Chandraghanta Ji

Chandraghanta is the third of the Navadurga, worshipped as Shiva's shakti in his Chandrashekhara form and venerated as destroyer of demons and protector of her devotees, a warrior-goddess who is also a compassionate mother figure.

Her name means "she who is adorned with the moon as her bell," from chandra (moon) and ghanta (bell), describing the bell-shaped crescent moon on her forehead.

She has ten arms, bearing a trident, sword, mace, bow and arrow, lotus, bell and kamandalu, with one hand in abhayamudra, the gesture dispelling fear. She rides a lion, has a golden complexion and a third eye, and her seat is held to be the Manipura (navel) chakra.

Two stories are told of her. At Shiva and Parvati's wedding, Shiva arrived in his wild ascetic form, ash-smeared, garlanded with skulls and snakes, riding Nandi at the head of a howling retinue of ghosts and spirits, and Parvati's family recoiled in terror; Parvati calmly transformed into the radiant, ten-armed Chandraghanta to restore order, and in turn asked Shiva to take a gentler form, after which the wedding proceeded. Later, the demon Jatukasura raised an army of monstrous bats whose wings blotted out the sun and terrorised the world; the gods prayed to Parvati, who again became Chandraghanta, and the roar of her lion and the sound of her bell scattered the bats before she killed Jatukasura himself with her trident.

Consort of Shiva in his Chandrashekhara form.

Her bell's sound is said to have paralysed demons in battle. She is understood to combine fierce, battle-ready power with maternal care for her devotees, and her worship on Navratri's third night is approached in that dual spirit.

No single named pilgrimage site stands out for her in the sources consulted; she is worshipped chiefly as part of the standard nine-night Navratri sequence rather than through a distinct regional cult.