On the bank of the Dwarka river at Tarapith in the Birbhum district of West Bengal, the Goddess is worshipped as Tara — the fierce and boundlessly compassionate Mother, one of the great Mahavidyas. Revered in the tradition of the Peethas as a seat where a part of Sati's form (by many accounts, her third eye) fell, Tarapith is above all a supreme centre of Tantric devotion, its power felt most keenly at the mahashmashan, the cremation ground beside the temple where sadhakas seek the Mother.
The shrine is inseparable from the memory of the nineteenth-century saint Bamakhepa, the God-intoxicated devotee who worshipped Tara as his own mother and whose samadhi nearby still draws pilgrims.
Tara is worshipped here in a form both awe-inspiring and tender — the Mother who, beyond all fear, grants liberation. Tarapith remains one of the most spiritually charged Shakta shrines of Bengal.
