The Man made caves are part of the Ambajidurga hill range situated in Chintamani Taluk, Chikkaballapura District.
Ambajidurga Hill Range: There is evidence to show the fort on the highest hill top was built by a Chieftan Ambaji Rao who was with the Maratha Empire. There is a temple of Lord Shiva and Hanuman in the vicinity of the Fort.
Background : Mr. Chowda Reddy was the MLA of the Chintamani taluk in the year 1991. Due to continuous drought there was scarcity of drinking water in Chintamani. Mr. Reddy trekked the hills and found this plateau and decided to build a water storage tank.
During the visits to construction site of the tank he noticed the south facing cliff measuring around 400feet. He had a vision and felt he should get a statue of Dakshinamurthy, Ganga and Bhagiratha.
Mr. Krishnamurthy the then convener at sri prasanna anjaneya swamy temple, mahalakshmi layout introduced Mr. Reddy to Mr. Vidyasagar from chennai who was a renowned geologist. Eagerly Mr. Vidyasagar agreed to look for a good sculpturer/stapathi to construct the temple. Mr. Vidya sagar meet Late Sri S M Ganapathi stapathi at kanchipuram and briefed him about the project and Mr. Chowda Reddy.
Mr. Ganapathi stapathi eagerly accepted to visit the place and suggested the feasibility.
Who is Ganapathi Stapathi?
Mr. Ganapathi Stapathi rebuilt bhadrachalam rama mandhir in 1960. He was an ardent devotee of the 68th pontif of kanchee kamakoti peetham latesri sri chandrashekharananda saraswathi. Mr. Ganapathi stapathi was instrumental in relocating 48 temples which would have been submerged in the back waters of nagarjuna sagar dam. To his credit he has couple of thousand temples designed and built.
During one of the interactions with his holliness sri sri chandrashekharananda saraswathi Mr. Ganapathi stapathi mentioned that he had completed construction/designed couple of thousand temples. At this juncture swamiji intervened and said none of these temples could withstand a natural calamity. Swamiji expressed his wish to build a temple in a hill range near kanchee in such a way that it could withstand any natural calamity and last as long as this planet is there.
When Mr. Vidhyasagar mentioned to Mr. Ganapathi stapathi about the project in the ambaji durga hill range he eagerly accepted to design and guide the temple project in order to fullfil the wish of mahasamiji sri sri chandrashekharananda swamiji.
Humble beginning in 1993 went on in creating a large 20,000 sft of inter connecting man made cave temple complex over a period of 25 years. This is the largest temple cave complex in last 1000 years.
Lord Ganesha statue was consecrated in the year 1994. In 1996 Lord Shiva (Chaturmukha Linga) with his consort Jagadamba was consecrated .
Aerial View of Shree Kshetra Kailasagiri Cave Temple
Yogi Narayana Yatindra of Kaiwara has in one of his hymes mentioned that goddess Jagadamba will come to this hill range
