I came across this scene during a morning drive through rural Goa. The shikhara (spire) of the Khapro Ravalnath temple in Narve stood out from the foliage in the warm light following sunrise.
Ravalnath – a manifestation of Lord Shiva – is widely worshipped in Goa and in the Konkan region of Maharashtra. The name of this temple in Narve is an oddity. Khapri is the Konkani word for negro. Village lore has it that an African man, brought in by the Portuguese during the early part of the colonial era, either died or was killed in the village. Lord Ravalnath promised the dying man that he would not be forgotten whence the coinage Khapro Ravalnath.