Taj Mahal: An Epic Manipulated (Part-2B)
Missing Elephants
31. Far from the building of the Taj, Shah Jahan disfigured it with black koranic lettering and heavily robbed it of its Sanskrit inscription, several idols and two huge stone elephants extending their trunks in a welcome arch over the gateway where visitors these days buy entry tickets. An Englishman, Thomas Twinning, records (pg.191 of his book “Travels in India A Hundred Years ago”) that in November 1794 “I arrived at the high walls which enclose the Taj-e-Mahal and its circumjacent buildings. I here got out of the palanquin and…..mounted a short flight of steps leading to a beautiful portal which formed the center of this side of the Court Of Elephants as the great area was called.”
Koranic Patches
32. The Taj Mahal is scrawled over with 14 chapters of the Koran but nowhere is there even the slightest or the remotest allusion in that Islamic overwriting to Shah Jahan’s authorship of the Taj. Had Shah Jahan been the builder he would have said so in so many words before beginning to quote Koran.
33. That Shah Jahan, far from building the marble Taj, only disfigured it with black lettering is mentioned by the inscriber Amanat Khan Shirazi himself in an inscription on the building. A close scrutiny of the Koranic lettering reveals that they are grafts patched up with bits of variegated stone on an ancient Shiva temple.
Carbon 14 Test
34. A wooden piece from the riverside doorway of the Taj subjected to the carbon 14 test by an American Laboratory and initiated by Professors at Pratt School of Architecture, New York, has revealed that the door to be 300 years older than Shah Jahan, since the doors of the Taj, broken open by Muslim invaders repeatedly from the 11th century onwards, had to b replaced from time to time. The Taj edifice is much more older. It belongs to 1155 A.D, i.e., almost 500 years anterior to Shah Jahan.
Architectural Evidence
35. Well known Western authorities on architecture like E.B. Havell, Mrs. Kenoyer and Sir W.W. Hunterhave gone on record to say that the Taj Mahal is built in the Hindu temple style. Havell points out the ground plan of the ancient Hindu Chandi Seva Temple in Java is identical with that of the Taj.
36. A central dome with cupolas at its Four Corners is a universal feature of Hindu temples.
37. The four marble pillars at the plinth corners are of the Hindu style. They are used as lamp towers during night and watch towers during the day. Such towers serve to demarcate the holy precincts. Hindu wedding altars and the altar set up for God Satyanarayan worship has pillars raised at the Four Corners.
38. The octagonal shape of the Taj Mahal has a special Hindu significance because Hindus alone have special names for the eight directions, and celestial guards assigned to them. The pinnacle points to the heaven while the foundation signifies to the nether world. Hindu forts, cities, palaces and temples generally have an octagonal layout or some octagonal features so that together with the pinnacle and the foundation they cover all the ten directions in which the king or God holds sway, according to Hindu belief.
39. The Taj Mahal has a trident pinnacle over the dome. A full scale of the trident pinnacle is inlaid in the red stone courtyard to the east of the Taj. The central shaft of the trident depicts a Kalash (sacred pot) holding two bent mango leaves and a coconut. This is a sacred Hindu motif. Identical pinnacles have been seen over Hindu and Buddhist temples in the Himalayan region. Tridents are also depicted against a red lotus background at the apex of the stately marble arched entrances on all four sides of the Taj. People fondly but mistakenly believed all these centuries that the Taj pinnacle depicts an Islamic crescent and star was a lighting conductor installed by the British rulers in India. Contrarily, the pinnacle is a marvel of Hindu metallurgy since the pinnacle made of non-rusting alloy, is also perhaps a lightning deflector. That the pinnacle of the replica is drawn in the eastern courtyard is significant because the east is of special importance to the Hindus, as the direction in which the sun rises. The pinnacle on the dome has the word `Allah’ on it after capture. The pinnacle figure on the ground does not have the word Allah.
Inconsistencies
40. The two buildings which face the marble Taj from the east and west are identical in design, size and shape and yet the eastern building is explained away by Islamic tradition, as a community hall while the western building is claimed to be a mosque. How could buildings meant for radically different purposes be identical? This proves that the western building was put to use as a mosque after seizure of the Taj property by Shah Jahan. Curiously enough the building being explained away as a mosque has no minaret. They form a pair at reception pavilions of the Tejomahalaya temple palace. 41. A few yards away from the same flank is the Nakkar Khana alias Drum House which is an intolerable incongruity for Islam. The proximity of the Drum House indicates that the western annex was not originally a mosque. Contrarily a drum house is a necessity in a Hindu temple or palace because Hindu chores, in the morning and evening, begin to the sweet strains of music.
42. The embossed patterns on the marble exterior of the cenotaph chamber wall are foliage of the conch shell design and the Hindu letter OM. The octagonally laid marble lattices inside the cenotaph chamber depict pink lotuses on their top railing. The Lotus, the conch and the OM are the sacred motifs associated with the Hindu deities and temples.
43. The spot occupied by Mumtaz’s cenotaph was formerly occupied by the Hindu Teja Linga a lithic representation of Lord Shiva. Around it are five perambulatory passages. Perambulation could be done around the marble lattice or through the spacious marble chambers surrounding the cenotaph chamber, and in the open over the marble platform. It is also customary for the Hindus to have apertures along the perambulatory passage, overlooking the deity. Such apertures exist in the perambulatories in the Taj Mahal.
44. The sanctum sanctorum in the Taj has silver doors and gold railings as Hindu temples have. It also had nets of pearl and gems stuffed in the marble lattices. It was the lure of this wealth, which made Shah Jahan commandeer the Taj from a helpless vassal Jaisingh, the then ruler of Jaipur.
45. Peter Mundy, an Englishman records (in 1632, within a year of Mumtaz’s death) having seen a gem studded gold railing around her tomb. Had the Taj been under construction for 22 years, a costly gold railing would not have been noticed by Peter mundy within a year of Mumtaz’s death. Such costly fixtures are installed in a building only after it is ready for use. This indicates that Mumtaz’s cenotaph was grafted in place of the Shivalinga in the center of the gold railings. Subsequently the gold railings, silver doors, nets of pearls, gem fillings etc. were all carried away to Shah Jahan’s treasury. The seizure of the Taj thus constituted an act of highhanded Mughal robbery causing a big row between Shah Jahan and Jaisingh.
46. In the marble flooring around Mumtaz’s cenotaph may be seen tiny mosaic patches. Those patches indicate the spots where the support for the gold railings were embedded in the floor. They indicate a rectangular fencing.
47. Above Mumtaz’s cenotaph hangs a chain by which now hangs a lamp. Before capture by Shah Jahan the chain used to hold a water pitcher from which water used to drip on the Shivalinga. 48. It is this earlier Hindu tradition in the Taj Mahal which gave the Islamic myth of Shah Jahan’s love tear dropping on Mumtaz’s tomb on the full moon day of the winter eve.
Treasury Well
49. Between the so-called mosque and the drum house is a multistoried octagonal well with a flight of stairs reaching down to the water level. This is a traditional treasury well in Hindu temple palaces. Treasure chests used to be kept in the lower apartments while treasury personnel had their offices in the upper chambers. The circular stairs made it difficult for intruders to reach down to the treasury or to escape with it undetected or unpursued. In case the premises had to be surrendered to a besieging enemy the treasure could be pushed into the well to remain hidden from the conqueror and remain safe for salvaging if the place was reconquered. Such an elaborate multistoried well is superfluous for a mere mausoleum. Such a grand, gigantic well is unnecessary for a tomb.
Burial Date Unknown
50. Had Shah Jahan really built the Taj Mahal as a wonder mausoleum, history would have recorded a specific date on which she was ceremoniously buried in the Taj Mahal. No such date is ever mentioned. This important missing detail decisively exposes the falsity of the Taj Mahal legend.
51. Even the year of Mumtaz’s death is unknown. It is variously speculated to be 1629, 1630, 1631 or 1632. Had she deserved a fabulous burial, as is claimed, the date of her death had not been a matter of much speculation. In a harem teeming with 5000 women it was difficult to keep track of dates of death. Apparently the date of Mumtaz’s death was so insignificant an event, as not to merit any special notice. Who would then build a Taj for her burial?
Baseless Love Stories
52. Stories of Shah Jahan’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 Shah Jahan’s authorship of the Taj look plausible.
Cost
53. The cost of the Taj is nowhere recorded in Shah Jahan’s court papers because Shah Jahan never built the Taj Mahal. That is why wild estimates of the cost by gullible writers have ranged from 4 million to 91.7 million rupees.
Period of Construction
54. 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
55. The designer of the Taj Mahal is also variously mentioned as Essa Effendy, a Persian or Turk, or Ahmed Mehendis or a Frenchman, Austin deBordeaux, or Geronimo Veroneo, an Italian, or Shah Jahan himself.
Records Don’t Exist
56. Twenty thousand laborers are supposed to have worked for 22 years during Shah Jahan’s reign in building the Taj Mahal. Had this been true, there should have been available in Shah Jahan’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.
57. 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 Shah Jahan’s mythical authorship of the Taj.
58. Description of the gardens around the Taj of Shah Jahan’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 Shah Jahan.
59. 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.
60. Prophet Mohammed 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 Tajamhal 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 Shah Jahan 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.
61. The Taj Mahal 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
62. The Taj Mahal 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 dinmultiplying and magnifying the sound of bells, drums and pipes accompanying the worship of Hindu deities.
63. The Taj Mahal 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.
64. The Taj Mahal entrance faces south. Had the Taj been an Islamic building it should have faced the west.
Tomb is the Grave, not the Building
65. 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 Taj Mahal too. One may therefore admit (for argument’s sake) that Mumtaz lies buried inside the Taj. But that should not be construed to mean that the Taj was raised over Mumtaz’s grave.
66. The Taj is a seven storied building. Prince Aurangzeb also mentions this in his letter to Shah Jahan (Refer to the Figure 1 above). 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 storey must be below the ground (river) level since every ancient Hindu building had a subterranean storey.
67. Immediately bellow the marble plinth on the river flank are 22 rooms in red stone with their ventilators all walled up by Shah Jahan. Those rooms, made uninhibitably by Shah Jahan, are kept locked by Archaeology 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 doorframes one at either end of the corridor. But those doors are intriguingly sealed with brick and lime.
68. Apparently those doorways originally sealed by Shah Jahan 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 Taj Mahal 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.
69. Apart from Hindu images hidden in the sealed stories it is also learnt that Hindu images are also stored in the massive walls of the Taj. Between 1959 and 1962 when Mr. S.R. Rao was the Archaeological 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 Shah Jahan’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 Taj Mahal? Its walls and sealed chambers still hide in Hindu idols that were consecrated in it before Shah Jahan’s seizure of the Taj.
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