Indian temple where tortoise is worshipped

There are temples where different gods are worshipped. India has got a temple, which has got a god in the form of a tortoise. Locals believe that tortoise is the second avatar of the Indian God Lord Vishnu.

The temple is situated in Srikakulam in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. Devotees at the Kurmamnatha Swamy temple worship the unusual god, which according to the spiritual beliefs is the Kurma avatar of Lord Vishnu.

The devotees believe that one can earn spiritual benefits, if the tortoise is worshipped. The locals also strongly believe that by worshipping the tortoise, all the sins will be washed off and the person will be freed from rebirth.

The temple looks like a moving tortoise and has more than 200 pillars, with many inscriptions written in Devanagari script. The walls of the temple are decorated with scriptures and rock edicts from the 11th century to the 19th century. Some have said that the temple was initially a Sri Pathala Siddeswara Kshetra temple , which belonged to Lord Shiva. However, it was later converted to a Vaishnavaite temple by a great saint of the 11th century known as, saint Ramanujacharya. The story of God incarnating in to a tortoise is very common in the Hindu Mythology.