The Nagore Dargah, 5 km north of Nagapattinam, is one of the most important Sufi shrines in south India. It is built over the tomb of Hazrat Meeran Sahib Shahul Hamid, a Sufi saint from Nagore who died in 1570. The dargah draws pilgrims from across Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, and Sri Lanka — Muslim, Hindu, and Christian alike — in a tradition of inter-religious veneration unusual even for Tamil Nadu's syncretic religious culture.
The complex contains five minarets of different heights added by different rulers, a main mosque, and the saint's tomb chamber. The annual Kanduri festival, lasting ten days, attracts hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and is one of the largest religious gatherings on the Tamil Nadu coast. The atmosphere in the dargah is intense and genuine: constant crowds, clouds of incense, and the particular quality of a place where people are actually there to pray rather than to visit.