When Stories Create History

AIIS is documenting 60 Mughal monuments and interviewing local communities to study their connections to the built heritage, under an AFCP-funded project. (Bureau of Educational & Cultural Affairs/AFCP India/Courtesy Flickr)

A rich history runs along the Grand Trunk Road, one of Asia’s oldest and longest roads, which stretches from Afghanistan in the west to Bangladesh in the east. A part of this history risks extinction as we lose generations that once settled along the route. The American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS), with the support of the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP), is documenting the oral history of families living in these ancient structures built in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The AFCP grant program draws on U.S. resources to support the preservation of historic buildings and monuments, archeological sites, museum collections, ethnographic objects, paintings, manuscripts, indigenous languages, and other forms of traditional cultural expression. Through the AFCP, the United States has invested $2.7 million over the past two decades in the documentation, conservation and restoration of 24 key historic sites and aspects of intangible heritage in India.

The project, “India: Documentation of 16th-17th-Century Mughal Monuments on the Grand Trunk Road,” is documenting 60 monuments and interviewing local communities to study their connections to the built heritage. Vandana Sinha, director of the AIIS Center for Art and Archaeology, says they will study the stretch from Agra to Amritsar in India, while virtual collaborators from the Lahore University of Management Sciences will study a section of the route in Pakistan. AIIS has received $153,000 for the project, which is to be completed within two years.

Way stations

The monuments along the Grand Trunk Road have survived the India-Pakistan partition, which fragmented the imperial highway on both sides of the border. AIIS documented monuments in Haryana and Punjab in 2008 under an AFCP grant and the current project will cover Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.

“We wanted to document this route because we learned during our previous project in 2008 that communities living along that route, around the monument, or, in many cases, within the monuments, migrated from Pakistan during the partition,” explains Sinha. “We were curious to know what made them live there.”

Kos minars (left) are distance markers built during the Mughal era. Every eight such markers were followed by a sarai (way stations). (Bureau of Educational & Cultural Affairs/AFCP India/Courtesy Flickr)

Though the highway was originally constructed around the third century B.C., it was developed and maintained during the Mughal period. The AIIS team has found bridges, gardens, mosques, sarais (rest houses), kos minars (distance markers), and tombs, with families living around or inside the structures while also maintaining them. Sarais are fortified way stations found between Agra and Amritsar. A kos is about 2 miles, and sarais were built after eight such pillars. “So, that means a caravan would be expected to travel during the day, and after every 16 miles you would find a sarai,” explains Sinha.

The team observed that almost all sarais are square with two gateways. “The gates of sarais in Uttar Pradesh toward Agra would be called Agra Gate, and those toward Delhi would be called Delhi Gate,” she explains.

The structure of the sarais remains the same, with two gateways and rooms along all four walls. The four corners of the fortified structures have bigger rooms that could be occupied by high officials or sarai owners and caretakers. Some of these structures also have hamams (bath houses).

Some way stations have wells and large stables nearby to support royal caravans and their animals, highlighting the importance of the route for the rulers of that time. “For example, Sarai Nurmahal near Jalandhar in Punjab is a beautifully decorated structure with a dedicated room for Mughal emperor Jahangir,” explains Sinha. Sarais in Punjab, she says, also boast of intricate artwork, paintings and glazed tilework on the gateways.

Fading into history

While talking to residents, Sinha’s team realized that there is a rich oral history associated with these structures. “We were asking people how they came to settle in these sarais, to find out when exactly these structures became insignificant for travelers,” she says. “Based on our oral history documentation, we believe the sarais became redundant for travelers when the highway was probably redeveloped by the British.”

For example, Sarai Amanat Khan in Punjab, the last way station in India on the Agra-Lahore route, which was built by Mughal emperor Shahjahan’s calligrapher, now houses three families from Gurdaspur who moved into the building about 300 years ago. “The Agra-Lahore route was functional in those days and provided them with great business opportunities. It was also a bustling market before the Partition, and the fortified structure felt safe for their families and businesses,” says Sinha.

Many people who migrated after the Partition, started settling into the abandoned sarais along the route in Punjab, explains Sinha. Having lived in these structures for a lifetime, residents develop an attachment to the places and are eager to help restore them. “From everyone we spoke to, we learned that they were proud of living in those places and were happy to collaborate with the government to protect these places,” she says. “The ancient historical structures are now part of their identity.”

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