Manwal is a town in Udhampur district of the Jammu division of Jammu and Kashmir, India. It lies away from the district headquarters of Udhampur. Manwal is a small town surrounded by the Shivalik Mountains. The Manwal railway station is located approximately from the main town area. Manwal is famous for an ancient Devi Bhagavati Temple which lies in the town. The Devi Bhagavati Temple was originally dedicated to Vishnu and dates back to the 10th or 11th century CE. Bhagavati Temple Bhagavati temple has been taken over by the Archaeological Survey of India for preservation and protection along with four other ancient temples. It consists of a Garbhgriha (sanctum) and an Antarala with square Mandapa. The walls of the Mandapa have eight niches. As per legend, the garbhgrihas once carried an image of Shakti, the divine power of creation. The outer chamber is open but the entrance doors have been richly carved with deities of different natures. The horizontal beam of the door has been carved with the images of navgraha, and is intermittently decorated with floral and geometrically designed motifs. The temple is a wide path around the main building wherein several sculptures of gods are kept. The most prominent among them are the images of Surya and Mahavira. There is a strange sculpture of a carved serpentine coil kept in a niche of the main wall of the parikrama. Other images include various incarnations of Shakti and Shiva. The temples are stone structures, which the great Kashmir ruler Lalitaditya built at the foot of Harmukh mountain in Kashmir in the 8th century AD. The remains of the ancient temples feature art and architecture that was prevalent in their time. Some of the stones, monolithic beams, and pillars used in their construction are over a dozen feet long and their sculptures and carvings are splendid and impressive. Historian Ashok Jerath, in his book tilted 'Dogra legends of Art and Culture' has written, "A few hundred meters from the main road, deep in the village of Dera, we found a colossus structure of a massive building with towering pillars, wide sanctums and open mandapas. This holy building is erected on a massive platform which can be reached with a flight of twelve steps on the west side. We suddenly found ourselves in a wide chamber with eight fluted columns having ornamental bases. These columns might have been used for