Badami Travelogue – Oct 2015

The hunger to explore our beautiful Karnataka took us to Badami this Dussera holidays. Usually in KSTDC or any other travels, the places we covered are covered in 1 day. But we being lazy covered it in 5 days. 2 families – Mine and Gautham’s went by train overnight to Badami from Bangalore. Stayed in one Good resort in Badami all days and covered all places by locally hired taxi.

The entire album with detailed comments is here. Do open each photo with info to read detail of the photo and place:

https://goo.gl/photos/ZwDiCM2tqXZfixb6A

The places we covered are:

Day 1: Banashankari Temple, Kannada Hampi University Traditional Sculpture Centre, Museum, Prasanna Venkata Dasara Katte, Badami Caves

Day 2: Almatti Dam & Park, Krishna River, Yalagooreshwara temple, Koodala Sangama, Ilakal;

Day 3: Aihole, Pattadakal, Mahakoota; On the way maize fields

Day 4: Thoravi Narasimha, Bijapura Gol Gumbaz (The family returned back to Bengaluru from Bijapur)

Day 5: (Explored alone due to a function I was attending in Dharwar next day) Gadag Veeranarayana temple, Thrikuteshwara temple; Lakkundi temples and basadi;

Observe the photos of Thrikuteshwara temple and Lakkundi to appreciate the finesse in sculpture & art on each pillar, wall, and door frame. It is almost equivalent to the Hoysala style architecture.

Chalukyan History

Badami, Pattadakal, Aihole are the triple heritage centres showing the zenith of Chalukyan contribution to the posterity. While Aihole is called the Primary school, Badami as High school, Pattadakal is called the college of the Chalukyan sculptural extravaganza. Aihole is small dusty town but boasts of hundreds of temples. It was a school for artesans & architects. So you see many northern and Deccan style temples. Similar experiment with higher degree of precision is there in Pattadakal. Badami takes the cake in exquisite Cave temples.

The Chalukyan temple architecture is dotted around many towns across the length and breadth of Karnataka. It also shows decline of Jainism in Karnataka during their period or may be soon after. The kings & edicts sure show harmony and equality to all faiths. In Badami, the 4^th cave is dedicated to Jainism although at that time, their population was less than 5%. It seems like the majority political power appeasing the minority is eternal in India. However in Lakkundi I could very easily spot the Jain Basadi converted to Shiva temples. May be during their times or after. The changing faiths, local chieftains changing priorities, the local political pressures might have conceded these changes.  

Chalukyans ruled our Karnataka from 6^th to 11^th century. Their empire at the zenith of Pulikeshi II extended from Narmada River in the north till Kaveri in the South. He defeated Harshavardhana at the Narmada banks and raided Kanchi in south defeating the Pallavas of Tamil.

Karnataka being host of great sculptural heritage, Chalukyan temple architecture is second in sequence of chronology & also maturity. The first being Kadambas and Rashtrakutas developed initial temple architectures. Chalukyans took it to a greater height. The Zenith of finesse in sculpture comes in Hoysala period of 10 to 13^th cent, testimony of which you can find in Belur, Halebid and numerous towns spread across Karanataka. After the barbaric raids from Mallik Kaffar a general from Mohammad of Ghazni, the Kannadigas were crest fallen. Almost a century went by in some kind of a stoic silence. There were many smaller kings, provinces trying to maintain some sensible living. Then Vijayanagara empire came about establishment around 14^th century consolidating and reviving the Hindu Culture. Post Islamic barbarism, in no shy manner, Vijayanagara kings called themselves Hindu Surathrana, the saviors of Hinduism and called for unification of Hindu kings. And through their meticulous harmonious ruling, they created a free and fair environment for all faiths to co-exist and construct great towns, temples & architecture.

Clockwise from top down:

Near Badami Boothanatha Temple; Gadag Thrikuteshwara temple Garbagriha; Lakkundi temple;

Notice the actual door is small; The load bearing pillar and then the frame each side and atop are very wide; The carvings are intricate. Badami is Red sandstone, so less intricate; Gadag and Lakkundi are black fine stone; The carvings are exquisite;

In one temple, the door frame has 1 inch sculpture series depicting Krishna leela; You can move your fingers in the air gap; It is like Thorana of Krishna leela

 

This peacock loving pair is taken by Indian Medical Associates as their emblem	Ganda Bherunda – The 2 headed Eagle with 1 body is a royal symbol chosen by Mysore Wodeyars. In the modern world the KSRTC our state transport corporation chose this as its emblem.	You will notice many such beautiful window designs in each and every temple. There many other motifs on temple walls used for saree making, block printing.

Ancient water management: It is small, beautiful & sustainable. It serves the city even today after a dozen “centuries”!! Photo of Agasthya Thirtha serving city of Badami.	Modern day Water Management: It is just stupid,  & barbaric. It is very very large. Serves very few for few days in an year for few years. Submerges a whole lot. High maintenance, needs modern cement, power, fuel daily. Lives for 50-100 years max. Photo of Almatti dam across the mighty Krishna.

What is Heritage?

After visiting these places you will be convinced what real heritage is. Heritage is art, architecture, man made beauty blending with god made nature. In the ancient past people built heritage which serves humanity even today.

In the modern day, are we building heritage which will serve posterity? Will Manyata tech park stand tall after petrol & coal gets over in a couple of century? Or will it become like Bombay ghost mills? Will we continue to lift & pump Kaveri water from 200kms and pump to a million houses in Bangalore for a century more?  When Bangalore retires to the history of great culture, what will it retain with it? May be Lalbagh, because it has water in it! And may be few temples because Bhakti is eternal & economical!

Hope these glimpses entice you to pay a visit to understand our heritage better. These places are very friendly. Kannadigas are very warm and welcome. Whatever your language, caste, creed, religion, people make you their own.