At the very southern tip of the Indian mainland, where the Bay of Bengal, the Arabian Sea, and the Indian Ocean meet, stands the Kumari Amman temple of Kanyakumari — the shrine of the virgin Goddess, the Kanya Kumari. Here the Devi is worshipped as an eternally youthful maiden who, tradition holds, undertook penance to wed Lord Shiva and remained here as a guardian of the land and destroyer of demons, her diamond nose-ring said to shine out to sea.
A Shakti shrine of ancient fame, sung in the classical Tamil tradition, the temple draws pilgrims to worship the Goddess at the meeting of the three seas, where sunrise and sunset over the ocean are themselves a darshan. Kanyakumari is among the most sacred and evocative of all the shrines of the South.
