Salabega occupies a prominent position among the devotional poets of Odisha, who devoted his life to
Jagannath. He lived in the first half of the 17th century. Nilamani Mishra, who has written a comprehensive account of the poet and his works, determines the birth of Salabega between circa AD 1607–1608. Salabega was the son of the Mughal subedar, Lalbeg. His father, on one of his military excursions, came across Dandamukundapur where he looted the village and killed many people. He saw a beautiful young Brahmin widow Lalita returning from her bath in a river. Lalbeg took her away by force, killed her family, raped her, and converted her to Islam and made her his wife but she still followed Hinduism. Salabega was their only son. As soon as he was old enough, Salabega took up fighting in his father's campaigns. Once he was severely wounded in battle. Battling for life he accepted the advice of his mother, and chanted the holy name of
Vishnu, which cured him miraculously. Feeling greatly indebted to Vishnu, he tried to learn more about
Hinduism. His mother taught him about
Jagannath, who is Vishnu. Amazed and thrilled he went to
Puri but was refused entrance into the temple of Jagannath due to his religion of birth. Thereafter he went on foot to
Vrindavan wherein he lived the life of an ascetic in the association of sadhus, reciting bhajans in honour of
Krishna. After one year in Vraja (Vrindavana), he returned to Puri desiring to see the
Ratha yatra festival of Jagannath, but on the way he suddenly fell ill. Feeling helpless and realising that he would not reach Puri in time to see the Ratha yatra festival, he offered prayers to Jagannath petitioning Him to wait until he arrived. On the day of the Return Cart festival, Nandighosa, the cart of Jagannath, did not move until Salabega's arrival. The place where the cart remained stationary to give darshana to Salabega, was later used by Salabega to compose his many bhajans in honour of Jagannath. His body was cremated there after his death. The Samadhi of this great devotee is still standing on the Grand road in Puri called badadanda. In his honour, every year during the Rath Yatra (Cart Festival), the cart of Jagannath stays for a while near his Samadhi. This poet was a great devotee of Sri Jagannath (Sri Krishna). His
bhajans are still popular among the devotees of Jagannath. Salabega composed numerous devotional songs but not all of them have survived. Most of his compositions are prayers and hymns to Jagannath and Krishna. A good number of these deal with the romantic dalliance of Krishna with the gopis and Radha, while a few are inspired by the vatsalya ras, the sweet, motherly feeling Yashoda had for little Krishna. ==Work==