Janakpurdham or Janakpur (Maithili: जनकपुर), is a capital city of Madhesh Province. This sub-metropolitan city is a central hub for Maithili language, religious and cultural tourism in Nepal.
The city was founded in the early 18th century but was retrospectively assigned as the location of the capital of the Videha kingdom although there is no archaeological evidence to support this.[2]
Janakpur is located about 225km (140mi) southeast of Kathmandu.[3]As of 2021[update], the city had a population of 195,438 with a 2,125/km2 density. [1][4] Janakpur is currently the fourth most densely populated city of Nepal. Janakpur is located about 23km away from the Bhitthamore border with India.[5]Nepal Railways operates between Janakpur and Jainagar in India.
Etymology
Janakpurdham, popularly known as Janakpur is Named after the late King of Videha in Mithila region - Janaka.The rulers of the Videha kingdom were accorded the title Janaka, meaning 'father' in Sanskrit, and this character is the best-known bearer of the same.
Accounts from ascetics, pandits, and bards indicate that Janakpur was founded in the early 18th century. The earliest description of Janakpur as a pilgrimage site dates to 1805. Earlier archaeological evidence of the presence of an ancient city has not been found and there is a lack of evidence to assign the modern-day city of Janakpur with the ancient capital of the Videha kingdom.[2]
Until the 1950s, Janakpur was a cluster of rural hamlets inhabited by farmers, artisans, priests, and clerks who worked for the monasteries that controlled the land. After the Independence Act in India, Janakpur expanded into a commercial center and became the capital of the Dhanusa District in the 1960s.[6]
Gautama Buddha and Vardhamana Mahavira, the 24th and final Tirthankara of the Jain religion are said to have lived in Janakpur. The region was an important center for the history of Mithila during the first millennium.[7] Following the Sugauli Treaty in 1816 between the Nepali rulers and the British East India Company, the northern part of ancient Mithila state, including Janakpur, became part of Nepal, while the southern part went into India.
As of June2011[update], the Janakpur municipality had 19,195 households and a population of 98,446 people with a density of 4,000 people per square kilometer.[8] In 2015, it was declared a sub-metropolitan city that incorporates 11 surrounding villages. The current population is 173,924 people, making it the sixth largest city in Nepal.[9]
Maithili is widely spoken in the area as the first language and is also used as the lingua franca. Nepali, Hindi, Marwari, and English are well understood. Languages like Bhojpuri and Awadhi are understood but less frequently used.
More than 90 percent of the total population is Hindu, with the rest being Muslims and Buddhists.
Economy
Janakpur is one of the fastest developing cities of Nepal and is the largest sub-metropolitan city in the country.[10] The city has good health care facilities, a number of parks, private schools, colleges, and internet service providers. There are medical, engineering, and management colleges that are affiliated to Tribhuvan University. The economy is mostly based on tourism, agriculture, and local industries.
The paintings on pottery, walls, and courtyards made by Maithili women are known as Mithila art.
Janakpur attracts migrants from the surrounding area, moving to the city for medical care, education, and jobs. The largest employers were the Janakpur Cigarette Factory Limited and Janakpur Railway until they closed in 2013 due to political corruption and heavy loans. By the end of 2018 service was resumed.[11] Zonal Hospital, Zonal Police, and the Banking Sector help the locals live a relatively easy lifestyle.
The city has many commercial banks, such as Nepal Rastra Bank, the State Bank of India, Nepal, Everest Bank LTD. Machhapuchhare, NIC Bank, Nepal Bank LTD, and Agriculture Development Bank.
Geography and climate
Janakpur is located in the Terai, where the climate is humid subtropical: the months of March and April are hot, dry, and windy. The wet season lasts from May to September, followed by mild dry autumn from October to November. It is a cold winter from December to February.[6]
The major rivers surrounding Janakpur are Dudhmati, Jalad, Rato, Balan, and Kamala.
Source: Department of Hydrology and Meteorology[12]
Transport
Roadways
Frequent bus services operate between Janakpur and Nepalese cities. Within the city, cycle rickshaws, electric rickshaws, tempos (three-wheeled vehicle), and buses are available. A few Bus services operate for Indian cities of Sitamarhi, Patna, Delhi and Ayodhya as part of the Ramayan Circuit to promote religious tourism in Nepal and India.[13][14]
Janakpur has a domestic airport(IATA: JKR, ICAO: VNJP) with most flights connecting to Kathmandu, There are plans of expanding it as a regional airport.[15]
The Janaki Mandir temple is in the centre of Janakpur, northwest of the market. It is one of the biggest temples in Nepal and was built in 1898 (1955 in the Nepali calendar) by Queen Brisabhanu Kunwari of Tikamgarh. It is also called Nau Lakha Mandir after the cost of construction, said to be nine lakh gold coins.[19] The temple is architecturally unique in Nepal: its inner sanctum contains a flower-covered statue of Sita that was found in the Sarayu near Ayodhya. Statues of Rama and his brothers Lakshman, Bharat, and Satrughna stand by Sita.
Adjacent to the Janaki Mandir is the Rama Sita Vivaha Mandir, a building that marks the event in which Rama and Sita were married.
The oldest temple in Janakpur is Sri Ram Temple, built by the Gorkhali General Amar Singh Thapa.[19](citation does not exist, false claim) Pilgrims also visit the over 200 sacred ponds in the city for ritual baths. The two most important ponds – Dhanush Sagar and Ganga Sagar, are located close to the city center.
Deities of Sri Sita Devi (far right) and Sri Rama (centre) (with Sri Lakshmana (far left) and Sri Hanuman (below seated))
Pond in front of Mani mandap, Rani Bazar. The place where the marriage of Ram and Sita actually happened.
On the night of the full moon in February and March, before the festival of Holi, a one-day Parikrama (circumambulation) of the city is celebrated. Many people offer prostrated obeisances along the entire 8km (5.0mi) route. Two other festivals honour Rama and Sita: Rama Navami, the birthday of Lord Rama,[20] and the Vivah Panchami that re-enacts the wedding of Rama and Sita at the Vivah Mandap temple on the fifth day of the waxing moon in November or early December.
Janakpur has educational facilities where several of the country's elites went to school, including the first president of the Federal Republic of Nepal, Ram Baran Yadav and former DPM, Bimalendra Nidhi. There are many private and government schools and colleges located in Janakpur. One of the oldest government colleges of Nepal, Ramsworup Ramsagar Bahumukhi Campus, which is a constituent campus of Tribhuvan University is homed in Janakpur. Janakpur also has Rajarshi Janak University for higher studies.[21]
Janakpur is the educational hub for high school. There are hundreds of high school like Shree Saraswati Ma Vï, Sankat Mochan School, MIT School, New English School and many more.
And many colleges like Model Multiple College, MIT, Dhanusha Science Campus, Rajshree Janak Campus are also there for higher studies in different streams.
Libraries
Gangasagar Public Library was established in 1955 and is situated between two historical ponds of Janakpur—Dhanuschatra Pond and Ganga Sagar. The library was reopened to the public in 2012. In recent times, a team of active and committed local youth workers has contributed to the revival of this library by organizing public book collections for the library. It is open daily for three hours, mainly for newspaper-reading but has few daily visitors.[26]
The local media of Janakpur primarily consists of several community radio stations, some TV channels, and a few print newspapers, such as Janakpur Today. Local Janakpur media primarily consists of radio shows, such as Mithila Jagaran.
Ayodhya and Janakpur became sister cities in November 2014.[27] Ayodhya is the birthplace of Rama and Janakpur is the birthplace of his consort, Sita.[28]
Ayodhya is a city situated on the banks of the Sarayu river in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is the administrative headquarters of the Ayodhya district as well as the Ayodhya division of Uttar Pradesh, India. Ayodhya became the top tourist destination of Uttar Pradesh with 11 crore visitor in the first half of 2024, surpassing Varanasi.
Sitamarhi is an Indian city in the Mithila region of Bihar. It is the district headquarters of the Sitamarhi district in Tirhut Division. The city was named in honour of the goddess Sita, who was born in Sitamarhi in Hindu mythology.
Janaki may refer to:
Janaka is the King of Videha who ruled from Mithila, in the Hindu epic Ramayana. Janaka was married to Sunayana. He is the father of Sita, the female protagonist of the epic, and Urmila.
Sita, also known as Siya, Janaki and Maithili, is a Hindu goddess and the female protagonist of the Hindu epic Ramayana. Sita is the consort of Rama, the avatar of god Vishnu, and is regarded as an avatar of goddess Lakshmi. She is the chief goddess of the Ramanandi Sampradaya and is the goddess of beauty and devotion. Sita's birthday is celebrated every year on the occasion of Sita Navami.
Maithils, also known as Maithili people, are an Indo-Aryan ethno-linguistic group from the Indian subcontinent, who speak the Maithili language as their native language. They inhabit the Mithila region, which comprises Northern and Eastern Bihar and Northeastern Jharkhand in India and some adjoining districts of Nepal constituting Madhesh Province in addition to some terai districts of Bagmati and Koshi Provinces.
Janaki Mandir is a Hindu temple in Janakpurdham, Nepal, dedicated to the Hindu goddess Sita. It is an example of Koiri Hindu architecture. Fully built in bright white and constructed in an area of 1,480 square metres, it is a three-storied structure made entirely of stone and marble.
Mithila, also known as Tirhut, Tirabhukti and Mithilanchal, is a geographical and cultural region of the Indian subcontinent bounded by the Mahananda River in the east, the Ganges in the south, the Gandaki River in the west and by the foothills of the Himalayas in the north. It comprises certain parts of Bihar and Jharkhand of India and adjoining districts of the Koshi Province, Bagmati Pradesh and Madhesh Province of Nepal. The native language in Mithila is Maithili, and its speakers are referred to as Maithils.
Duhabi is a Village Development Committee in Dhanusa District in the Janakpur Zone of south-eastern Nepal. At the time of the 1991 Nepal census it had a population of 5,762 persons residing in 990 individual households.
Vivaha Panchami is a Hindu festival celebrating the wedding of Rama and Sita in the Janakpurdham which was the capital city of Mithila. It is observed on the fifth day of the Shukla paksha or waxing phase of moon in the Agrahayana month as per the Bikram Samvat calendar and in the month of Mangsir. The day is observed as the Vivaha Utsava of Sita and Rama in temples and sacred places associated with Rama, such as the Mithila region of Nepal and Ayodhya of India.
Dharharwa is a village in Parihar Tehsil in Sitamarhi District in Bihar State, India. In Hindi: धरहरवा
Siya Ke Ram is an Indian television series on Star Plus produced by Nikhil Sinha under the banner of Triangle Film Company. This show presents the epic Ramayana, the story of Rama and Devi Sita from Sita's perspective. The show features Madirakshi Mundle and Ashish Sharma playing as Goddess Sita and Lord Rama, respectively, and Karthik Jayaram as Raavan. It premiered on 16 November 2015 and ended on 4 November 2016.
Madhesh Province is a province of Nepal in the Terai region with an area of 9,661 km2 (3,730 sq mi) covering about 6.5% of the country's total area. It has a population of 6,126,288 as per the 2021 Nepal census, making it Nepal's most densely populated province and the smallest province by area. It borders Koshi Pradesh to the east and the north, Bagmati Province to the north, and India’s Bihar state to the south and the west. The border between Chitwan National Park and Parsa National Park acts as the provincial boundary in the west, and the Kosi River forms the provincial border in the east. The province includes eight districts, from Parsa in the west to Saptari in the east.
Simraungadh, Simraongarh or Simroungarh is a municipality situated in Bara district of Nepal.
Sunayana is the queen of Videha in the Hindu epic Ramayana. Sunayana is the queen consort of Janaka, the king of Videha, who ruled from Mithila. She is the mother of Sita, the female protagonist of the epic and Urmila.
Mithila Madhya Parikrama is an annual periodic journey of the central part of the ancient Mithila. It is held every year between the months of Kartik (October–November), Falgun (February–March) and Baishakh (April–May). But nowadays only Falgun (February–March) journey is famous. It is a circular journey of the central part of the Ancient Mithila. It covers a distance of 128 km circular path. It is mentioned in the epic Mithila Mahatmya which was composed in the 18th century.
Janaki Sthan is a historical place related to the temple of Goddess Sita in the city of Sitamarhi. According to some scholars and Saints, Janaki Sthan is claimed to be the manifestation place of Goddess Sita in Ramayana. This is a temple dedicated to the Goddess Sita called Janaki Sthan Mandir. This temple is about 2 kilometers away from Sitamarhi Railway Station. The temple comes under Ramanuja tradition in Hinduism.
Rama's Journey in Mithila is the part of Ramayana from the Vishwamitra Ashram at Buxar to the Kingdom of Mithila.
Manimandapa is a Hindu temple believed to be the actual place of marriage between the Prince Rama of Ayodhya and the Princess Sita of Mithila Kingdom. It is located at the outskirts of Janakpur city in the Mithila region of Nepal.
Rajdevi Mandir at Janakpurdham is the Kuldevi temple of the King Janaka in the ancient Mithila Kingdom. It is located at a distance of a few steps from the Janaki Mandir in Janakpur.
1 2 Burghart, R. (1988.) Cultural knowledge of hygiene and sanitation as a basis for health development in Nepal. Contributions to Nepalese Studies 15 (2): 185–211.
1 2 3 Mishra, K. C. (1996). Pilgrimage centres and tradition in Nepal. In: D. P. Dubey (ed) Rays and Ways of Indian Culture. M.D. Publications Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi.
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