By Ashima Goyal.
Would you believe me if I say, I travelled
back in time?
That one moment I was in 2013, and one hour later, I was in the 1500s?
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| Sahar Ki Masjid. Photo by Dimitry B. |
Just about an hour outside of Vadodara,
lies a town called Champaner. A town whose palaces, forts, mosques and wells stand
to tell tales of a time when Champaner was the capital of the Gujarat Sultanate.
Rightly called a city “frozen in time”, Champaner is a world heritage site, dotted with a large number
of historical monuments.
One Sunday afternoon, we set out with lots
of water and a packed lunch, for a day trip to Champaner. As soon as we turned
left from Halol on the SH87, we were transported. Suddenly the road was
deserted, there was greenery all around, there was a huge mountain in the
distance, and while we were still appreciating the change from the state highway, we found our first monument – Ek minar ki masjid!
It was rightly called Ek Minar ki Masjid, because that
is all that was left of the mosque; a single minaret! The rest was in
ruins.
Normally, a mosque has a pond or other water structure
for ablutions. This one had two; one in the mosque compound and one below.
First we thought it was for women, but women weren't allowed in mosques
back then. So perhaps it was to distinguish between different castes of people?
The helical (spiral) step well, made of stone and
bricks. The stairway to the well descends down like the coil of a snake.
Sakar Khan’s tomb. Notice the four guys perched up on
the tomb, having their own picnic in the afternoon.
Moti Gate: Entrance to the walled city.
Champaner is an exceptional example of a
pre-mughal township. The architecture and designs of the monuments are a blend
of local Gujarati traditions and Islamic designs. As the pictures below show,
we simply kept moving from one monument to another.
Shahar Ki Masjid: The private mosque of the royal
family. They say that each time you count the number of pillars here, you come up with a different number!
Jami Masjid, the most imposing monument in Champaner. There is a single grave in the mosque compound and when we asked one of the
locals, he said it was the grave of the priest during Mehmud Begda’s rule.
We spent almost an hour admiring the amazingly
intricate carvings and stone screen work inside the Jami Masjid.
There are in all 9 mosques in the entire walled city
and surprisingly, a common motif we saw in all was that of a kalash in the
Mihrab (priest’s standing place). An intentional mix of Hindu and Muslim
symbols?
Out trip ended with the
pigeons putting up an amazing show, inside the centuries old kabootar khana.
Author Bio: is passionate about volunteering and has been working actively with non-profits to encourage volunteerism. She runs small projects aimed at reaching out to the stranger like anonymous letters of love, gifts by hand that are left for people to pick up! She shares resources on volunteerism both for organisations and individuals at www.Volunteer Weekly.org.
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thanks for giving me such nice information it encourages me to go and visit all these places.
ReplyDeleteThe Muslim rulers very often plundered and razed the temples and later on while constructing a mosque in its place used the portions which could be put to use. That pillar with a Kalash is one such part.
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