Rani of Natore, Rani Bhawani was one of those rare women zamindars who not only weilded power but weilded it well.
She has left behind a heritage of secular and religious structures.
She was famed for her philanthropy and general generosity, combined with an austere personal life
Of her religious structures i was fortunate to visit the Char Bangla temples in Azimganj on my 2018 Murshidabad trip.
Made in the typical style called bangla ( inspired by thatched roof of cottages in Bengal) they are dome-shaped roofs with drawn-down corners. They came up in 16th century and became very popular in Mughal and Rajput architecture.
There are several common types of Bengal roofs: the do-chala type has only two hanging roof tips on each side of a roof divided in the middle by a ridge; in the rare char-chala type, the two roof halves are fused into one unit and have a dome-like shape; the double-storey at-chala type has eight roof corners, four on each level.
Char Bangla Temples at Baranagar are do-chala type and have triple entrance, measuring 31’ x 15–16.5’. We could not see inside but it has shiv-linga inside.
The northern temple is dated 1760. Two of the temples have rich terracotta façade, one has incised plaster and the fourth one is plain.
The terracotta panels, depict scenes from the daily life and and Puranic legends
In above photo on the top you can see The battle between Rama, seated on the shoulders of Hanuman, and the ten-headed Ravana, depicted above the entrance arch.
