TEMPLE VILLAGE
It may be the last time you set eyes on the exquisite temple village that is being reduced to dust
says Krishnendu Bandyopadhyay
Gopaldas Mukherjee’s weathered face deepens into a frown when he looks
around the place he so dearly loves. You follow his gaze – and stand
dumbfounded. There is temple, after temple, after temple. Some still
standing, their exquisite terracota designs preserved for centuries, others
in varying stages of decay and mostly in ruins.
It’s not for no reason that this place is called the Temple Village. “Soon,
very soon, this will all go,” sighs the ex-air force soldier. “It is virgin
territory for archaeology. The riverbed of Shirali is full of Palaeolithic
stone weapons but no one bothers about this treasure trove,” says Mukherjee
of Maluty, a forgotten village in the Dumka hills, on the Bengal-Jharkhand
border, a mere 16 km from Rampurhat. It’s a land of legends – the only place
in the country where 108 temples are clustered in a radius of just 350
metres.
These terracota temples have survived four centuries of nature’s vagaries
but the next generation may never get to see them. There is no attempt at
preserving these exquisite works of art. If you want a chunk of history to
liven up your drawing room, you can simply loosen one of the tiles and walk
off. Villagers say art ‘collectors’ and thieves are doing just that. What
makes it worse is the unbridled stone quarrying. The fumes and dust are
reducing the delicate terracota to dust.
A sad pass for a village that was once revered as a great seat of
learning. Mention of Maluty – known as Gupta Kashi in ancient times – is
found as early as the Sunga dynasty (185 BC-75 BC), whose founder was
Pushyamitra Shunga (185 BC-151 BC). It was at Maluty that the king of
Pataliputra performed Ashvamedh Yajna. It is said that Adi Shankaracharya,
on his way to Varanasi, had stopped over at Maluty. And it is here that he
launched his mission against Buddhism. Dandiswami of Varanasi’s Sumeru Math
still comes here once a year as part of the ritual that began with Adi Shankaracharya.
How Maluty – the capital of Baj Basanta dynasty – came about to be a
temple city is also an interesting story. “Instead of constructing palaces,
the Rajas built temples. The dynasty was broken into parts (tarafs) but each
taraf kept building temples, competing with the others. In the end, it
turned out be a unique temple village. Inscriptions in Proto-Bengali on the
temples show they were named after women,” said Gopaldas Mukherjee, who has
written the only book available on Maluty (Debbhumi Maluty, now out of
print). The tarafs brought in some of the finest artisans from Bishnupur to build the temples.
The once bustling temple village now lies virtually deserted. At sunset, only the lamps in the
temples light up Maluty’s winding paths. It’s eerie to see flickering lamps under the moonlight.
“In 1986, electricity came. Ten days later, it was gone forever,” says
Sadhana Chatterjee, an elderly resident of this predominantly Bengali
village. The nearest hospital is 16 km away in Rampurhat, West Bengal. The
police station – Shikaripara – is 25 km away.
The place is out of bounds despite having a fairly good road. “There is
no public transport system in this part of the country. No Bengal vehicle
wants to come here because they require dual permit, which is very
expensive,” said Amiya Chatterjee. More than half of the population has left
the historical village. Many houses are under lock and key. They come back
once a year, during Kali puja.
In the village without electricity, Mukherjee is the lone source of
entertainment. Every evening, he organises Ramayana and Mahabharat sessions,
which draw the entire village to Bamdev temple. He is also the chief
preserver of its heritage. In the twilight of his life, the ex-soldier is
fighting a battle to save his village and its priceless treasures. “Whoever
comes to Maluty, Mukherjee takes him around, tells him fabulous stories
about each temple. He knows the temples brick by brick,” says former deputy
director (archaeology) Satish Tyagi. “I wonder what will happen of these
priceless treasures.”
As you step gingerly among the temple ruins, it is hard not to feel a
sense of guilt. It’s somehow degrading to see the exquisitely carved stones
strewn around like debris.
As if to rub salt into the wound, within a stone’s throw from the
temples, the Jharkhand government is building an inspection bungalow at a
cost of Rs 1.16 crore. This much money would have changed the face of the
village. Or saved a hundred temples.