Surya

Surya is the Hindu sun god, shown driving a chariot drawn by seven horses, with two lotuses in his hands. He is worshipped in the Saura tradition and honoured in Shaiva, Shakta and Vaishnava worship too. In Odisha, the Sun Temple at Konark, built in the thirteenth century and listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the great shrine of Surya, whose region is called Arka Kshetra. Samba Dashami in the month of Pausha, when women fast for their children, and Magha Saptami at the Chandrabhaga coast are the main observances.

In the Rigveda, Surya is the visible eye of the cosmos, who drives away darkness and sees all that happens. Later Puranic accounts give him a wife, Sanjna, daughter of Vishvakarma, who found his heat unbearable and left her shadow Chhaya in her place. Vishvakarma then trimmed Surya's brightness...