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[[File:Jakh Botera (Kutch folk deities) temple shrine on Kakadbhit Hill, Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Jakh Botera temple on Kakadbhit Hill]]
'''Jakh Botera''', '''Jakhdada''', '''Jakkha Bautera''', '''72 Yaksha''' or '''Bohter [[Yaksha]]''', literally seventy-two [[Yaksha]] warriors, are group of folk deities worshiped widely in [[Kutch district]] of [[Gujarat]], India.

==Legends==
[[File:Many idols of Jakh Botera (Kutch folk deities) at Kakadbhit, Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Jakh Botera at Kakadbhit|left]]
[[File:Central idols of Jakh Botera (Kutch folk deities) at Kakadbhit, Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Central idols at Kakadbhit]]
The Jakhs said to were shipwrecked on the Kutch coast and came ashore at place, now known as [[Jakhau]]. Variously described as tall and fair-complected with an advanced culture, their traditional number is seventy-two with at least one woman. Their origins are obscure.<ref>{{Cite book|author=Simpson, Edward |year=2009|chapter=Chapter 1. Texts, Machinations and the Past|title=Muslim Society and the Western Indian Ocean: The Seafarers of Kachchh|location=London|publisher=Routledge|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=dtI1ynX9x-UC&pg=PA40 40]|isbn=978-0-415-54377-4}}</ref><ref name="Dilipsinh2004">{{cite book|author=K. S. Dilipsinh|title=Kutch in Festival and Custom|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oPUFiGRH07IC&pg=PA60|date=1 January 2004|publisher=Har-Anand Publications|isbn=978-81-241-0998-4|pages=59–60}}</ref>

The legend associates Jakhs with historical town of Punvaranogadh, the ruins are located about two miles to the north-west of present-day village of [[Manjal]], [[Kutch district]], [[Gujarat]].<ref name="gbp">{{cite book|title=Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency: Cutch, Palanpur, and Mahi Kantha|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dLUBAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA210|year=1880|publisher=Printed at the Government Central Press|page=234-237}} {{PD-notice}}</ref>

Punvaranogadh was built around 878 by Punvar, son of Ghaa or Ghav, the chief of [[Kera, Kutch]] and possibly a nephew of Lakho Phulani. Quarreling with his family, Punvar or Punrao resolved to found a city and call it after his own name. When the city was finished, the architect was rewarded by having both his hands chopped off that he might not do work like it for any one else. Soon after, seven devotees of Jakhs renowned for their virtues and miracles came from Rum-Sham (possibly [[Anatolia]] and [[Syria]] or [[Byzantine]]), and settled in a high hill near Punvaranogadh. Hearing of their fame, Punvar's childless queen had an underground passage dug from the palace to the devotees' hill. Helping them in the service of their god Jakh, she after six months prayed them to ask the god to give her a son. But, for her husband's sins, until a sacrifice was offered in the palace, the prayer could not be granted. By the underground passage the holy men entered the palace and were performing their rites when Punvar, hearing there were strange men in the women's rooms, forced his way in, seized the devotees, and set them with bare feet to tread out corn in a threshing floor bristling with harrow-spikes. Pitying their sufferings a friendly barber named Babra offered to take the place of one of them. The freed devotee went to the top of Lakhadiya hill nearby and call Jakhs to their aid. Jakhs heard the prayer, and, with an earthquake that shook the hills, appeared with seventy-one brothers and a sister, Sayari or Sairi. Called on to give up the holy men, Punvar refused and by the help of the gods and a magic amulet suffered nothing from the arrows of Jakhs. Then Sayari, taking the form of a mosquito, bit Punvar on the arm so that he drew of his amulet, and, in the siege, a stone falling from the roof broke his head. Jakhs cursed the town and it has since lain desolate. Later Jakhs were revered by people and the temples were erected in their dedication.<ref name="gbp"/><ref name="The Times of Indiab2006">{{cite web | title=Liberating 'gora' gods of rural Kutch | website=The Times of India | date=10 September 2006 | url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Liberating-gora-gods-of-rural-Kutch/articleshow/1973771.cms | access-date=27 July 2015}}</ref><ref name="Olikara 2013">{{cite web | author=Olikara | title=Jakhs of Kutch-Were they Jacobite Syrian Christians ? | website=Nasranis | date=29 December 2013 | url=http://www.nasrani.net/2013/12/29/jakhs-of-kutch-were-they-jacobite-syrian-christians/ | access-date=27 July 2015}}</ref><ref name="Desai2007">{{cite book|author=Anjali H. Desai|title=India Guide Gujarat|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gZRLGZNZEoEC&pg=PA325|year=2007|publisher=India Guide Publications|isbn=978-0-9789517-0-2|page=325}}</ref>

Another story is that in the eighth century; king Punvar oppressing the Sanghar community, they sought the aid of Jakhs. Seventy-two Jakhs came, and, establishing themselves on a hill three miles from Punvaranogadh, took the fort and killed the chief. The Sanghars named this hill Kakkadgadh or Kakkadbhit in honour of the strange leader Kakkad, and, out of respect for the saviours, called them Yakshas or Jakhs after the fair-skinned horse-riding demigods, [[Yaksha]]. In their honour the Sanghars made images of the seventy-two horsemen, set them on a railed platform on Punvaranogadh with their faces towards the south and started annual fair dedicated to them.<ref name="gbp"/><ref name="Olikara 2013"/>

Another story suggested that they were healers who traveled on horseback, helped poor and considered messenger of God. Due to their influence of people, Punvar disliked and killed them all. The temple was erected at Kakkadbhit to commemorate their sacrifice.<ref name="Dalal2014">{{cite book|author=Roshen Dalal|title=Hinduism: An Alphabetical Guide|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zrk0AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT563|date=18 April 2014|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|isbn=978-81-8475-277-9|page=563}}</ref>

Several of the hills near get their names from their quaking before Jakhs; Nanao, "the sinker"; Dhrabvo, the shaker ; Lakhadiyo, unstable as water ; Addho Chini, the eleft{{typo help inline|reason=similar to left|date=August 2021}}. Another hill was called Kakadbhit after the youngest of the seventy-two Jakhs.<ref name="gbp"/><ref name=":0">{{Cite news|url=https://shareinindia.in/shree-yakshbauntera/|title=શ્રી જખ્ખબૌંતેરા - કચ્છ|last=Siddhapura|first=Mayur|date=2017-09-06|work=Share in India|access-date=2017-09-15|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170915124139/https://shareinindia.in/shree-yakshbauntera/|archive-date=2017-09-15|language=gu|trans-title=Shri Jakhkh Botera - Kutch}}</ref>

==Origin==
[[File:Idols of Jakh Botera (Kutch folk deities) at Kakadbhit, Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Idols at the temple on Kakadbhit hill]]
Yaksha, a term later corrupted into ''Jakh'', of Kutch has obscure origin but are agreed as a historical figures. They are described as superhuman beings, white, handsome, and mounted on horseback. According to popular view, Jakhs were of either Hindu or Arab origin. The social and religious customs and practices of Sanghars, the followers of Jakhs, are a mixture of Hindu and Islamic ones.<ref name="Olikara 2013"/> Fair horsemen from the west, the fact that their traces remain only on the coast would seem to show that they came by sea. This excludes from the number of possible Jakhs, the [[Greeks]], the [[Indo-Scythians]]s, and the [[White Hun]]s who all came from land routes. There remain the Romans of the first, the Persians of the sixth, and the Arabs of the eighth centuries. The Romans may be rejected. Their invasion is doubtful and they could hardly have brought horses. Arabs too seem unlikely. They would strike the Kutch people as ruddy not as white, and, by their conquest of Sindh and their attacks on western India, the Arabs were too well known to become centres of legend. It therefore seems probable that these Yakshas were the Persians who, at that time the chief seafaring nation in the Indian seas, in the sixth century, conquered the lower [[Indus]], but did not settle withdrawing as soon as the local ruler agreed to pay tribute. The Indo-Sassanian coins recovered in 1830 also associate them with Persian origin.<ref name="gbp"/>

Sometimes they are associated with Europeans due to reference of fair skin.<ref name="The Times of Indiab2006"/> [[Rushbrook Williams]], an English historian, in his book ''The Black Hills of Kutch'' suggested that the Jakhs may be [[Zoroastrian]] who while fleeing Persia might have shipwrecked on the coast of Kutch. Another theory suggest that they belonged to [[Byzantine]] or [[Assyria]].<ref name="Dilipsinh2004"/><ref name="Desai2007"/><ref name="Dalal2014"/> The Persian [[Sassanid]] kings had association with [[Israelites|Jacobites]] or [[Nestorian]]s which might have landed in Kutch.<ref name="Olikara 2013"/><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/301199092|title=The idea of Gujarat: History, ethnography, text|last1=Simpson|first1=Edward|last2=Kapadia|first2=Aparna|year=2010|isbn=9788125041139|pages=7–15}}</ref>

==Names==
The names are listed in a poem associated with legend. In 18th century, Hamirji Gadhvi, the court-poet of Rao [[Deshalji II]] of [[Cutch State]], was asked by Deshalji to find the all names of Jakhs. He miraculously received the names of Jakhs on the Lanki hill close to Sinduri stepwell near Bharapar village on the way to [[Kera, Kutch|Kera]] from [[Bhuj]]. Hamirji doubted that the Rao would consider his list as forgery. When he prayed the Jakhs and presented the list in court, the Jakhs appeared in the sky, one after another. The temple was built at the place where they appeared near the court which is known as Jakhjarna in Bhuj. The shrine was also built by Hamirji on the Lanki hill ({{coord|23.1716295|69.6380945|display=inline}}) where they had given him names.<ref name="Wikimedia Commons 2016">{{cite web | title=File:Jakh Botera Kakadbhit Kutch folk deities list in Gujarati.jpg | website=Wikimedia Commons | date=21 April 2016 | url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jakh_Botera_Kakadbhit_Kutch_folk_deities_list_in_Gujarati.jpg|language=gu | access-date=21 April 2016}}</ref><ref name=":0" />

They are as follows:<ref name=":0" />
{{columns-list|
# Sahu
# Beriyo
# Jindiyo
# Jakkh Sacho
# Jakkh Sinagaro
# Devpuri
# Sompuri
# Sanheri
# Datar
# Kandero
# Vikalsen
# Mesharol
# Mandrakal
# Jakkhadev
# Abhadev
# Abhevan
# Adamjakkh
# Adepal
# Oliyo
# Ratanna
# Sidhat
# Padamnag
# Setranag
# Makesari
# Vadajakkh
# Makad
# Kakad
# Siddha
# Sahad
# Chahad
# Megha
# Bimbar
# Pingad
# Sah
# Zamut
# Baluk
# Visot
# Veyasguru
# Jasguru
# Vachhraj
# Melash
# Belash
# Jakka Ajit
# Mahuk
# Sidharath
# Samrath
# Bharat
# Uttamsen
# Paratapi
# Gaupal
# Bhupal
# Nipal
# Hatharan
# Gangesar
# Dharam
# Gautamraj
# Budhvant
# Tejvant
# Makarand
# Tansen
# Dhajabandh
# Rishbhan
# Digbhan
# Dwijbhan
# Madhuvan
# Roopmal
# Makat
# Sakatmal
# Surchand
# Veerchand
# Anand
# Sadhir
}}

==Iconography and temples==
[[File:Gate of village Mota Yaksh (Kakadbhit), Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Gate of village Mota Yaksh (Kakadbhit)]]
Their idols are presented as the Jakh warrior mounted on the horse. They are presented in group with idols, generally seventy two, in varying size and shapes.

The temple shrines dedicated to Jakhs are known as ''Thada'' locally. The major temple dedicated to them is erected on a small hillock of Kakadbhit, located on highway few kilometers from [[Manjal]], which is about 35 kilometers from [[Bhuj]].<ref name="About Gujarat">{{cite web | title=Kakkad Bhit Yaksha | website=NRI Gujarat | url=http://www.nri.gujarat.gov.in/kutch-kakkad-bhit-yaksha.htm | access-date=27 July 2015}}</ref> Several other temples are construed across Kutch and beyond by their followers including Sanghar community. Saint [[Mekan Dada]] and the ruler of former [[Cutch State]], [[Deshalji II]] construed temples in their dedication.

==Fair==
[[File:Annual Mota Yaksh Fair at Jakh Botera (Kutch folk deities) temple at Kakadbhit, Kutch, Gujarat, India.jpg|thumb|Annual Mota Yaksh fair at foothills of Kakadbhit]]
The fair dedicated to Jakhs, ''Jakh Botera no Melo'' or ''Mota Jakh no Melo'', is organised on the second Monday of [[Bhadrapad]] (September–October) every year on the foothills of Kakadbhit. This fair lasting two to three days is attended by thousands of pilgrims, mostly Kutch Hindus.<ref name="gbp"/><ref name="The Times of Indiab2006"/><ref name="Olikara 2013"/><ref name="Dalal2014"/> It is considered one of the largest fair of Kutch. Other fair known ''Nana Yakshno Melo'' is organized every year near [[Bhuj]].{{citation needed|date=May 2018}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{HinduMythology}}

[[Category:Regional Hindu gods]]
[[Category:Hindu folk deities]]
[[Category:Culture of Kutch]]

Jakh Botera - Revision history

ImportMaster at 11:27, 24 September 2021