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There
are, however, scattered all over the district, stones with one or two rudely- carved
figures. These are known as autar stones and were erected by the relatives of a man
who had died without leaving male descendants to perform the shraddha ceremony. The
circumstance that, Raja Udai Singh died sonless led to the founding of the Udaipur temple,
and the slab it contains evidently serves the purpose of an autar stone.
Trilok Nath Temple----- In the Chander Bhaga Valley Only one temple
of the shikhara type is found. It is the famous sanctuary of Trilok Nath, the lord of the
three worlds', which is another name for Avalokiteshvara, the Popular Bodhisatva. It is,
probably, with the Bodhi temple at Gaya, the only Buddhist shrine in India, which has
remained Buddhist up to the present day. It contains a six-armed image of white marble.
One right hand is in the gift-bestowing attitude; one of
the left hands holds a lotus, the typical attribute of this Bodhi- sattva; and, on his
head, he wears the effigy of his spiritual father, the Buddha of Boundless Light,
Amitabha. The officiating priest is a lama. Trilok Nath is, indeed, equally worshipped by
the Buddhists of Lahul,Ladakh and Zaskar, and by the Hindus of the neighboring hill
tracts. It is of special interest to note that the Trilok Nath temple is purely Indian in
type and must, therefore, be regarded as a monument of Indian Buddhism.
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