The drowned & the saved

FOR forty-seven years these temples on the bank of the Sutlej have struggled to keep their head over water. Ever since the Gobind Sagar rese...

FOR forty-seven years these temples on the bank of the Sutlej have struggled to keep their head over water. Ever since the Gobind Sagar reservoir that feeds the Bhakra Nangal Dam was made in 1958, 28 temples on the river’s left bank, 1.5 km southeast of Bilaspur, spent six months under water. They include the Raghunath temple that dates to the eighth century.

Sixteen temples have been washed away. For the remaining twelve, there is some hope finally. The government now intends to relocate these temples.

All over the Sutlej bank are remains of crumbling arched gateways and broken temple shikharas. The water has chipped away the stone figures etched on temple walls and the paintings on the roof have faded away.

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Director of the Department of Language and Culture at Himachal Pradesh, Prem Sharma vouches for the ‘‘immense architectural and archaelogical value’’ of the mutilated temples. ‘‘While the earliest temple dates back to eighth century, others were built during the medieval and Mughal period. No one knows who built them though they appear to be built during the post-Gupta period by the Shail Varman dynasty.’’ The temples are built in the Nagara style of hill architecture.

THE project to relocate the temples gained momentum only after the matter was raised in a conference of state secretaries of culture at New Delhi on November 18, 2004.

While the Shimla mini circle office of the Archaelogical Survey of India (ASI) has forwarded a detailed proposal to the Director General, ASI, for shifting these monuments to a higher altitude, the Himachal Pradesh government too has begun ground work on a site 5 km from the existing one to build a tourist complex. It will have a separate enclosure to house these temples. The assessed cost of the project is Rs 1 crore for the first phase.

Of the 28 ancient temples on the bank of the Sutlej in Himachal, 16 have gone under water. The government
now plans to move the rest to safety

Five temples are to be relocated in the first phase of the project which will be the first of its kind in north India. A few Buddhist temples had been relocated from Nagarjuna Konda in Andhra Pradesh in the 1950s because the valley housing Buddhist relics was to become a reservoir.

Principal secretary (tourism) of Himachal Pradesh Ashok Thakur says work on the site where the tourist complex is to come up has already begun.

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A process that will take a few years to complete, relocation of temples will involve extensive documentation and excavation.

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