Gudahandi Hills, Kalahandi Odisha

The Gudahandi hills are situated in the vicinity of Khaligarh, a tiny villoage close to the Koraput District boarder, about 17.6 K.Ms North-East of Ampani. Ampani is 77 K.Ms from Bhawanipatna on the road towards Nawarangpur. In the Gudahandi hills are some ancient caves bearing pictographic paintings of remote antiquity, Khaligarh is a very out of the way place, the 17.6 K.Ms of Ampani being cart tracxt parts of which pass through dense forest.
Three small hills, all of curved length, are together known as the Gudahandi hills. The North and the South hills join eachother in the East leaving a courtyard like vally in between which is open towards the West. This valley is paved by a huge block of stone slopping down to the East. Just at the foot of these hills facing the valley are rows of caves. Excepting one in the North, all the caves are small in size. Although at places hewed to shape by human hand they generally appear to have been formed bynature itself in red slate stone. Pictographic paintings in Red and Black colours appear at the entrances of some of caves in the Southern row. These have not yet been thoroughly studied but it is generally surmised that they bear approximately to the picture scripts of the Indus Valley Civilisation. Besides Gudahandi in Kalahandi District, Bikramkhol and Ulapgarh in Sambalpur District and Naraj in Cuttack District also possess some writings resembling pictographic paintings. a fact indicative of pre-historic man’s habitation in Orissa.

The third hill extending North to South stands like a way to the immediate West of the Valley. But as this hill does not join with the other two, the valley is approachable from the North as well as from the South by a narrow pass. All the three hills taken together have the appearance of a pot with a lid on. The name Gudahandi, meaning a pot, for molasses, may have its origin in the impression its shape apprently conveys.
A rivulet named Behera flows past the village. There are remains of a veryold dam across this revulet, local people call it the work of Bhima, the second of the Pandavas.

Nearest Railway Station : Junagarh
Nearest Airport : Bhubaneswar, Raipur
How to Reach :