Night view of Ambedkar Park in Lucknow, India

Lucknow in India is remembered for it's landscape of crumbling palatial buildings and gardens inspired by 'Nawabi' fantasies and British nostalgia, now includes Ambedkar Memorial Park which may not be an architectural beauty but gigantic look for sure.

This Park is at the gateway of the Gomti River, is a memorial, built using red sandstone from Rajasthan (India), is a vast complex with 112 feet high 'Stupa' at the center surrounded by countless pillars, elephants structures with formations.

Looks so celestial at night sprawling in an area of 107 acres.

©Anjani Kumar Tripathi
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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi
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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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©Anjani Kumar Tripathi

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Culture Embeded In Stone: Maheshpur

Archaeological explorations # 1

Stories of civilizations 

have always their roots 

in fertile plains of some river !!

                                Rihand River (also referred to as Rend, Rer, Rehar, Renu or Renuka) (Hindi: रिहन्द नदी) is a tributary of the Son River and flows through the Indian states of Chhattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh.

The Rihand rises from Matiranga hills, in the region south west of the Mainpat plateau, which is about 2,100 meters above mean sea level. The river flows north roughly through the central part of Surguja district for 160 kilometres (99 mi). The Rihand and its tributaries form a fertile plain in the central part of the district stretching from around Ambikapur to Lakhanpur and Pratappur. Thereafter, it flows north into Sonbhadra district of Uttar Pradesh via Singrauli district of Madhya Pradesh, where it is called Rhed and finally joins the Son.

 It's principal tributaries in Surguja district are the Mahan, the Morana (Morni), the Geur, the Gagar, the Gobri, the Piparkachar, the Ramdia and the Galphulla. Many seasonal and perennial rivers join the Rihand reservoir such as the Kanchan, the Mayar and the Azir of Singrauli district of Madhya Pradesh.

Rihand river as in Northern Province of India with a dam on it and terminating into Son river there in.

Rihand river as in northern parts of Chhattisgarh state of India, where it originates from.

^{Rivers have made the best bed for sprouting of human civilizations, ever since in history:}

The Rihand and it's tributaries form a fertile plain  in the central district stretching  around Ambikapur to Lakhanpur and Pratappur. It's principal tributaries are the Mahan ,the Morana(Morni) ,the Geur ,the Gagar ,the Gobri ,the Piparkachar , the Ramdia and Galphulla .

 The valley of this river must have been a place of seers, farmers, tradesmen of the great repute and satisfaction with peace ending for the longer period. So indicates the mythology in the name of the river, which says Renu name refers the seer Yamdagni's wife and Purushottam's (a legend of Hindu mythological history) mother Renuka Devi.

Excavations: Just at the bank of this river, 8 kilometers from Udaipur on Kedma road is the place 'Maheshpur' where ruined temples and numerous (about 200) images have been found including a stone inscription ( शिलालेख ) of 18 sentences.
Villagers called this place as 'Nishan Pakhna Teela' (means Heaps of Stony Symbols) as stony images were self visible on the open ground even without excavations .

The time period: These are the 8th century temple ruins. Shiva temples, ruins/images are so much in number that this place bears it's name 'Maheshpur' meaning the place of Shiva'.

stony structures entangled in roots of giant trees suggest that they must have remained deserted for a very long period of time for one or more reasons in their history of existence

Shiva worshiping structures are so much in number suggesting that this was a region of Gond empire. Gond were the tribal caste of Dravids.

Other idols and structures: Narsingh, Ganga, Kuber, Saraswati are the other deities whose idols were found at this site.

Laxmangarh is another near by place where fort ruins, beautiful rock arts, 6th century idols of Lotus, Laxmi were found in excavations.

Cultural phylogeny:

# the place must have been a center of 'Shaiv' culture ( worshiper of lord 'Shiva').
# the place must have been dominated by the 'Gond' (Gondwana) people (Gond as tribal caste of 'Dravids') of 'Dravidian' (sourtherner) culture (as Shiva temples, idols and symbols are found so much in abundance), as Gond empires were all in the central part of India of then history.
# 'Maheshpur' seems to be a city of temples basically Shaiv (Shiva) worshiping populace.
# 'Maheshpur' (meaning a fort of lord Mahesh or Shiva) name itself suggest the place and it's importance as Shaiv symbols/idols are so predominantly found.

*The Gondi (Gōndi) or Gond people are people in central India, spread over the states of Madhya Pradesh, eastern Maharashtra (Vidarbha), Chhattisgarh, northern Andhra Pradesh, and Western Orissa. With over four million people, they are the largest tribe in Central India.

Gond or Rajgond are same tribes. The term Raj Gond was widely used in 1940s, but has now become almost obsolete, probably because of the political eclipse of the Gond Rajas.
The Gondi language is related to Telugu and other Dravidian languages. About half of Gonds speak Gondi languages, while the rest speak Indo-Aryan languages including Hindi.

*But images of Vaishnav (worshiper of Vishnu deity) and Jain idols (of jain Teerthankar Rishabh Dev Aadinathतीर्थंकर आदिनाथ ) suggests that the preceding yeras population of the place , where culture flourished  and a lot people must have come to this place for trade and commerce purposes, living together amiably indicating a democratic governance at that time with equal right of life, opportunity and individual observance of faith.


Visible effect of 'Kalchuri' period: 
That shows the southerner effect on ..sculpture (मूर्तिकला).
Kalchuris (in Chhattisgarh, based basically in Ratanpur), they were secular in administration but they them self were Shaiv (Shiva) worshipers; but Vaishnav (Vishnu worshiper), Jainis, Buddhists were given protection in their kingdom to live, do trade and commerce and worship their own god.

Present state of 'Maheshpur' excavations:
Many images are broken in many pieces, so that, after cleaning-restoration, cosolidation and preservation work is still on. The place is surrounded by the dense forest. More deeper studies are yet to be done by technical experts of archaeologists. 

This place (Maheshpur) must be a mine of gem,

when we concern our self with the importance of Archaeological findings,

in understanding our days gone by 

on this planet earth !!

Funny Faces

Hilly Elephant

Ramgarh > Surguja > Chhattisgarh > India.

How Green Is My Valley

Monsoon has always defined the course of world's most civilizations in the long past human history. Cultures either flourished along with or vanished in the thin air leaving their traces behind, deep hidden in the barren grounds for archeologists to assumptions many. 

This is the most awaited & loved season of the year in India. Monsoon-rain factors like mountain 'Himalaya' & 'Sky' up above has always been revered and sung by poets in 'Rig Veda', the oldest writing available in India. 

And great many civilizations sprang up along side the rivers, in the course of time. 

Rivers have always been near to life and even in the death after..

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

picture at: Saraitikra, Ambikapur

Faith Matters: Vedic Rituals En Masse

'Faith' is a science of bodily-powers which transcends the confine of human body and finally acts as desired/projected.

'Particle Physics' too believes that the 'Graviton' are the only closed 'String' form (particle/energy:the duality) which has capacity to move through all other 11 known dimensions.

Such is the human spirit that one fine morning we found out that villagers are busy in erecting a huge podium for their faith sake to observe the oldest known rituals of Indian civilization, that is 'Vedic' observation and offerings to 'Agni' the 'Fire'.

Temporary tents were erected in the field by the villagers for the participants..

And a temporary covered-podium for the sermon of the Saints, who were gathering from the different parts of this huge nation..

And a temporary staying-utility-there-in the field too for the guest who shall share their insight with audience..

A central canopied structure made purely of Bamboo stem & leaves with native decorations.

This centrally erected structure shall be the place of worship with a place of 'sanctum sanctorum' in the most central to it.

And the Vedic rituals of worshiping 'Fire' with various 'Mantras' from 'Rig Veda' and other age-old scriptures would contain a wish for the well-being of all humans including the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms with the crucial balance of Nature with everything.

More references for the 'Yajna' (the sacred fire worshiping):

 (courtesy:Wikipedia)
In Hinduism, yajna (Sanskrit यज्ञ wikt:yajna; also Anglicized as Yajna, Yadna) is a ritual of sacrifice (also "worship, prayer, praise, offering and oblation, sacrifice" according to Monier-Williams) derived from the practice in Vedic times. Yajna is a ritual of sacrificing and sublimating the havana sámagri (herbal preparations) in the fire accompanied by the chanting of the Vedic mantras. The sublime meaning of the word yajna is derived from the Sanskrit verb yaj, which has a three-fold meaning of worship of deities (devapujana), unity (saògatikaraña) and charity (dána). An essential element is the sacrificial fire - the divine Agni - into which oblations are poured, as everything that is offered into the fire is believed to reach God. As the name of the service, the term yajna is linguistically (but not functionally) cognate with Zoroastrian (Ahura) Yasna. Unlike Vedic Yajna, Zoroastrian Yasna has "to do with water rather than fire".(Drower, 1944:78; Boyce, 1975:147-191)
Rituals associated with temple worship in Hinduism are called agamic, while those involving communication with divinity through Agni are considered to be Vedic. Temple rites in modern-day Hinduism are a combination of both Vedic and agamic rituals. The ritualistic portion of the Hindu scriptures is called Karma-Kanda. Parts of Vedas which describe or discuss Yajnas or sacrifices fall into this portion. The Nambudiri Brahmins of Kerala are among the most famous Śrauta Brahmins who maintain these ancient rituals.
Today, only a few hundred individuals know how to perform these sacrifices and even fewer are able to maintain the sacred fires continuously and perform the Śrauta rituals. Only a few thousand perform the Agnihotra or basic Aupasana fire sacrifice daily .

#place:Bhitthi, Ambikapur, India.
#date:11th February, 2012