Arulmigu Balathandayuthapani Temple, Penang (Waterfall Hilltop Temple)

Drive up Waterfall Road and, some 3 km before the Botanic Gardens, a Shiva over eight metres tall stands at the base of the hill to welcome you. From there it is 513 steps. Halfway up, on a narrow ledge of rock, is the old Murugan temple, where Thaipusam was held until 2012. Climb on and you reach a granite plateau and a seven-storey rajagopuram about 21.6 metres tall. Through an 18-foot carved teak door, six pillars inside stand for Murugan's six Arupadai Veedu. In the sanctum is Balathandayuthapani, Murugan as the young renunciant leaning on his staff. The temple was carved on site over four years by artisans from South India, in the manner of Chola and Pallava temples, and the view from the top takes in George Town and the sea.

The name comes from a waterfall. When Francis Light founded the British settlement in the late 18th century, the indentured Tamil labourers who came with him found fresh water at the island's eastern falls, and they were the men who carted it into town by bullock cart. They also needed somewhere to pray, so they planted a vel on the bank of the falls under a thatched roof. Thaipusam was being kept at that thatched vel by the early 1800s; no place of worship on the island is older. As the town grew, the falls became a protected water catchment and then the Botanic Gardens, and crowds were kept out to keep the water clean. In exchange the Hindus were given land on this hill 3 km away. There is no waterfall at the new site, but the names Waterfall Temple and Thanneermalai never left. A small vel shrine still stands at the original spot, and the falls can be visited with special permission.

The hill has seen five generations of the temple. It began as a shrine eight feet square; the first steps were built in 1933 and a fourth-generation temple in 1985. Around 1999 the committee could not decide whether to enlarge it or build afresh higher up. To learn Murugan's own wish they used an old method: a two-year-old child was asked to pick one of two coloured packets, one for each choice. Three times the child picked the packet that meant moving. Consultants added that underground springs ran beneath the old temple and made it unsafe, and so the fifth temple rose higher up the hill.

At the summit there is a small koi pond and an aviary with peacocks and bright birds, and smaller shrines and sculptures dot the grounds. Day-to-day management lies with Penang’s statutory Hindu Endowments Board.

Thaipusam pilgrims were gathering at the falls early in the 1800s. Sketches from 1879 record a thatch-roofed hut on the stream’s left side. Around 1904 the area was declared a catchment and became the Botanic Gardens. The temple was given about 13 acres on the hill in three parcels, the largest of 11.5 acres. The old hill temple halfway up goes back to about 1850, but the waterfall shrine itself was only being moved across in 1913, when the Penang Gazette printed a notice of its removal to protect the water supply. The first steps came in 1933 and a fourth-generation temple in 1985. In February 2000 a delegation went to the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham for guidance on a new temple, which was designed under the sthapati V. Ganapati. After nearly a decade of work and about RM10 million, its Maha Kumbhabhishekam was held in 2012. In 2017 the board brought in a golden chariot carrying the vel.

For about two weeks before Thaipusam, milk abhishekam is held every morning and evening, and devotees carry pots of milk up the steps to offer to Murugan. The vel kavadi is the highest form of vow, and some groups pull a ratham kavadi, a cart-like kavadi drawn by several people. The board asks elderly devotees, the chronically ill and people with disabilities to fulfil their vows a week early to avoid the crush. These are acts of devotion, and no outcome is promised.