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THE CURIOUS CASE Of MANDU- MADHYA PRADESH.
Situated at about 35 kam from Dhar, this city is situated on a hill top and is enclosed by fort walls.

Mandu’s name has been mentioned in the Jain Granth”teerthmala chaiyavandan “
“कोडीनारक मंत्रि दाहड़ पुरे श्री मंडपे चार्बुदे”

The earliest reference of Mandu is found in a Sanskrit inscription, when it was called as Mandapa-Durga.This inscription, dating to 555 AD, refers to the city as Mandapa-Durga. It has been claimed that the Prakrit, or vernacular version of this name is Mandava

By the end of tenth century, Mandu came under Paramaras, who ruled with their capital at Ujjain and later shifted to Dhar.Its said that Mandu was at its prime glory under their dynasty.

It progressed in the likes of the rulers
Maharaja Krishnaraj, Maharaj Harsh, Munj, Bhojdev, Jaisinghdev Parmaar and Udyaditya.

The memory of king Munja is still retained at Mandu in the name of the Munja-Talao. It is also probable that King Bhoja put a blockade to Mahmud of Ghazni when he was returning from Somnath, which made him to divert his route leaving Mandu unharmed.

An inscription on the sarpa-bandha in the local collection in the fort has the date Vikrama Samvat 1125 (AD 1068) and refers to Sri-Bhattaraka-Devendra-deva, possibly a vassal chief under the Paramara King Udayaditya

From the ‘Rasamala’ it could be gathered that Lohani caves and Shiva temples were of this period.

Geographically, the Malwa Plateau has an important place in Madhya Pradesh. Mandava is considered as the symbol of Kashmir of Madhya Bharat.

The Mandava is geographically located at the south end of Vindhyachal at 75 degrees-25 degrees from the Eastern Longitude and 22 degrees from the Northern Latitude. It's height 633.7 m above sea level.

In 1937, the statue of Bhagwaan Vishnu and many other statues were found in the excavation near Lohani cave. Several temples have been found in the excavation of the old Mandu, which has been authenticly stored in the Purasampada Vithika (Museum).

Parmar rulers constructed many buildings, palaces of different styles in Mandu, including interior of Jahaj Mahal, Hindola Mahal, Taveli Mahal, Munj Sagar, Kapoor Pond, Jal Mahal, Allha Udal Ki Sang, Malik Mugith's Masjit, Jamie Masjit , Hoshangshah's tomb etc.

The composition of these buildings has taken the priority of pure Indian architecture style. Here the lines of pillars made in Mharabo, lotus flowers, trishul, indispensable signs of kalash, bandanwar made on the door, etc. show the Indian architecture style.

1)Lohani Cave & temple ruins – These caves are ordinary excavations without much of carvings and without any inscription. In plan they represent a few rock-cut cells meant primarily for residence, perhaps for Shaiva Jogis.

On exploration, the entire surroundings of the caves were found scattered with carved fragments representing ruins of Hindu temples, mostly Shiva, which once stood there, but were presumably destroyed and their materials used in later Muslim buildings.

Lohani caves:

2)Hathi Pol – This is the main entrance to the royal enclosure. This is called Hathi Pol, on account of two elephant images flanking on either sides. These elephants were broken down by Aurangzeb in later period.

3)Gada Shah’s Shop:.Gada Shah is believed to be a Rajput nobleman-merchant who used this structure as his house, trading station and also general meeting place for public.

Due to being owned by a Rajput in an Islamic territory, this building has features of both architectural styles – no domes, but hanging arches, open courtyard with a central podium, etc.

4)Dilawar Khan’s Masjid. The mosque was built in 1405 A.D by Dilawar Khan.However, the pillars show traces of Hindu style notwithstanding the arch-shaped central mirhab suggests that this mosque was built by Hindu workmen.

5)Jama masjid -
The unique feature of the mosque is the numerous enormous praying rooms. Traces of Hindu craftsmanship are seen all over the mosque.

In about AD 1227, Shamsu’d-Din Iltutmish invaded Malwa and sacked Ujjain, but reigning Paramara King Devapala concluded a treaty with him hence Mandu was left untouched. This was the first Muslim invasion to the area.

The final onslaught came in AD 1305 from Alau’d-Din Khalji. He sent his trusted general Ainu’l-Mu’lk to fight with Mahlak Deo, the Hindu ruler of Mandu. Mandu was added to Delhi Sultanate.This wiped out the Hindu influence from Mandu.

In 1732, Marathas under Malhar Rao Holker defeated Diya Bahadur, the Mughal governor of Malwa in a battle of Tirla near Dhar. Mandu was with Marathas till the British rose to power.

The complete glory of Mandu is lost in history, and it’s perhaps only a reflection of the brutal invasion by the Mughals. The majority of the standing monuments at Mandu were raised in the period of hardly 125 years, between AD 1401 and AD 1526.

In this period Mandu was under Muslim rulers, and as elsewhere, they desecrated and destructed Hindu temples to raise their structures with their own ideas of architectural compositions.
Credit: different articles from google

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