The Kamakhya Temple at Nilachal hills in Guwahati, Assam is one of the oldest and most revered centres of Tantric practices,"Seated on top of Nilacala hill on the banks of the Brahmaputra river in the state of Assam, Northeast India, Kamakhya temple is one of the oldest and most revered centres of Tantric practice in South Asia." dedicated to the goddess Kamakhya. The temple is the center of the Kulachara Tantra Marga and the site of the Ambubachi Mela, an annual festival that celebrates the menstruation of the goddess."Today, Kamakhya remains both a vibrant centre of Tantric practice as the seat of a living lineage of the Kulacara Tantra Marga and a popular pilgrimage destination as the locus of major festivals such as Ambuvacī Mela." Structurally, the temple is dated to the 8th-9th century with many subsequent rebuildings—and the final hybrid architecture defines a local style called Nilachal. It is also one among the oldest 4 of the 51 pithas in the Shakta tradition.The four oldest of [the sakta pithas] are Kamarupa in the northeast, Uddiyana in the north (in the Swat Valley of modern Pakistan), Purnagiri in the south (precise location unknown) and Jalandhara (near Kangra in Himachal Pradesh)" An obscure place of worship for much of history it became an important pilgrimage destination, especially for those from Bengal, in the 19th century during colonial rule." As Ramos persuasively argues in her study of the sakta pithas, the once obscure and remote region of Assam became increasingly important to many Indians (particularly Bengalis) during the nineteenth century amidst the politics of British colonial rule."
