Uchha pind of Buddhism in Punjab

MA Srinivasan

“We converse with stones and bricks under the layers of earth,” says Teja Singh, explaining how he identified a Buddhist site at Sanghol. Teja Singh, who retired as an attendant from the Archaeological Department, could not have imagined that he would bring back the glory of the Buddhist past of Punjab by exploring an agricultural field of a farmer who was complaining that his land was full of stones and bricks and ploughing had become tough. Sanghol, a small town in Punjab, stands as an evidence of the ancient past of this land. In local parlance, Sanghol is called Uchha Pind, meaning a high or exalted site, something very apt for history buffs. 

Buddhism, the original religion of this land, has left many evidences in the layers of the earth, whether it is Sanghol in Punjab or Taxila on the other side of the border in Pakistan. Some of my friends rolled their eyes when I said I was visiting a Buddhist stupa in Punjab as they identified Buddhism with only a few places in India, and a few statues in museums. As a student of archaeology and history, non-living things like stones, bricks, trenches and mounds whisper into our ears to shout out to the world that they existed here and are still ready to narrate the story of the past. “I dug out these beautiful railings depicting Salabhanjikas”, said Teja Singh, showing one of the finest carved beauties of Indian sculpture of the Kushana period. It was a memorable moment for me to have the man who brought a glorious cultural history to light standing with me as my guide. 

A gold mine

Sanghol has two Buddhist stupas, one palatial mound, a museum, monastery complexes, residential places and other remains beneath the earth, crying for attention to get excavated. The large stupa, called SGL 5 in archaeological terms, is a marvel.  A circular structure, it has spoke-like radial walls with 32, 24, 12 spokes, enclosed with a lime-plastered path for circumambulation. One of the important finding is a relic casket in this stupa, with bone relics of Buddha or another important monk, and the Kharosthi script inscribed on the casket. “We found 117 carved stone slabs and sculptures dumped in a huge place on one corner of the stupa”, said Teja Singh. The dumping of carved stones presupposes an attack on the site by adversaries, may be by the Huns. 

Sanghol lies on a geographically important location, on the Uttarapatha, connected to the ancient Silk Road. This made this town so important that some of the historian identified Sanghol with She-to-tu-lu, a town described by Xuanzang, a Buddhist monk from China who travelled the Indian subcontinent in seventh century when Harsha was a prominent king in the North. Punjab has early historic cities like Sunetra, Jalndhara, Phalakpura (Phillaur), apart from Sanghol, on the ancient Silk Road. Like Sanghol, all these sites cry for attention.  

A small stupa, which lies in a protected site on the highway, is well conserved. Hathiwara mound in the protected site at Sanghol has a great history hidden under it in the form of ‘palatial remains’ and fortification of the Kushana period, which is about 1900 years old. A cattle grazer, near this mound, took me to one corner of the site and showed me a half of a cylindrical pot-like structure exposed above the soil. A big alms bowl found in the field away from the protected site is indicative of the extent of the site.

Job half done 

The excavations stopped in 1986 and till date no further attempts were done either by the Archaeological Survey of India or Punjab’s Archaeology Department to excavate the entire treasure. If such great sites had been discovered in Europe or even in China, it would have been flourishing as a big tourist attraction by now. I glanced through the visitors’ book kept at all sites in Sanghol to see the flow of visitors. It left me nervous and disappointed — there were only a few entries in a week. 

After Sanghol, I visited another great site of Punjab — Ropar, a prestigious archaeological site of the Indus Valley period. The museum maintained by ASI will not disappoint as the exhibits are properly displayed with labels and are well illuminated. But the site where they found six continuous periods of history, starting from the Indus Valley Civilisation to the medieval period, is poorly maintained. 

What ails our sense of heritage

Neither the governments nor the society have a sense of history and responsibility to preserve it for future generations. If all the schools in Punjab are mandated to visit the museums and sites, these proud custodians of history will narrate their story to future generations. My cab driver, Guddu, a matriculate, said, “We were taught history but I could never remember or connect. Having seen all this here, I feel reconnected to the past,” he said.

But who cares? Archaeology departments are orphans in this country, struggling with paucity of budgets and support. Sanghols and Ropars remain unnoticed, unattended by the governments. Will the situation deteriorate further to the point that we lose all the archaeological treasures forever? Only time will tell. 

Teja singh, the unsung hero

There are many unsung heroes in archaeology whose names are never mentioned in the annual reports or monographs. Teja Singh,  a native of Sanghol, is one of them. Interestingly, he’s not a trained archaeologist. A primary school dropout, he was employed as a digger by the Archaeological Survey of India in 1968. Over the next few years, however, Teja Singh built a reputation for himself as an excavation expert. He had the uncanny knack of directing excavations in right directions, and needed just a glance to tell the age of bricks, pottery and other antiquities. Much of the credit for the discovery of treasure troves at Sanghol and Ropar goes to him. What could be seen as an acknowledgement of his contribution and skill, he has been invited to Telangana Bouddha Sangiti-2019, an international seminar on Buddhist Archaeology in Hyderabad, to be held on November 16 and 17.