South Indian Inscriptions

ARCHITECTURE SCULPTURE AND PAINTING

trees. When Vālin fell down, Rāma, Lakshmaṇa and Hanumān approached him. Vālin then rebuked Rāma for attacking him while he was engaged in fighting with another. Rāma justified his action on the ground that Vālin deserved the extreme punishment as he had violated his brother’s wife in utter disregard of the eternal law of moral conduct¹. This scene is portrayed in the panel. It shows four figures. Vālin has fallen on the ground. With his right hand he is supporting his head which was reeling with the loss of blood caused by the wound. He is looking up to accost and rebuke Rāma. The latter is seen in the pratyālīḍha posture, with the left knee advanced and the right leg drawn back. His left hand is placed on the forward thigh, while the right hand is holding something. He wears a small necklace and has an udarabandha and a kaṭibandha. His body is gracefully modelled. He has a haughty demeanour as he flings back the accusation of Vālin and justifies his own action. Lakshmaṇa and Sugrīva are standing behind Rāma. The trees from behind which Rāma shot his arrow are shown by means of the conventional large flowers in the upper right corner. They are of the same type as those in the well-known panel of Ahalyōddhāra (Redemption of Ahalyā) in the Gupta temple at Dēogaḍh in Madhya Pradesh². This beautiful panel undoubtedly belongs to the Vākāṭaka-Gupta age.

...The conjecture about the erection of a temple dedicated to Rāma by Pravarasena II at his new capital Pravarapura, which was made by me several years ago, was based only on the evidence of these panels and was not substantiated by any inscription. That evidence has now become available unexpectedly. Recently, while digging in the courtyard of Vinōbāji’s āśrama, the image of a female deity, about 6 ft. in height, was discovered.³ Originally it was four-armed, but now all the arms are broken. The goddess wears several beautifully carved necklaces, a vaikakshaka, an exquisitely carved mekhalā (girdle) and anklets. Her hair is modelled in a coiled fashion which was in vogue in the Gupta-Vākāṭaka age. Her face is serene. She is standing on a crocodile, which marks her out as the river goddess Gaṅgā. The identification is placed beyond doubt by the inscription carved to the proper right side of her legs, viz., Gaṅgā Bhagavati (i.e. Goddess Gaṅgā). The characters of the inscription closely resemble those of the Paṭṭan plates of Pravarasēna II and leave no doubt that the image is of the Vākāṭaka age. This find clearly shows that there was a magnificent temple of that age just where Vinōbājī’s āśrama is now situated.

... As stated before, none of the temples built by the Vākāṭakas is now extant, but two shrines erected by their feudatories are still standing, from which we can form a fair idea of the religious buildings of that age.

... The first of these is at Tigōwā near Bahuribandh in the Jabalpur District of Madhya Pradesh. Tigōwā is probably a corruption of Trigrāma (Three Villages), the other two of the triad being Aṅgōrā and Dēorī. It is reported that there was, in ancient times, a large town at Bahuribandh, which had Tigōwā and the other villages as its suburbs. There is still at Bahuribandh a colossal statue of the Jaina Tīrthaṅkara Śāntinātha, with an inscription of the reign of the Kalachuri king Gayākarṇa (11th century A.C.) on its pedestal,⁴ which testifies to the importance of the place in old days. When Cunningham visited Tigōwā in 1873-74, he noticed there, besides two Gupta temples, the foundations of as many as thirty-six shrines which had been utterly destroyed by a railway contractor.⁵
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¹ Rāmāyaṇa, II, 96, 16; 23-34.
² The Gupta Temple at Deogarh (M.A.S.I., No. 70), plate XVI.
³ See Plate D.
⁴ C.I.I., Vol. IV, pp. 309 f.
⁵ C.A.S.I., Vol. IX, p.41.