We had been travelling for a long time-almost 4 hours when we reached Jamkhed. Our destination the fort of Dharur was still a long way off so we decided to take some rest in a temple in a village half way between Jamkhed and Patoda.
Feeling refreshed, we started off at about 8am from there and stopped at Manjarsumba to get some breakfast. We have now just started on our way again. The next mile stone is Kej where we shall take the turn towards Dharur. I will continue my naration now once we have seen the Dharur fort.
Dharur is a mix of a hill and land fort. Its defences are strenthened by valleys on 3 sides and a moat on the 4th side. Initially built by Rashtrakut kings, this fort was later under the Nizam and later the Moghuls. Netaji Palkar was captured by Aurangzeb.
The road that takes one to the fort through the Dharur village brought back memories of Chakan in Pune. A narrow road snakes through the densely crowded houses towards the fort. A lot of the houses are pretty old and have beautiful old doors.
The entrance to the fort is strategically flanked by 2 huge bastions such that the actual doorway is hidden from view. The fort is protected by 30 bastions and a lot of the fortifications are intact. Inside the fort one can see a temple, some dry tanks which seem like old swimming tanks ! Interestingly the moat seems to have been by building two walls on 2 sides of the fort and damming a stream that might have flowed down the valleys. Both the walls are huge and have formed spectacular pools which are part of the moat. One can see ducks frolicking around in the water. There is also a mosque on which you can see a inscription in Parsi. Interestingly there are a couple of recent graves in the courtyard dating 2010.
There are 2 bastions inside the fort that seem to be lookout points. One of them is in a diapiladated state with no way left to reach the top.
We reached Dharur fort at about 11 and completd our tour by 1 30. According to some locals that we talked to the covered tanks in the middle of the fort are 'tupachya wihiri' which means wells of ghee. In those times old ghee was used to treat wounds.
We started off from Dharur at 1 30. Next we plan to stop for lunch at Ambejogai and then go on to Dharmapuri where there is a 'gadhi' and a very old Kedareshwar temple with beautiful
Sculptures.
Comments