Sambhar Lake

The Story

When desert land is usually desolate and barren, Sambhar is a dazzling exception: a huge bowl-shaped water body in the middle of the Thar, ringed by the historical town of the same name. In the dry months it is not water but a vast white salt field that crunches underfoot.

Legend tells that Shakambhari Devi, the tutelary goddess of the Chauhan Rajputs and a form of the divine mother, once turned a dense forest into a land of silver as a reward for service. Fearing greed would overcome the people, she then converted the silver into salt — and the lake was born.

Every year, Sambhar yields nearly two lakh tonnes of salt, harvested from the brine in great crystalline sheets. Migratory flamingos and thousands of other birds also make the lake one of Rajasthan's most important wetlands, drawn by its shallow, salty waters.