Gateway to Lumbini, Siddharthnagar
Formerly called Bhairahawa, Siddharthnagar, the administrative headquarters of Rupandehi District, is about 265 km west of Kathmandu. The change in name is obviously because of the fact that Siddhartha Gautam (Lord Buddha) was born in nearby Lumbini. In fact, it is the gateway to Lumbini, which is situated some 22 km to the west of the city. The Gautam Buddha Airport (which everyone wants to make international but haven’t been able to as yet) is about 3 km from the city center. Siddharthnagar is a bustling mid-sized city that has a lot of commercial activities because of its proximity to the Indian border town of Sunauali (about three and a half kilometers away) which in turn is just two hours from Gorakhpur, one of the larger cities of Uttar Pradesh, India’s biggest state. Gorakhpur has an important train junction from where Delhi can be reached in 12–18 hours and Kolkata in 10–12 hours. Within Nepal, the Siddhartha Highway connects to Butwal and thereon to the East-West Mahendra Highway.
There’s an archeological site called Devedaha (near Khairhani village) about 15 km northeast of Siddharthnagar that is associated with the Koliyas, Queen Mayadevi’s tribe, and thus, Lord Buddha’s too, from the maternal side. A particularly significant fact about this tribe is that it is believed to be one of only eight tribes to receive Lord Buddha’s corporeal relics after his demise at Kushinagar. There’s another place called Ramagrama about 20 km east of Siddharthnagar that has the remains of a stupa (with a mound 20 m across and 10 m high) and a monastery on the banks of the Jahari River. Archeologists think that Ramagrama could have been the center of the Koliya kingdom in the old days. Kapilvastu, the ancient kingdom of the Shakyas, Lord Buddha’s clan, is located 40 km west of Siddharthnagar, and it’s the scene of many archeological finds.
