Para Stone Deul

Para Stone Deul is an ancient 10th to 11th-century sandstone temple located in Para village, Purulia district, West Bengal. Standing approximately 40 feet high, it is part of a complex of three medieval deuls built during the Pala-Sena era when Para served as an early capital for local chieftain lineages (Panchakot / Manrajas). Constructed in the classical Orissan Rekha Nagara order, the temple displays intricate relief carvings of dancing celestial maidens, floral scrolls, and geometric friezes chiseled directly into the stone blocks without mortar. The site was surveyed by J.D. Beglar for the ASI in 1878 and remains a crucial monument of pre-Islamic stone architecture in the Rarh region.