Places to visit in Kalahandi District

Dokarichanchara

Kalahandi is one of the famous historical and ancient places of India or Odisha; where Dokarichanchara is a picnic or tourist place located in the village Kokasara, on the border of Kalahandi and Nabarangpur district. It is completely different and unique place than that of other attractive tourist centers in Kalahandi. Dokarichanchara is famous due to its two famous waterfalls, Dokaridara and Bhanyaraghumara (or Bhairav dhar). In addition, the historical Gudahandi cave nearby it makes this place more prominent. The Gudahandi cave was named due to its appearance as a jaggery (guda) pot (handi). There you can see several pre-historical literatures, pictographic inscriptions and drawings crafted on the stone walls. There is famous Ram temple, which is famous due to very old and ancient. Every year on Sri Ram Navami a nine-day long festive occurs. Dokarichanchara Falls The Dokaridhara falls from a height of 200ft, which is surrounded by beautiful stoned hills. Maa Dokari Devi is also been worshiping at this place since a long time. 

Karlapat Sanctuary

The Karlapat sanctuary is located in Kalahandi South Division which is 12km from Bhawanipatna in Kalahandi district covering a dense patch of lush green dry deciduous forest. A beautiful waterfall,'Phurlijharan' has been developed as a picnic spot for the local visitors and draws large number of visitors from far off places in and around Kalahandi District.Karlapat Wildlife Sanctuary is home to a plethora wildlife animals and birds.The sanctuary is rich in wildlife such as leopard, gaur, sambar, nilgai, barking deer, mouse deer,soft claws ottawa, a wide variety of birds and reptiles.

Rabandara

Rabandarh is a place of great scenic beauty lying about 12.8 K.Ms from Bhawanipatna and approachable by a dusty road. It is named after a small water fall inside a mountain gorge. The panorama around provides some delightful consrasts of scenery, in mountains and over looking dales, in bore rocks and thick forests and in the eternal calmness of the surroundings broken by the music of the fall. Despite bad communications picnic parties some times visit the place from Bhawanipatna as there is no market nearby. The stream which creats the fall almost dries up during the hot season. Down stream, a Minor Irrigation Project utilizes its water for agriculture purposes.

Gudahandi

The Gudahandi hills are situated in the vicinity of Khaligarh, a tiny villoage close to the Koraput District boarder, about 17.6 K.Ms North-East of Ampani. Ampani is 77 K.Ms from Bhawanipatna on the road towards Nawarangpur. In the Gudahandi hills are some ancient caves bearing pictographic paintings of remote antiquity, Khaligarh is a very out of the way place, the 17.6 K.Ms of Ampani being cart tracxt parts of which pass through dense forest.Three small hills, all of curved length, are together known as the Gudahandi hills. The North and the South hills join eachother in the East leaving a courtyard like vally in between which is open towards the West. This valley is paved by a huge block of stone slopping down to the East. Just at the foot of these hills facing the valley are rows of caves. Excepting one in the North, all the caves are small in size.Although at places hewed to shape by human hand they generally appear to have been formed bynature itself in red slate stone. Pictographic paintings in Red and Black colours appear at the entrances of some of caves in the Southern row. These have not yet been thoroughly studied but it is generally surmised that they bear approximately to the picture scripts of the Indus Valley Civilisation. Besides Gudahandi in Kalahandi District, Bikramkhol and Ulapgarh in Sambalpur District and Naraj in Cuttack District also possess some writings resembling pictographic paintings. a fact indicative of pre-historic man’s habitation in Orissa.The third hill extending North to South stands like a way to the immediate West of the Valley. But as this hill does not join with the other two, the valley is approachable from the North as well as from the South by a narrow pass.All the three hills taken together have the appearance of a pot with a lid on. The name Gudahandi, meaning a pot, for molasses, may have its origin in the impression its shape apprently conveys.A rivulet named Behera flows past the village. There are remains of a veryold dam across this revulet, local people call it the work of Bhima, the second of the Pandavas.

Phurlijharan

Fifteen Kilometers from Bhawanipatna, Phurlijharan is a perennial water fall about 30 Ft in height and has a special charm of its own. Themulti coloured rainbow created by the sunrays falling on the scattered water particles of the fall is an amusing sight to be seen. The evergreen forests around the fall provide ample opportunities to group picnickers.

Amathguda

Amathguda is a fort, situated on the right bank of the river Tel to the place where the road leading towards Balangir crosses the river. It is now incomplete ruins.Nothing is definitely known about this fort as its remains have not yet been investigated. The fort, presumably, was of considerable strategic importance in view of the fact that it stood close to the point where the river was fordedd since ancient time.Theroad which spanned the river by a low bridge ran almost on the old route.Another bridge was constructed abo9ut a few metres away from the old ruined bridge. Portions of this new bridge have been washed away by the highfloods in river Tel that occured in 1977.

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Source : https://kalahandi.nic.in/places-of-interest/