Bhusandeswar Temple

Baba Bhusandeswar Temple is in Kumbhirgadi village in the Bhograi block of Balasore district, Odisha, and is described as housing Asia's largest Shiva linga. The linga, carved from black granite, measures about 12 feet long and 14 feet wide, yet only half of it shows; the rest has stayed buried for years. It is made in three parts, with an octagonal middle section around 12 feet across and nearly four feet high, and the whole linga leans slightly to the right.

Local belief connects it with Ravana. Shiva is said to have given him the linga with a warning never to set it down, but while carrying it in his flying chariot, the Pushpaka vimana, he grew desperate and planted it here. When he tried to raise it again it proved too heavy, and the linga lay in the wild for a long time.