A Study of Historical Remains of Chelur and its Surroundings
PRASANNA KUMAR S R
ICHR – Junior Research Fellow
Dept. of Studies and Research in History and Archaeology
Tumkur University, Tumkur
E-mail: srprasanna89@gmail.com Mob: 9482722591
Abstract
Historical remains are the Evidences of our heritage and representative of our past culture and society. In present days heritage is in danger and historical monuments are destructed by lack of protection and mismanagements of local organizations. In this situation this research paper try to analyze the Chelur region historical remains, Chelur is presently a semi urban area; earlier it was a political center surrounded by many historical places like, Hagalavadi, Bidare, Guddadahalli, Nittur, Sira and others. In this research paper, I try to analyze present condition of the historical remains, to discuss the reasons for decay of historical remains, hurdles in protecting the heritage, to find different ways to save the historical remains and understand the role of society and academic organizations in saving the culture.
Key words: Analysis, historical remains, heritage, Chelur, condition
Introduction
Present days are competitive, man always tries to do better in his/her work and get better than yesterday; at the same time they are running to future dreams, this kind of people are all over the world. Generally people think new innovations are only giving recognition and they want to update every day to new versions. In this condition people lose touch with their culture and values. The values depend upon our culture and ancestors, because culture make a animal as a human being and values give them a higher position in the ecological system. But nowadays our culture and history do not have any importance in our daily life, and these things are treated as non productive matters and these are raw material and thoughts of new physical and metaphysical constructions.
My Paper on Analysis of Historical Remains of Chelur Region: Present Condition is a concern for our heritage. India is one of the countries which have long and continues history. In the modern world heritage is in danger, because people think written evidences and what they know traditionally those are only comes under the heritage value, which are in their surroundings or locally available those are do not have any value in front of the popular heritage representatives. Heritage is the full range of our inherited traditions, monuments, objects, and culture. Most important, it is the range of contemporary activities, meanings, and behaviors that we draw from them[1].
In this situation late is better than never say like it is an attempt to analyze present condition of heritage or historical monuments of Chelur region, it is an experimental research to create awareness in the present generation.
Objectives
This research papers is an absolutely different from the established historical research paper making theory. Through this research paper, I try to find some innovative ideas to save our heritage and remains of our history; it is final goal of this research paper. This paper basically took the shape based on objectives, the main objectives of this research are, to identified the major casus for destruction of our heritage and historical remains, to know the barriers in protecting monuments and other historical matters, to organize the remedial action to protect our culture and history, and lastly all changes start from the beneficiaries that why in this paper discuss how public and academic organization work to create awareness in the society, these are the main objectives of this research paper and it is developed on these thought.
Methodology
In this research I used some of better historical methods to collect the data, those are, field work in the particular research area, photography of the historical and heritage monuments, took the interviews of the local population, and read the available literature in the hard and soft manner, and took the Google map help to make map and marking the sites in the Chelur region. These methods are used in this research.
Discussion
Chelur is one of the hoblies of Gubbi thaluk in Tumkur district of Karnataka, presently it is a commercial semi urban area, from the historical view, it was played major role in this region and it was situated in the center of many regional administrative powers like, the Hagalawadi Nayakas, the Navabs of Sira, the Gowdas of Gubbi Hosahalli (Rao, 1969), the Nadaprabus of Bidare, and itself it comes under the reign of Gowdas of Chelur. Chelur region have large number of heritage, historically and archaeological materials through the ages, presently we seen many historical monument which were belongs to Hoysalas, Nayakas, Mysore Odeyars, and other local contributors. In this region we found many historical monuments in different places like, from Chelur - Chelur Bavi, Dristeshvara temple, inscription at Honnadevi temple, stone hen, sand Bull, hero stone, Bairaveshvara temple, at Kodiyala – Hoysala style Nandi Sculpture, hero stone, in Bidare- Kalleshvara temple, Veerabadreshvara temple, Hoysala style Nandi and Veerabadra sculpture, unique Ganapathi sculptures (Rao, 1916), Vijayanagara Queen Kamaladevi inscription (Rice, 1904), Jain Basadi, at Hagalavadi- Two Gate ways, Mathas of Veerashaivas (Yogeeshvarappa, D. N,2004 ), hero stone with inscription, Junjappa temple, in Guddadahalli- Nayakas period temple and pavilion, at Sanabanahalli- memorial stones and grooves on rock (Prasanna Kumar,2018), at Lakkenahalii- hero stones and temple and many other monuments are give evidences to historical richness of this region(Sheshashastri, 2004).
Heritage is playing an important role in the civilized world, it is a showcase of our past days, during the historical time writing was belongs to Noble people and the common people were did not have these facilities, when we try to know their history the only way is our heritage, like historical monument, folk songs, sculptures, and other element of our past. But in the modern world our heritage is destructing by many things, lets we know the major reasons for the destruction of our heritage, mainly it is classified in two types like, Natural destruction and Human destruction. In the Chelur region major destruction happened naturally, in the rains season monuments are damaged in large scale, the famous Chelur Bavi (stepped well) north side wall stones collapsed in 2013 and 2014 by rain, another reason for destruction plants, some of the trees like, Peepul and Banyan and other bushes growing in and on the monuments, birds and animals also damage the monuments in the minor quantity.
Destruction by human being is the biggest problem to heritage and monuments, people always try to expose themselves from everywhere. Kind of destruction by humans on heritage and historical monuments are, encroachment on heritage area, in Hagalavadi outside the village an old Shaiva matha is their presently it is used as a cattle shed, in the same village at the fort entrance two pavilions there those are used as Lay stall, and the whole structure is surrounded by drainage water.
Another one is renovation of the monuments, and sometimes it causes more destruction temples. Basically men try to offer service and donation to god and for this purpose they badly renovate monuments, like putting the tiles on carved pillars, removing the stone pillars, plaster ceilings by cement, paint on walls, leave the damaged sculptures in water bodies. Some greedy people take the monumental remains to their own use and try to preserve in their own collection. In the case of hero stones, hero always disappears because people look on the god symbol only. Youngsters try to leave their memory of the visit to the place as they caved their and their associates names on the monuments. Some time they intentionally damage the monuments, like Hampi monuments, these are the main destruction reasons of our heritage and monuments.
Protection is an essential action towards saving heritage, but the problem is when we try to protect monuments we get hurdles from everywhere, hurdles in protecting historical remains, local population never ready to accept outsiders, because they think, these peoples steal the sculptures, or treasures hunters like, some time if they allow someone to protect it make damage to their tradition and they supper from the god’s unhappy. Generally hero stones and sati stones are under the individual control they have blind beliefs on those; they never allow anybody to near the sculptures. Which monuments come under the government control there is lack of coordination between the authorities, and it is a big official correspondence work it takes many years to come action, in present situation our governments not ready to pay money to protect the heritage they are do not know the value of our heritage, and it needs more money also, these are the practical hurdles in protecting the monuments.
Here I discuss about what kind of actions we may take to protect our heritage, heritage is a national property we avoid it become as an individual property, government must take the initiative to save heritage and they make collaboration between concern departments, heritage belongs to public without their cooperation nothing will happen, concern departments choose interested people to participate in the local heritage save programs. Present day NGO’s are interested to deal with the heritage issues, many charities are ready to pay the money to protect our culture and history in the proper manner like, Infosys, Wipro, Tata, and many others. First and for most action is avoid the distraction of monuments, for it we make a team at least in every taluk level, it have students, teachers, officers, NGO representatives, experts in heritage protection, and interested public. Any where renovation is going in historical monuments voluntarily concern team visit their and give proper guidelines to them if they want help from the heritage protection team they ready to give. To create the awareness and give the information about the heritage and historical monuments in every village, tell them to the value of our heritage, purpose of the protecting heritage, clear the blind belief about the sculptures and monuments, and show how to economically develop. These are my suggestions to protect the heritage and historical monuments.
Culture and heritage are not technical matters they are associated with our feeling and beliefs, every society have their own culture and heritage and it sustain from the many years, in the modern time our society become very narrow and too much restricted. Our society value depend upon our culture and heritage, which society have culture and long heritage and historical remains in large number that shoes historical richness of the society, that’s why present society to know our heritage and participate in heritage and historical remains protection programs. Because society is always changing and growing, it must preserve its history for future generation as it helps to lead a better life. For these reasons society give the support to save heritage, take education about heritage management, try to behave like civilized.
Academic organizations are most powerful and active organizations in the modern world. Heritage and historical monuments are essential for them. In the present system our schools and colleges have many non curriculum activities, like NSS, NCC, Scouts and Guides, CLC, and some orientation programs. Out of these no take responsible of the heritage, in the UG and PG levels Universities make compulsory Heritage Awareness Camps (HAC) and it become a study paper in degree level from this kind of actions every year awareness will growing and future citizens knowing about the importance and students are easily connected with publics and we take students in the restoration work, it gives education to students and save money also, universities take leadership to document historical monuments and send the action plan proposals to concern authorities. Through the HAC collect the unprotected historical materials and reestablished at same place are protected places, these kind of participation very much need by the society and academic organizations.
Conclusion
This research paper analyzes heritage and historical monuments management. Chelur region one is of the important historical region, at the same time heritage management is completely fail by the concern departments, it is not only the problem of Chelur it is common problem of all heritage sites, what I discuss in research paper about reason, hurdles, suggestion of heritage management or heritage protection these are applicable at everywhere and these are flexible, these are look like ideal thoughts but when these come action it changes situation and society also slowly interact, it is prime time to take action to save our heritage because we lost many important materials in our country through the ages, late is better than never. With this hope, I present this research paper and it open for correction and adoption.
References