NEW DELHI: When author and historian Rana Safvi and Sanskrit and Persian scholar Sam Dalrymple’s social media posts about Mughal-era Hindu frescoes in temples in Delhi being treated without respect to their historical import gained traction, ironically the attention wasn’t on these precious works of art but the fact that people didn’t know the city had temples from those times. “It’s true, certain Mughals did destroy temples. But there are also over a hundred mandirs built in the era of the Mughals that are still surviving,” said Dalrymple.
It was on a visit to Charan Das Ki Bagichi in old Delhi’s Chawri Bazar, a Mughal-era tomb built for a Hindu saint, that Safvi and Dalrymple, son of the celebrated William Dalrymple, first encountered the shocking state of the art works. “The frescos were covered in careless modern restorations that destroyed the oldest surviving Vaishnav painting in India’s capital,” said Dalrymple.
That led the duo to see if they could create awareness about the Mughal-era temples located in the heart of Shahjahanabad. Their Instagram-based Mughal-era Mandir Project has covered 20 temples across the city thus far, including Jhajjarwala Mandir, Gwalior Maharaj Ka Mandir and Urdu Mandir.
The idea to start the project, says Safvi, came from Dalrymple. “Sam read about the mandirs I described in my book on Shahjahanabad. We decided to explore together and write about them to showcase the temples in a city perceived as an Islamic city,” revealed Safvi.
The first Mughal-era Mandir they featured was the Ghanteshwar Mahadev Shivalaya. Although Mughal architecture has been studied extensively, Hindu and Jain monuments built during the dynasty remain under-researched. There are over 100 Jain and Shaivite temples in the city, only one-fifth of which have so far been assessed by the pair.
The two want people to have a broader understanding of Shahjahanabad. “Most people associate it today with either food or Jama Masjid or perhaps shopping in Chandni Chowk,” adds Safvi. But in the walled city of Shahjahanabad, there are temples found on every other street. There’s Shri Digambar Jain Lal Mandir, the oldest Jain temple in Delhi, and Kali Devi Prachin temple, a mandir of Maa Kaali that has three big brass idols surrounded by smaller ones. These Mughal-era temples are adorned by impressive art. Safvi singled out the Bada Jain Mandir as a favourite. “It reminds me of how glorious the city must've been during its time,” she said.
Other than temples, other places of worship built in the Mughal era include Gurdwara Sis Ganj Sahib, a historical Sikh shrine within Shahjahanabad, and the Central Baptist Church and Saint James Church. These Mughal-era shrines serve as a little-known gateway to an era that has now become controversial. Not surprisingly, Dalrymple cautioned, “If you don't conserve these places, then you are allowing history to be manipulated.”
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