Batu Caves

The Batu Caves are a limestone massif thirteen kilometres north of Kuala Lumpur, turned into the main Hindu temple complex of Malaysia. The sanctuary here was set up by Tamil settlers at the end of the 19th century and dedicated to Murugan, the god of war and patron of the Tamils. His gilded statue about forty metres high stands at the foot of the rock, and two hundred and seventy-two steps, painted in every colour in 2018, lead up to the Temple Cave. The vault of the main grotto rises almost a hundred metres, and altars and painted gate towers stand in the natural niches beneath it. At the festival of Thaipusam hundreds of thousands of pilgrims come here, many carrying kavadi on their shoulders.

On the map