Sarvananda (15th century) was a Hindu votary of the tantras (religious orders or service-books) who devoted himself to worship at Mehar, the place in chandpur where he was born. His grandfather, Vasudev Bhattacharya, had attained a spiritual enlightenment through yoga. Sarvananda was illiterate in his youth. Legend has it that he was indoctrinated by a saint and reached attainment after meditation based on mystic incantations while riding on a corpse on the last day of the Bangla month of Paus at the feet of an old tree in Mehar. He experienced the ten forms of goddess Bhairabi in 1426 AD (1437 according to some account). Later, he took Chandrachur Tarkalankar of Senhati village in khulna as his preceptor and married his daughter Gauri. He compiled a sanskrit book called Sarvollasatantra, a collection of incantations for tantric meditation. The descendants of Sarvananda are now known as the Sarvavidya family. [Satyanarayan Chakraborty]