When I visited the shrine this week, stink emanating from a gutter, blocked by a mass of rotting flowers, greeted at the gate. As I stood with nose covered in a long queue, a policeman on duty called for a wooden stick so he could himself clear the water passage.

He noticed a visitor carrying a polythene bag. “It’s not allowed," he said. The visitor took out the puja paraphernalia and threw the polythene in the direction of the gate. The cop didn't object.

A woman shrieked, this was followed by peels of laughter. It turned out that one of the monkeys jumping temple walls had pooped on her.

Just a manifestation of Indians’ easy cohabitation with dirt.

This temple draws huge crowds to Varanasi every year as it houses one of the 12 Jyotir Lingams. This makes it one of the most revered Shiva temples across India and, therefore, a must visit for Hindus.

But on return, I couldn't help but agree with Gandhi that Hindus need nothing less than condemnation for what they have done to the holy site.

But just how did we reduce one of our holiest places of worship to such a pathetic state?

Devout Hindus know that it's not just the Kashi Vishwanath we have mangled. Our most revered temples throughout India, and particularly in the north, are - to put it plainly - a repellent sight.

A shopkeeper just outside the entrance to the temple, who requested not to be named but introduced himself as a relative of the pujari, blamed the "mismanagement" on the government. "This temple has been under the control of the government since the eighties. We don't know where all the donations go. Besides increasing the temple security and stationing so many cops, they haven't done anything," he said.

"Even the allied charitable activities of the temple, like running a school and akhara, have stopped," he said.

Another shop owner in the vicinity, who introduced himself simply as Raju, objected to the term "filthy" I used for the temple in the first place. "Just what is clean and what is dirty? It means different things to different people. You city-bred folks think water mixed with soil is dirty. It is not," he said.

"We bathe the Lingam with milk and water, and offer flowers, leaves and fruits. All that leaves a mess, I agree, but it's not dirt," he said.

What about the stink and the sight of excrete outside the premises?

"All that is muncipal body's laxity. Temple authorities have nothing to do with that," he said.

The government has been attempting course correction and has announced a Rs 600 crore highly ambitious Kashi Vishwanath Corridor Project for comfortable accessibility to the temple. The plan, that was shelved several times in the past but has received a renewed push under the Yogi Adityanath government, is to make Kashi Vishwanath visible and accessible from the Ganga. This will involve demolition of many unauthorised structures around the temple that also affect fire-fighting and other rescue operations. The path, it is expected, will become much cleaner.

But for now, visitors must bear with the stench and the rot.

However, they are equally to blame.

Barely two kilometres away, again in a narrow and slippery lane, stands another revered Shiva temple named Kal Bhairav. This temple houses one of the fiercest forms of Lord Shiva and is believed to protect devotees from all problems.

"Devotees are wary of throwing anything they have bought or received from the temple as it’s considered sacred. If they receive a flower garland from the priest, they would put it around the neck of a cow because they can't dump it on the ground. They place the leftover leaves under the trees. They even refuse to throw the empty paper boxes in the dustbin. Instead, they leave them in a corner," said Pradeep Nath Upadhyay, who sells sacred hand bands near the temple.