The stone sculptures still amaze me, as they did, the day I saw them.
I grew up near the hills, in a valley surrounded on the three sides by hills to be more precise.
The hills, if not lofty certainly were mysterious, their mystery enhanced by the story about how gods descended from heavens to earth a couple of thousand years ago, and decided to make the hills their earthly abode.
The day was a fairly good one. We had gone on a class-picnic to one of the many ‘hill resorts’ that abounded the hills. My classmates, my teachers and I had just consumed our lunch. The teachers decided to take a siesta and did so, after ordering us kids to do the same. We students however were too young to be forced by a heavy lunch into a state of sleepiness. The boys got up to play a game of cricket. The girls huddled together, and started playing Chinese whisper. I tried playing with the girls for sometime before getting bored, moving over to the area where the boys were playing and begging them to allow me to play with them. The boys seemed too glad to include me; the only catch was that I had to do the job of a ‘ball fetcher’ for two ‘overs’ before I was allowed to bowl or bat. I hesitated for a couple of seconds as fetching a ball in such hilly terrain as the one I was treading on, would certainly involve some dangerous rock climbing and jumping. The urge to play, however got better of me, and made me agree to the condition
The first over passed off more or less without me having to fetch the ball, as the fielders performed their jobs adeptly, restricting the scoring rate to less than two runs a ball. The batsman managed to get better of the fielders in the penultimate ball of the second over. The ball penetrated the circle of fielders and started running off towards the nearby precipice. I ran after the ball, slipped and almost fell into the precipice myself before stopping the ball’s and my descent in time. The boys who saw me slip came running towards the spot, saw to their relief that I thankfully was unhurt and miraculously had the ball in my hand and shouted out to me to throw the ball, so that the game could resume. Grimacing at their selfishness, I threw the ball back with such a force that I staggered, slipped and went tumbling another ten feet down before regaining my balance and getting back on my two feet.
Feeling disgusted with myself for having tumbled down the way I had, I brushed the dust off my clothes and started climbing up the steep incline. Half-way up, I spotted something that made me stop in my tracks. It was an opening in the nearly sheer wall of the cliff that opened into a cave, which to my amazement was strewn with massive stone sculptures. I abandoned my climb, crawled towards the cave and entered it to have a closer look. The sculptures were those of Hindu gods; they were sculpted to perfection, giving those sculptures a life-life appearance. It was magical; If someone told me that those were gods who had taken stone forms and would get up any time and walk out, I would have believed them. I walked to the mouth of the cave and shouted out to the boys to come and join me in my discovery. A couple courageous ones did and experienced similar wonder as I did, if not more, at those beautiful figures lying there, untouched by human hand. Closer inspection of the cave revealed more wonders; for example, there was a natural fountain that spouted off the head of one of the gods and pooled around the feet of the other.
We stood there marveling for a few minutes till one of the boys started getting jittery about the possible punishment we might have to face if the teachers came to know of our little adventure. Agreeing with the boy, we all climbed back to the level ground where the others were huddled together, casting furtive glances in the direction of the still sleeping teachers.
I walked over to the girls, narrated the findings to them and was all set to take some of the more adventurous of them with me to the cave, when one of the teachers woke up and starting shouting at us for all the noise that disturbed her beauty sleep. Her yelling woke the other teachers, who quickly instructed us to huddle together for a roll-call, which was followed by a snack session after which it was time for us to head back home.
Looking back, I still marvel as to how those statues withstood erosion for centuries under the continuous flow of water. I also wonder who sculpted those figurines and how they managed to carry or move those massive nearly twenty feet long monoliths into that cave. I once mustered up enough courage to ask my mother about those. When I wondered about the sculptor, she replied that he or they most probably were divine and godly beings, who could do anything. My heart says she is right, for it cannot think of any other answer till date.
