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ON the way to Jhalawar, we pass by the Darah Wildlife Sanctuary. With a jeep at our disposal, we can think of venturing through it. This darah (pass) is the only available space wide enough, between the deep blue waters of the Kali Sindh and the Chambal, through which the full-fledged Rajput armies could pass. This also became the playground for many a bloody battle. Temples on the way-side commemorate the marriage of Bhim and Hidimba. And then driving on the strata of limestone quarries, famed for the kota stone, we soon enter little fortified Jhalara-Patan. This was named thus either because this expression means the town of temple bells or because of its connection with the dynastic appellation of the ruling kings. |
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However, when I climbed the steps through the little quarter of the temple priest. I discovered that my visit there was, after all, not all that fruitless. Everything was perfectly preserved here, in total contrast to the ground floor. The tapering, deep declining razor-sharp arches over the oblong canopies with slender pillars (a minor variant of which is to be found in the Undeshawar temple of Bijolian and the three-storeyed entrance gateway of the Menal complex). There are three 10-pillared canopies with arched roof and some smaller canopies at different rooflevels in front of the tower.
They are perched loftily on the three sides of the temple overlooking even the shabby sign-boards of the insipid commercial world below, supported well by their superb facial contours. Not very minute work, but immensely graceful and proud self-absorbed lonely beings. There seems to be nothing like them. The priest told me that they are the mahatmas associated with the temple. But they are the mahatmas of a different creed. Moreover, they are surprisingly intact. I could not find a single scar, crack or chipped element. Probably, they were sculpted after the iconoclasts had retreated, though we do have the case of mercifully spared Jain structures in the fort of Chittaur, with their fantastic iconography.The priest was anxious, lest I forget to write in my article that the government must take over the temple from its present private governing body, so that the steps might be initiated to salvage it from its further decay and encroachments and to bring its financial matters to a surer footing. Though at present there is no sun idol in the temple, the first ray of the morning sun falls direct into the sanctum sanctorum. |
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Unexpectedly,
the Jhalara Surya temple, (10th century), which is held by some as
only second to the Konark Surya temple, was a disappointment. Barbers,
toy-sellers, cloth-sellers and the like had brazenly entrenched their
tin shanties (with their human and animal dirt) against its walls on
the lower half, while the upper half was eclipsed by wires and
commercial sign-boards. From no point was it possible to have a full
view of the temple. Inside, the four central pillars were particularly
massive but had graceful brackets and the sculpture was generally
marred with the lime mortar thrown over them. The priest told us that
the devotees had poured lime over their gods to save them from the
ravaging iconoclasts.
Above
all, there are the red sand-stone squatting or halfsquatting figures
of the five spiritual beings on the roof, likes of which I have not
still come across in Rajasthan. It is not that we cannot find better
craftsmanship elsewhere; but the art is very fine here but its bearing
is unique too — the sitting stance, the apparent conflict of
spiritual pose and the taut, will-defined moustache that is
half-twisted at the ends, sharp aquiline nose and eye brow set high
above the eye-ball, thick (almost negroid) but distinct lips. The
first man has a rudraksh string going through his pierced
ear-lobes, the second has his tummy bulging, the third has a
precariously tilted head, the fourth has an arm resting on a wooden
T-shaped stake carried by the sages; they are either turbaned or have
hair neatly plaited and coiled overhead.