Tejomahalaya: The Truth Behind Taj Mahal – 2

Contd…

Baseless Love Stories

26. Stories of Shahjahan’s exclusive infatuation for Mumtaz’s are concoctions. They have no basis in history nor has any book ever written on their fancied love affairs. Those stories have been invented as an afterthought to make Shahjahan’s authorship of the Taj look plausible.

Cost

27. The cost of the Taj is nowhere recorded in Shahjahan’s court papers because Shahjahan never built the Tajmahal. That is why wild estimates of the cost by gullible writers have ranged from 4 million to 91.7 million rupees.

Period Of Construction

28. Likewise the period of construction has been guessed to be anywhere between 10 years and 22 years. There would have not been any scope for guesswork had the building construction been on record in the court papers.

Architects

29. The designer of the Tajmahal is also variously mentioned as Essa Effendi, a Persian or Turk, or Ahmed Mehendis or a Frenchman, Austin Bordeaux, or Geronimo Veroneo, an Italian, or Shahjahan himself.

Records Don’t Exist

30. Twenty thousand laborers are supposed to have worked for 22 years during Shahjahan’s reign in building the Tajmahal. Had this been true, there should have been available in Shahjahan’s court papers design drawings, heaps of labor muster rolls, daily expenditure sheets, bills and receipts of material ordered, and commissioning orders. There is not even a scrap of paper of this kind.

31. It is, therefore, court flatterers, blundering historians, somnolent archeologists, fiction writers, senile poets, careless tourists officials and erring guides who are responsible for hustling the world into believing in Shahjahan’s mythical authorship of the Taj.

32. Description of the gardens around the Taj of Shahjahan’s time mention Ketaki, Jai, Jui, Champa, Maulashree, Harshringar and Bel. All these are plants whose flowers or leaves are used in the worship of Hindu deities. Bel leaves are exclusively used in Lord Shiva’s worship. A graveyard is planted only with shady trees because the idea of using fruit and flower from plants in a cemetery is abhorrent to human conscience. The presence of Bel and other flower plants in the Taj garden is proof of its having been a Shiva temple before seizure by Shahjahan.

33. Hindu temples are often built on river banks and sea beaches. The Taj is one such built on the bank of the Yamuna river an ideal location for a Shiva temple.

34. Prophet Mohammad has ordained that the burial spot of a Muslim should be inconspicuous and must not be marked by even a single tombstone. In flagrant violation of this, the Taj mahal has one grave in the basement and another in the first floor chamber both ascribed to Mumtaz. Those two cenotaphs were in fact erected by Shahjahan to bury the two tier Shivalingas that were consecrated in the Taj. It is customary for Hindus to install two Shivalingas one over the other in two stories as may be seen in the Mahankaleshwar temple in Ujjain and the Somnath temple raised by Ahilyabai in Somnath Pattan.

35. The Tajmahal has identical entrance arches on all four sides. This is a typical Hindu building style known as Chaturmukhi, i.e.,four faced.

The Hindu Dome

36. The Tajmahal has a reverberating dome. Such a dome is an absurdity for a tomb which must ensure peace and silence. Contrarily reverberating domes are a necessity in Hindu temples because they create an ecstatic din multiplying and magnifying the sound of bells, drums and pipes accompanying the worship of Hindu deities.

37. The Tajmahal dome bears a lotus cap. Original Islamic domes have a bald top as is exemplified by the Pakistan Embassy in Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, and the domes in the Pakistan’s newly built capital Islamabad.

38. The Tajmahal entrance faces south. Had the Taj been an Islamic building it should have faced the west. Tomb is the Grave, not the Building

39. A widespread misunderstanding has resulted in mistaking the building for the grave.Invading Islam raised graves in captured buildings in every country it overran. Therefore, hereafter people must learn not to confound the building with the grave mounds which are grafts in conquered buildings. This is true of the Tajmahal too. One may therefore admit (for arguments sake) that Mumtaz lies buried inside the Taj. But that should not be constructed to mean that the Taj was raised over Mumtaz’s grave.

40. The Taj is a seven storied building. Prince Aurangzeb also mentions this in his letter to Shahjahan (Refer to the Figure ). The marble edifice comprises four stories including the lone, tall circular hall inside the top, and the lone chamber in the basement. In between are two floors each containing 12 to 15 palatial rooms. Below the marble plinth reaching down to the river at the rear are two more stories in red stone. They may be seen from the river bank. The seventh storied must be below the ground (river) level since every ancient Hindu building had a subterranean storied.

41. Immediately bellow the marble plinth on the river flank are 22 rooms in red stone with their ventilators all walled up by Shahjahan. Those rooms, made uninhibitedly by Shahjahan, are kept locked by Archeology Department of India. The lay visitor is kept in the dark about them. Those 22 rooms still bear ancient Hindu paint on their walls and ceilings. On their side is a nearly 33 feet long corridor. There are two door frames one at either end of the corridor. But those doors are intriguingly sealed with brick and lime.

42. Apparently those doorways originally sealed by Shahjahan have been since unsealed and again walled up several times. In 1934 a resident of Delhi took a peep inside from an opening in the upper part of the doorway. To his dismay he saw huge hall inside. It contained many statues huddled around a central beheaded image of Lord Shiva. It could be that, in there, are Sanskrit inscriptions too. All the seven stories of the Tajmahal need to be unsealed and scoured to ascertain what evidence they may be hiding in the form of Hindu images, Sanskrit inscriptions, scriptures, coins and utensils.

43. Apart from Hindu images hidden in the sealed stories it is also learn t that Hindu images are also stored in the massive walls of the Taj. Between 1959 and 1962 when Mr. S.R. Rao was the Archeological Superintendent in Agra, he happened to notice a deep and wide crack in the wall of the central octagonal chamber of the Taj. When a part of the wall was dismantled to study the crack out popped two or three marble images. The matter was hushed up and the images were reburied where they had been embedded at Shahjahan’s behest.

Confirmation of this has been obtained from several sources. It was only when I began my investigation into the antecedents of the Taj I came across the above information which had remained a forgotten secret. What better proof is needed of the Temple origin of the Tajmahal? Its walls and sealed chambers still hide in Hindu idols that were consecrated in it before Shahjahan’s seizure of the Taj.

Pre-Shahjahan References to the Taj :

44. Apparently the Taj as a central palace seems to have an chequered history. The Taj was perhaps desecrated and looted by every Muslim invader from Mohammad Ghazni onwards but passing into Hindu hands off and on, the sanctity of the Taj as a Shiva temple continued to be revived after every Muslim onslaught. Shahjahan was the last muslim to desecrate the Tajmahal alias Tejo Mahalaya.

45. Vincent Smith records in his book titled `Akbar the Great Moghul’ that `Babur’s turbulent life came to an end in his garden palace in Agra in 1630′. That palace was none other than the Tajmahal.

46. Babur’s daughter Gulbadan Begum in her chronicle titled Humayun Nama refers to the Taj as the Mystic House.

47. Babur himself refers to the Taj in his memoirs as the palace captured by Ibrahim Lodi containing a central octagonal chamber and having pillars on the four sides. All these historical references allude to the Taj 100 years before Shahjahan.

48. The Tajmahal precincts extend to several hundred yards in all directions. Across the river are ruins of the annexes of the Taj, the bathing ghats and a jetty for the ferry boat. In the Victoria gardens outside covered with creepers is the long spur of the ancient outer wall ending in a octagonal red stone tower. Such extensive grounds all magnificently done up, are a superfluity for a grave.

49. Had the Taj been specially built to bury Mumtaz, it should not have been cluttered with other graves. But the Taj premises contain several graves at least in its eastern and southern pavilions.

50. In the southern flank, on the other side of the Tajganj gate are buried in identical pavilions queens Sarhandi Begum, and Fatehpuri Begum and a maid Satunnisa Khanum. Such parity burial can be justified only if the queens had been demoted or the maid promoted. But since Shahjahan had commandeered (not built) the Taj, he reduced it general to a muslim cemetery as was the habit of all his Islamic predecessors, and buried a queen in a vacant pavilion and a maid in another identical pavilion.

51. Shahjahan was married to several other women before and after Mumtaz. She, therefore, deserved no special consideration in having a wonder mausoleum built for her.

52. Mumtaz was a commoner by birth and so she did not qualify for a fairyland burial.

53. Mumtaz died in Burhanpur which is about 600 miles from Agra. Her grave there is intact. Therefore, the cenotaphs raised in stories of the Taj in her name seem to be fakes hiding in Hindu Shiva emblems.

54. Shahjahan seems to have simulated Mumtaz’s burial in Agra to find a pretext to surround the temple palace with his fierce and fanatic troops and remove all the costly fixtures in his treasury. This finds confirmation in the vague noting in the Badshahnama which says that the Mumtaz’s (exhumed) body was brought to Agra from Burhanpur and buried `next year’. An official term would not use a nebulous term unless it is to hide some thing.

55. A pertinent consideration is that a Shahjahan who did not build any palaces for Mumtaz while she was alive, would not build a fabulous mausoleum for a corpse which was no longer kicking or clicking.

56. Another factor is that Mumtaz died within two or three years of Shahjahan becoming an emperor. Could he amass so much superfluous wealth in that short span as to squander it on a wonder mausoleum?

57. While Shahjahan’s special attachment to Mumtaz is nowhere recorded in history his amorous affairs with many other ladies from maids to mannequins including his own daughter Jahanara, find special attention in accounts of Shahjahan’s reign. Would Shahjahan shower his hard earned wealth on Mumtaz’s corpse?

58. Shahjahan was a stingy, usurious monarch. He came to throne murdering all his rivals. He was not therefore, the doting spendthrift that he is made out to be.

59. A Shahjahan disconsolate on Mumtaz’s death is suddenly credited with a resolve to build the Taj. This is a psychological incongruity. Grief is a disabling, incapacitating emotion.

60. A infatuated Shahjahan is supposed to have raised the Taj over the dead Mumtaz, but carnal, physical sexual love is again a incapacitating emotion. A womanizer is ipso facto incapable of any constructive activity. When carnal love becomes uncontrollable the person either murders somebody or commits suicide. He cannot raise a Tajmahal. A building like the Taj invariably originates in an ennobling emotion like devotion to God, to one’s mother and mother country or power and glory.

61. Early in the year 1973, chance digging in the garden in front of the Taj revealed another set of fountains about six feet below the present fountains. This proved two things. Firstly, the subterranean fountains were there before Shahjahan laid the surface fountains. And secondly that those fountains are aligned to the Taj that edifice too is of pre-Shahjahan origin. Apparently the garden and its fountains had sunk from annual monsoon flooding and lack of maintenance for centuries during the Islamic rule.

62. The stately rooms on the upper floor of the Tajmahal have been striped of their marble mosaic by Shahjahan to obtain matching marble for raising fake tomb stones inside the Taj premises at several places.

Contrasting with the rich finished marble ground floor rooms the striping of the marble mosaic covering the lower half of the walls and flooring of the upper storey have given those rooms a naked, robbed look. Since no visitors are allowed entry to the upper storey this despoliation by Shahjahan has remained a well guarded secret. There is no reason why Shahjahan’s loot of the upper floor marble should continue to be hidden from the public even after 200 years of termination of Moghul rule.

63. Bernier, the French traveler has recorded that no non Muslim was allowed entry into the secret nether chambers of the Taj because there are some dazzling fixtures there. Had those been installed by Shahjahan they should have been shown the public as a matter of pride. But since it was commandeered Hindu wealth which Shahjahan wanted to remove to his treasury, he didn’t want the public to know about it.

64. The approach to Taj is dotted with hillocks raised with earth dugout from foundation trenches. The hillocks served as outer defenses of the Taj building complex. Raising such hillocks from foundation earth, is a common Hindu device of hoary origin. Nearby Bharatpur provides a graphic parallel. Peter Mundy has recorded that Shahjahan employed thousands of laborers to level some of those hillocks. This is a graphic proof of the Tajmahal existing before Shahjahan.

65. At the backside of the river bank is a Hindu crematorium, several palaces, Shiva temples and bathing of ancient origin. Had Shahjahan built the Tajmahal, he would have destroyed the Hindu features.

66. The story that Shahjahan wanted to build a Black marble Taj across the river, is another motivated myth. The ruins dotting the other side of the river are those of Hindu structures demolished during Muslim invasions and not the plinth of another Tajmahal. Shahjahan who did not even build the white Tajmahal would hardly ever think of building a black marble Taj. He was so miserly that he forced laborers to work gratis even in the superficial tampering necessary to make a Hindu temple serve as a Muslim tomb.

67. The marble that Shahjahan used for grafting Koranic lettering in the Taj is of a pale white shade while the rest of the Taj is built of a marble with rich yellow tint. This disparity is proof of the Koranic extracts being a superimposition.

68. Though imaginative attempts have been made by some historians to foist some fictitious name on history as the designer of the Taj others more imaginative have credited Shajahan himself with superb architectural proficiency and artistic talent which could easily conceive and plan the Taj even in acute bereavement. Such people betray gross ignorance of history in as much as Shajahan was a cruel tyrant ,a great womanizer and a drug and drink addict.

69. Fanciful accounts about Shahjahan commissioning the Taj are all confused. Some asserted that Shahjahan ordered building drawing from all over the world and chose one from among them. Others assert that a man at hand was ordered to design a mausoleum and his design was approved. Had any of those versions been true Shahjahan’s court papers should have had thousands of drawings concerning the Taj. But there is not even a single drawing. This is yet another clinching proof that Shahjahan did not commission the Taj.

70. The Tajmahal is surrounded by huge mansions which indicate that several battles have been waged around the Taj several times.

71. At the south east corner of the Taj is an ancient royal cattle house. Cows attached to the Tejo Mahalaya temple used to reared there. A cowshed is an incongruity in an Islamic tomb.

72. Over the western flank of the Taj are several stately red stone annexes. These are superfluous for a mausoleum.

73. The entire Taj complex comprises of 400 to 500 rooms. Residential accommodation on such a stupendous scale is unthinkable in a mausoleum.

74. The neighboring Tajganj township’s massive protective wall also encloses the Tajmahal temple palace complex. This is a clear indication that the Tejo Mahalaya temple palace was part and parcel of the township.

A street of that township leads straight into the Tajmahal. The Tajganj gate is aligned in a perfect straight line to the octagonal red stone garden gate and the stately entrance arch of the Tajmahal. The Tajganj gate besides being central to the Taj temple complex, is also put on a pedestal. The western gate by which the visitors enter the Taj complex is a comparatively minor gateway. It has become the entry gate for most visitors today because the railway station and the bus station are on that side.

75. The Tajmahal has pleasure pavilions which a tomb would never have.

76. A tiny mirror glass in a gallery of the Red Fort in Agra reflects the Taj mahal. Shahjahan is said to have spent his last eight years of life as a prisoner in that gallery peering at the reflected Tajmahal and sighing in the name of Mumtaz. This myth is a blend of many falsehoods. Firstly, old Shajahan was held prisoner by his son Aurangzeb in the basement storey in the Fort and not in an open, fashionable upper storey.

Secondly, the glass piece was fixed in the 1930’s by Insha Allah Khan, a peon of the archaelogy dept.just to illustrate to the visitors how in ancient times the entire apartment used to scintillate with tiny mirror pieces reflecting the Tejo Mahalaya temple a thousand fold. Thirdly, a old decrepit Shahjahan with pain in his joints and cataract in his eyes, would not spend his day craning his neck at an awkward angle to peer into a tiny glass piece with bedimmed eyesight when he could as well his face around and have full, direct view of the Taj Mahal itself. But the general public is so gullible as to gulp all such prattle of wily, unscrupulous guides.

77. That the Tajmahal dome has hundreds of iron rings sticking out of its exterior is a feature rarely noticed. These are made to hold Hindu earthen oil lamps for temple illumination.

78. Those putting implicit faith in Shahjahan authorship of the Taj have been imagining Shahjahan-Mumtaz to be a soft hearted romantic pair like Romeo and Juliet. But contemporary accounts speak of Shahjahan as a ruler who was constantly egged on to acts of tyranny and cruelty, by Mumtaz.

79. School and College history carry the myth that Shahjahan reign was a golden period in which there was peace and plenty and that Shahjahan commissioned many buildings and patronized literature. This is pure fabrication. Shahjahan did not commission even a single building as we have illustrated by a detailed analysis of the Tajmahal legend. Shahjahn had to enrage in 48 military campaigns during a reign of nearly 30 years which proves that his was not a era of peace and plenty.

80. The interior of the dome rising over Mumtaz’s cenotaph has a representation of Sun and cobras drawn in gold. Hindu warriors trace their origin to the Sun. For an Islamic mausoleum the Sun is redundant. Cobras are always associated with Lord Shiva. Forged Documents

81. The muslim caretakers of the tomb in the Tajmahal used to possess a document which they styled as Tarikh-i-Tajmahal. Historian H.G. Keene has branded it as a document of doubtful authenticity. Keene was uncannily right since we have seen that Shahjahan not being the creator of the Tajmahal any document which credits Shahjahn with the Tajmahal, must be an outright forgery. Even that forged document is reported to have been smuggled out of Pakistan. Besides such forged documents there are whole chronicles on the Taj which are pure concoctions.

82. There is lot of sophistry and casuistry or at least confused thinking associated with the Taj even in the minds of professional historians, archaeologists and architects. At the outset they assert that the Taj is entirely Muslim in design. But when it is pointed out that its lotus capped dome and the four corner pillars etc. are all entirely Hindu those worthies shift ground and argue that that was probably because the workmen were Hindu and were to introduce their own patterns. Both these arguments are wrong because Muslim accounts claim the designers to be Muslim, and the workers invariably carry out the employer’s dictates.