Katas Raj Temples

"Hindu Temple walls of reverence"

Built in 600 A.D the temple complex at Chakwal personifies the mortification of the Hindu god "Shiva". He on the death of his beloved wife "Satti" shed tears of anguish and bitterness, giving rise to two water reservoirs whose waters flow in their tranquil calmess.....disturbed occassionally by the fall of a stray leaf or a water toad that has made its home below the moss covered surface of the water. One of these water ponds popularly known as "Pushkar" is near Ajmer in India the other one is at "Kataksha" at Katas (Kalar Kahar) in District Chakwal. The image on the left is of "Kataksha"visited by myself along with my family on the 15th of October 2007.

The temple complex from a distance seems like any ordinary building with a domed top....but as you drive closer the temple walls with their sheet of moss and mildew...carving arches, significant of the time of construction, become vivid in all their past and present glory.....they are an embodiment of religious veneration....carrying within them the impressions of many generations of proud and courageous Hindu idols. For a Muslim who has little knowledge of Maha Bharat and the many tales of chivalry, courage, devotion, war, revenge, rage, deceit, adultery and sexual intercourses.....i am not fit to go into the religious significance of the temple or the rituals and rights that might have been carried out in its many spaces. I only bear witness to what the eye can behold, the heart can feel and the mind can imagine.....for the mind can imagine a lot...

The water in the pond is of the clearest Emerald green that you ever saw....looking at it your pupils dilate to soak in the brilliance of the color....... so distinct and contrasting with the dark, dingy and decrepit walls of the temple rising above the water level. The water itself is a harmony of clarity and muck.....traveling the eye a little farther off from the source you will see the moribund and torpid water.....covered with a thick layer of moss..... barred and bound by the passage walls that lead to the temple........thus trapped it signifies the death of something that once was alive with all the vigor and valor of existence. Maybe the soul of the temple is gone....gone as its practicing loyal subjects are gone...now the temple walls bear witness to the keen site seers who only come to see what was in the past a place of great respect. Maybe it still is...but to me the walls seemed to cry...to cry for their old glory.....now all that they see are humans who come to watch without any respect for the beliefs and the rights that once crowned and glowed in every part of the temple complex....its various hidden and apparent crevices, room spaces, walls and domes.

For the temple has been unpracticed for quite some time now.....site seers’ loiter within its walls taking images of empty rooms, desolate arches, dingy walls and soiled passages. It has become something of a showpiece....having lost its purpose...vanished within the folds of time....its structure witnessed by many yet its soul and life felt by few. It must shed tears of sad desolation just as the god after which it was built....for the temple too has lost something important to time and decay....to the daunting reality of loss, demise, faltering devotions, shifting respects and fading significances.

Now it is exposed to the heart wrenching reality that the tears that come to some innocent eyes aren’t due to devotion or spiritual and religious relief...they are due to the bigotry and division of man that lies naked and exposed in every facet of our lives. We have made ourselves and the innocent generations after us scared of anything that is foreign...that doesn’t seem or look similar....that has a division from our value system.....we are not just paranoid we are devoid of the ability to understand, to mingle, to respect, to acknowledge and to stand as one......stand as one, as we will surely stand on the day of judgment. Exalted or fallen not due to our race, ethnicity, color or appearance but due to our actions....actions towards all....towards the Lord himself, his many manifestations and towards his many people.

These are just thoughts and ramblings of someone trying so very hard not to judge, divide or criticize....someone who would want to see things through the eyes of those who believe in them....someone who would rather accept than reject the many possibilities and branches of life....someone with a soul that identifies with others....someone who is angered at the senseless accusations, judgments, divides and snobbery that come as a package and get transferred from our parents to us.....and from us to our children....and maybe from them to theirs. Maybe its time that we stopped....stopped and just respected others for who they are and what their actions are rather than what they look like or what they believe in.