sacred for ancestral rites — is dotted with countless Shiva lingas; the Tantric tradition knows this as the Oddiyana Peetha, named for the ornament worn at the navel.
Biraja is the guardian Mother of central Odisha and a cornerstone of the Shakta sacred geography of the east.
