Find a 1,400-year-old Buddha image in Odisha village

Students at Utkal University, Bhubaneswar discovered a 1,400-year-old Buddha statue, surrounded by a seven-headed snake statue at Govindapur near Banapur in the Khurda district of Odisha, nearly 100 km from Bhubaneswar.

While 80% of this five-foot statue is buried in the ground, the Buddha's face with the seven-headed snake has been found lying close to the ground.

Researchers from the university have been assisted by the Indian Archaeological Survey (ASI) and the State Museum to further study this statue.

This is an ancient god statue first discovered by Dakhineswar Jena, a student of the Ancient Indian History Bureau, Culture and Archeology.

After Jena discussed with his assistant professor Anam Behera, a group of researchers led by Professor Behera and included students Minaketan Sundar Ray and Ramakant Pradhan and Jena started digging near a tree. Govindapur area. After digging about 0.9m they first found the seven-headed snake and then an estimated 1,400-year-old Buddha statue.

" The discovered Buddha statue is nearly 1400 years old. It has similarities with the statues discovered from Ratnagiri and Lalitgiri in Jajpur district of Odisha. Recent findings suggest that there may be communities of people. Ancient Buddhists lived in the Banapur area in the previous Khurda district, "Professor Behera said. Other rare Buddha statues are also found in several places in Odisha.

Talking about the history of this statue, twenty years ago, a farmer found the statue when the upper part of the snake hit his cow cart while plowing the land. Without digging further, he ignored it thinking it was like a rock. After that, people forgot about this after a large banyan tree growing near the statue almost covered it under the roots.