Bisfi (old Bisapi), a village some 21 km west of Madhubani town, was the home of Vidyapati (c. 14th–15th century), the Maithil Kavi Kokil whose songs to Radha-Krishna and Shiva-Gauri shaped Maithili and Bengali devotional literature. The site preserves the poet’s dih (ancestral mound), the ruins of the academy where he taught, a pond, and the Bhagwati Visveshwari Mata Sthan.
Bisfi is steeped in the most beloved legend of Maithil devotion: that Lord Shiva, moved by Vidyapati’s bhakti, incarnated here as Ugna — a humble servant in the poet’s courtyard — until his identity was revealed and he vanished. The Shiva temple Vidyapati is said to have frequented anchors the village’s sacred memory.
Long neglected, the dih has drawn renewed attention as a heritage and literary-pilgrimage site; the Bihar government has sanctioned a development scheme, including a tall statue of the poet, to honour Mithila’s foremost cultural icon.
