Holding a Key to the Past

While granite boulders were used to create most of the city, several individual structures were further embellished with stucco which covered bricks of that period. The stucco or the coating of plaster was used to fashion gods, goddesses and their retinues atop temple entrances. Much of the stucco and the brick have now fallen, and the ASI has attempted to reconstruct these exquisite figures. Something that should never be done, in my view, because today we seem to lack the devotion and sensibility that once gave these figures the perfection that they had. Perhaps today we treat it as a job that needs to be done and nothing more. Moreover, since the quality of contemporary workmanship is inferior to the original, we will give an incorrect assessment of the original to future generations. They will accept today’s inferior work to be that of earlier centuries.

The brickwork under the stucco is what requires attention. In many areas the bricks are exposed and gradually falling off, soon to disappear. The stucco jharokas in the fabulous Queen’s Bath, supported by granite slabs, are collapsing in a similar fashion. Time and money should not be wasted on attempts at beautification. It is more important to work at not allowing the supporting granite slabs or the brickwork to disintegrate as with that will disappear a certain architectural reference which today makes us understand the building ability of these people, the influences that prevailed on them and what they in turn influenced.