{"id":20540,"date":"2024-01-30T01:54:13","date_gmt":"2024-01-30T01:54:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/?p=20540"},"modified":"2024-01-30T01:54:13","modified_gmt":"2024-01-30T01:54:13","slug":"chambers-carvings-decorations-asi-report-on-gyanvapi-mosque-describes-temple-that-was","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/2024\/01\/30\/chambers-carvings-decorations-asi-report-on-gyanvapi-mosque-describes-temple-that-was\/","title":{"rendered":"Chambers, Carvings, Decorations: ASI Report on Gyanvapi Mosque Describes Temple That Was"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>INDIA, January 27, 2024 (Indian Express): A central chamber \u201ctastefully decorated with carvings of animals and birds,\u201d pillars with \u201clotus medallion\u201d and \u201cflower bud chains,\u201d a \u201clarge decorated entrance gateway\u201d on the wall of one of the chambers \u2014 these, according to the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), formed part of \u201ca large Hindu temple\u201d that existed at the site in Varanasi where the Gyanvapi mosque now stands. In a report on its scientific survey of the mosque complex \u2013 it\u2019s in four volumes \u2013 the ASI, tasked by the Varanasi district court to ascertain whether the mosque was \u201cconstructed over a pre-existing structure of a Hindu temple\u201d, has concluded just that, and describes a temple that existed before it \u201cappears to have been destroyed in the 17th century, during the reign of Aurangzeb and part of it\u2026 modified and reused in the existing structure\u201d.<br><br>The ASI report, made public Thursday after its copies were handed over to Hindu and Muslim litigants by the court, in the section titled &#8220;Reply to Observations of the Court,&#8221; stated: \u201cBased on the studies carried out, observations made on the existing structures, exposed features, and artifacts studied, it can be concluded that there existed a large Hindu temple prior to the construction of the existing structure.\u201d \u201cThis temple had a big central chamber and based on the study of the existing structures and available evidence it can be concluded that it had at least one chamber to the north, south, east and west respectively,\u201d it stated.\u201cRemains of three chambers to the north, south and west can still be seen but the remains of the chamber to the east and any further extension of it cannot be ascertained physically as the area to the east is covered under (a) solid functional platform with stone flooring,\u201d it stated.<br><br>Much more at source.<br><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/india\/chambers-carvings-decorations-asi-describes-temple-that-was-9129734\/\n\">https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/india\/chambers-carvings-decorations-asi-describes-temple-that-was-9129734\/<br><\/a><br>see also: <a href=\"https:\/\/organiser.org\/2024\/01\/27\/218622\/bharat\/asi-report-in-pictures-50-artefacts-and-images-showing-there-existed-grand-mandir-before-the-disputed-structure\/\n\">https:\/\/organiser.org\/2024\/01\/27\/218622\/bharat\/asi-report-in-pictures-50-artefacts-and-images-showing-there-existed-grand-mandir-before-the-disputed-structure\/<br><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>INDIA, January 27, 2024 (Indian Express): A central chamber \u201ctastefully decorated with carvings of animals and birds,\u201d pillars with \u201clotus,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20554,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20563,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20540\/revisions\/20563"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}