Discovering Dholavira in 1997
Yesterday I read in the newspaper that Dholavira has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
“Do you remember our trip?”, I asked H, seated across on the dining table.
“Of course!”, he said. “That was a good trip.”
To the uninitiated, Dholavira is a little village located in Kutch in Gujarat. It is the site of a massive excavation dating back to the Harappa times (Indus Valley Civilisation).
In 1997, H and I were on a 15 day trip to Gujarat and had visited Dholavira with my chuddy buddy U and her sis, J. It was an adventurous trip from the word go.
First of all, all anyone in the main tourism office in Gandhinagar knew about Dholavira was that it was shown on the map with a marking close to it that stated ‘Wild Asses’. At first, when I laid my hands on the brochure with the map, I looked for Lothal (the dry dock excavated near Bhavnagar which also belonged to the same period as Dholavira). Both H and I enjoy historical places and we were very keen to see Lothal. But I was also keen to see Dholavira because it was as unknown as the ‘Wild Asses’ of Kutch were, in 1997.
After a few more enquiries we were told that the village is a 2–3 hour drive from a village called Rapar, near Bhuj. We decided to undertake the trip after we located Rapar on a TTK map of Gujarat. Since it was on the map, it would be habitable, we reckoned.
From Ahmedabad, we boarded a train to Gandhidham and then took a bus to Bhuj, where we stayed in an Army mess and enjoyed the hospitality. The following morning we took another bus to Rapar.
After a few hours of the journey, the bus broke down. All of us, snoozing in the overcrowded bus with goats for company, were rudely woken up by a clang clang sound coming from under the bus. H got off and asked the driver when the bus would get repaired. “Who knows!”, he said in proper Gujarati, as he sat on his haunches by the side of the road, smoking a beedi.
Even though it was October, it was quite warm in the day but we were not keen to get off the bus and lose our precious ‘baari’ (window in Gujarati) seats. So we stayed put. After what seemed like ages, the bus started and we reached Rapar.
When we left Bhuj in the morning, we had planned to return the same day. As per our calculations, we should have reached Rapar by 11:00 AM, Dholavira by 2:00 PM and we could have taken the last bus back to Bhuj, at about 6:00 PM.
But we reached Rapar around 3:00 PM, thanks to the break down, and we were ravenous. The first thing we did is find ourselves a dhaba where we devoured gujarati fare of khichri, undhiyo etc. All I remember from that meal is that it was delicious and there was a large cow that stood next to us, ‘inside’ the eatery, chewing her own meal.
After lunch, we found ourselves at a taxi stand of sorts where it took a lot of time to convince one of the bhais to take us to Dholavira. They didn’t want to be on that isolated road after sun down (due to the fear of wild animals) and demanded more money from us. But we had to do it. It was that day or never, and so we paid an arm and a leg for the Tata Sumo that took us to Dholavira.
Enroute we crossed the Rann of Kutch and stopped to take photos because we were mesmerised by the sea of white salt! What an unique experience that was! (Later when I checked my TTK map, the area that was marked ‘Wild Asses’ was the Rann.)
At about 5:30 or so, we reached a little village. There were no signboards of any kind, but the taxi bhai told us that the site was nearby. And eventually, we found ourselves inside the unmanned site.
The excavated area left us stunned! We walked around remembering what we had learnt in our history books — that Harappan villages had sections; an upper level, mid level and underground level with underground drainage and more. This city was exactly like that. We walked around, spellbound by the vastness and the sheer complexity of the erstwhile city, imagining its grandeur.
A village woman with a baby on her hip and her husband stood guarding the treasures recovered from the site — precious stones, pottery etc. — all laid on the floor of a hut that was also their home.
As soon as the sun began to set, we had to leave. We barely got 20–25 minutes exploring the site, before our bhai started haranguing us to leave.
We had a rather uneventful road trip back to Rapar and found ourselves a Dharamsala to shack in for the night; the four of us slept in a row, falling asleep the minute our heads hit the pillow.
Photo: The three gals from Kochi, exploring Dholavira in 1997
