Dhamra (or Dhamara) is a small community on the banks of the

Dhamra River Dhamara is a joint stream in Odisha that is formed by the confluence of the Brahmani and Baitarani rivers south of the town of Chandabali. It lies in the Bhadrak district and empties into the Bay of Bengal. To the north of its mouth is the Dhamr ...

in the

Bhadrak district Bhadrak is a district of Odisha state in eastern India. Bhadrak city is the headquarters and the largest city of the district. Origin of name The district is named after goddess Bhadrakali whose temple is situated in Agarpada which is 8 ...

Odisha Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of ...

state,

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. They were Shoodars before independence, as it's in history. Others believe they're descendants of Clan Loot. It developed as a port around the 15th century AD. The port was used for the coastal trade between northern Odisha and

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

to the northeast, and continued to be used to a small extent after independence in 1947. During April, 1998, an agreement was signed to develop the

Port of Dhamara The Dhamra Port is a port in Bhadrak district, Odisha, India, on the shore of the Bay of Bengal about seven kilometres from the old port of Dhamra. The agreement to develop the port was signed in April 1998. The Dhamra Port Company Limited (DP ...

, about seven kilometers away on the coast of the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean, bounded on the west and northwest by India, on the north by Bangladesh, and on the east by Myanmar and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India. Its southern limit is a line between ...

, as a deep water port.

Legend

The temple of the Goddess Maa Dhamrai is located in the town. Some say that the goddess was brought from

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

by a local merchant who frequently traded with that island. Others say that she came from a place named ''Satabhaya''. She was thrown into the sea by her sisters who were angered by her pure vegetarianism, and was found floating by some fishermen who brought her to Dhamra. After an earlier temple had been destroyed, the present temple was built over a ten-year period, opening around 1990.

References

Cities and towns in Bhadrak district {{Bhadrak-geo-stub