Brahmani Temple, Avana

Brahmani Temple is a living shrine at Avana in Balasore district, Odisha, on the left bank of the Son river, roughly 6 km north of Ajodhya and 21 km from Balasore town. It is protected by the Odisha State Archaeology department. The building itself is recent, but it houses older sculpture: the presiding deity, an eight-armed, three-faced Chamunda, is dated on style to the 10th–11th centuries, and there is also a four-armed Avalokiteshvara among Buddhist and Shaiva images of the same period.

The temple faces west and is built of laterite in ashlar masonry, with a square pidha vimana, pancharatha in plan, fronted by a rectangular flat-roofed mandapa; its walls are plain inside and out. The images are carved in chlorite, and the priests regularly coat them with vermilion and oil, a practice that may harm the carving over time.