Wonders and mysteries of Mahrouli

Mehrauli has mysteries and wonders beyond the Qutub Minar like the Alai minar which was supposed to be twice the height of Qutub Minar, the vry first Mosque built in Islamic India and the mysterious Iron pillar which hasnot rusted for 1600 years.

Qutub Minar the Red Sandstone wonder mesmerizes you not only during the first sight, but every single time you make a visit.

Qutub-ud-din Aibak was inspired by the Minaret of Jam in present day Afghanistan and built the Qutub Minar to celebrate the victory of his king Mohammed Ghori over Rajput king, Prithviraj Chauhan. The primary purpose it seems was for the muezzin to call people for prayer at the Mosque near by. Interesting considering the fact that it is 240 feet tall and without microphones, i dont know how ,many poeple would have heard him!

Alai Minar is another unfinished dream here. Allaudin Khilji had a dream to surpass the Qutub Minar. He wanted to build a tower twice its height. Thus began the construction of Alai Minar. However, Khilji died after Alai Minar was just 27 meters tall. It never got completed. Khilji's successors were more cost conscious than him!

The mysterious Iron Pillar in the Qutub Minar complex has raised the curiosity of visitors for several millennia. It was originally built by Chandragupta II also known as Vikramaditya in AD 402. It was part of a Vishnu Temple in Udayagiri. Anangpal the Tomar King had brought the pillar to Mehrauli in 10th century to be part of a Vishnu Temple he had built. The pillar is 7.2 meters high and weighs 6 tons. An inscription on the Pillar mentions that it was built as a Vishnudhvaja, standard of god Vishnu, on the hill known as Vishnupada in memory of Chandragupta.

The mystery is that the pillar, which is made of 98 per cent wrought iron, has stood 1,600 years without rusting or decomposing!

Recent developments by scientists at IIT Kanpur have revealed that a thin layer of "misawite", a compound of iron, oxygen and hydrogen, has protected the cast iron pillar from rust. This layer is just 1/20th of a millimeter in thickness! Some say the high phosphorous content in the Iron of those times helped in this film getting formed. In those times, there was a unique process for making iron. Iron ore was reduced into steel in one step by mixing it with charcoal. In contrast, today’s blast furnaces use limestone instead of charcoal and this leads to the phosphorous getting lost in slag. There is enough to learn from these ancient metallurgical techniques despite todays’ technological achievements. Experts say these practices can help us in reducing corrosion on containers of nuclear fuel.


Ofcourse most visitors give a damn about the rust and just try to reach their hands from the back over the pillar. Apparently your wish gets fulfilled if you do. Vikramaditya would have been amazed at this turn of events!

Nice photos! I will make the Qutub Minar a priority on my first visit to Delhi this November. What other cultural treasures do you recommend there?

Within the same complex you have Quwwat-ul-Islam, the first mosque built in Delhi after the Islamic conquest.Then these is The Alai Darwaza, which is the main gateway for the mosque. Tombs of Balban, Iltutmish and Imam zamin are also intersting.

Have you been to Delhi before? The Red Fort, Humayun's tomb and Purana Qila are all worth a visit.

Agra is the other hotbed. Other than Taj, Agra Fort and Fatehpur sikri are all must visits.

I forgot the Bahai Lotus temple in Delhi. will be uploading my trip account shortly on that as well

I stayed near Merauli when I was first in India, some 40 years ago. There were lots of ruins in the area; we did some exploring but I had no camera at that time, so no photos to share. It was all farmland then and the village was tiny. I have fond memories of those times.

some of those might be part of the city now!

All of it is the part of city now ! Mehrauli area is a hot spot for restaurants, pubs and night clubs......

City has extended well beyond Mehrauli in last 40 years......

I just finshed reading an interesting book called Objects of Translation: Material Culture and Medieval "Hindu-Muslim" Encounter by Finbarr B. Flood (Princeton University Press, 2009). It is written from an art historian's perspective and has a whole chapter on the Qutb complex at Mehrauli. I plan to photocopy this chapter (the book itself has coffe-table dimensions) and use it as a guide to that area when I next visit Delhi.

Another near by area Lal Kot is hardly known to even people who live in Delhi. This is the area from where the last Hindu ruler of Delhi ruled.

Check out the hardly visited Zafar Mahal in the Moslem area just behind Qutab Minar it was the summer palace of the last Mughal Emperor,written about by William Dalrymple;

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Last-Mug.../dp/074758639X

It's 5 mins by rickshaw then 5 mins walk from Qutab;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zafar_Mahal

http://vikramjits.wordpress.com/2009...ahal-mehrauli/

Behind Kutub is the only Archeological Park Delhi has and on sunday I went there with few travellers for a picnic and had a long walk there.The place has about 80 small ruines, many taken over by high bushes.So anyone has intrest in ruines would like to see it.The most noteworthy is the famous Baoli(step well) which has no water now.

Just read in TOI today that the ASI is going to give more attention to it.

Second the Mehrauli Archaeological Park suggestion. There are organized walks there Saturday mornings for a nominal fee.

http://www.delhiheritagewalks.com/me...ical-park.html

http://www.intachdelhichapter.org/heritage_walks.html

http://www.igougo.com/story-s1216579...ical_Park.html

Question? Is this featured in the film Rockstar near the beginning or is it Tuglabad Fort or some other place in Delhi...

though I didn't go there just a bit further on the metro chattarpur looked lik it might be interesting too

https://www.google.nl/search?hl=nl&r...NYXJ0QXS7tyJCQ

It's a nice place for a IndiaMike meet up as well.

There is a peak with a canopy in the park which has nice view of Kutub specially in night since it's illuminated.Once I went on that peak with few photographer friends to capture Kutub in night.

Havent seen "Rockstar" even being "theRock" so can't comment but Kutub is a famous place for movies and as a fact MOST visited tourist place of Delhi.A notable scene was shooted in Amitabh Bacchan's "Cheeni Kum".

The Chatturpur Complex is a huge complex of different temples and worth a visit.It looks very nice during Navratra's festival.

One more notable place near Kutub is "Ahinsa Sthal" which is a Jain temple just opposite Kutub.The Jain statue is on a small mountain so it has nice view of Kutub,Chatturpur and south delhi.

And if you go past Chatturpur village about 1km there's Sharma Farm, home of real and manufactured antiques. Worth a visit just for the spectacle of it all.

They're very touchy about taking photographs at the Jain temple, so take them from from the ruined temple on the next hill, same side of the road.