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| Catholic church bell, marker of the fabulous Maratha victory over the Portuguese in 1739 |
Pune, with its enchanting weather, picturesque surroundings, and great cultural heritage, is home to several historic monuments in and around the city. It has seen several eras: from its inception during Shivaji Maharaj’s childhood, the Peshwa rule, the political base of famed anti-colonialists Tilak and Gokhale, and today as an IT hub. With every historic monument, there is always an interesting story intertwined. With the intention of reliving one such story, last month my friend Heramb and I went off on an escapade towards the east of Pune, to visit the Chintamani Ganesh temple at Theur. The Chintamani temple, having witnessed the many ups and downs of Pune ever since it became a city of prominence, has become part of the aura of the place, having been interwoven into it's history and culture.
From a religious standpoint, the
Chintamani temple at Theur is said to house the Chintamani incarnation of the Hindu
lord Ganesha, one among his eight manifestations, whose temples are scattered
across Maharashtra, known as ‘Ashta-Vinayak’ or The Eight Ganeshas.
Said to be built by the contemporary
ascetic Morya Gosavi in the 16th century, it wasn’t until the rise
of the Chitpavan rulers of the Maratha Empire in the beginning of the 18th
century that this temple got its present importance. These rulers, appointed as
‘Peshwa’ ministers (Persian for Prime Minister), adopted the Chintamani Temple as
a family deity, due to which the temple began to enjoy a special religious
status. It is noteworthy that these rulers, who went on to control the dominion
themselves, brought a third of present day India and parts of Pakistan under
the realm of the Maratha Empire, until their expulsion in 1818 at the hands of
the British. With the powerful Peshwa family having its seat of governance
first at Saswad and then at Pune (both near Theur), this temple’s stature
continued to rise.
We decided to visit Theur on a
windy Saturday morning, with the quaint countryside punctuated by post-monsoon
showers. The village, just like any pilgrimage town, is small and unclean, with
hawkers peddling temple offerings such as flowers and coconuts right from the
parking lot up to the entrance of the temple. We parked our car and zipped across
this market to enter the Chintamani temple. When we entered the premises, the
object which greeted us was one of the principal reasons why we chose to visit
this place. Not a sword, not jewels, not sculptures, but a Catholic church
bell!
This Catholic bell, now a part of
the temple, is so indistinguishable from the remainder of the structure, that
if it weren’t for the Greek markings on its hull, we would have easily ignored
it too, as do all other normal pilgrims. This bell marks a watershed milestone
in Maratha politics and tells a fascinating story about Indian and Maharashtrian history,
which goes like this:
In 1737, a conflict ensued
between the Marathas and the Portuguese Empire. Within the next two years, the
Peshwa rulers, now with their second generation at the helm of Maratha affairs,
had captured among others the strategic Thane Fort and Salsette Islands,
isolating the Portuguese at Bassein (now Vasai, near present day Mumbai), their
imperial capital. which enjoyed more power and prestige than their other colony
at Panjim in Goa. In 1739, a member of the ruling Peshwa clan, Chimaji Appa, set
out with an expeditionary force towards Bassein, unfolding a set of events
which history would seldom permit happening again in the coming ages. Chimaji
Appa emerged victorious, delivering such a decisive blow, that the Portuguese Empire
in the Maharashtra region ceased to exist. Such was the rout that the
Portuguese had to abandon their capital, and relocate to far off Goa and Diu
(where they continued to rule until 1964). An Indian kingdom had humbled a superpower feared the world over.
Bassein, which now lay ravaged, was
earlier said to be a Portuguese colonial wonder, with several churches and an
Iberian town layout. Chimaji Appa, himself fascinated with the spoils, carried
some of the church bells back with him to Pune. As a memento celebrating the
victory of natives over foreign aggressors, he then had them installed at Hindu
temples having Peshwa patronage, one of them at the Chintamani temple
at Theur.
We simply sat in the temple
courtyard, trying to visualize events as they would have taken place at the
very spot, some three centuries ago. As remarkable as this moment is in Maharashtrian
history, equally appalling is the attitude of the temple authorities which have
not deemed it fit to install even a single plaque commemorating the historical
importance of the bell, the Maratha-Portuguese war, Chimaji Appa, or even the
Peshwa family. Few decades after the victory over the Portuguese in 1739, the fourth
generation Peshwa Madhav Rao I, under whose leadership the Maratha Empire
revived its tenacity in North India after the disastrous Panipat campaign
against the Afghan kingdom, made the Chintamani temple his home during his final
days, and breathed his last here in 1772. There is no memorial in the temple
dedicated to this great ruler either, and the only one there is stands in
squalid conditions a five minutes’ walk away.
It made me wonder: if Germany, which even maintains its World War era concentration camps with the same seriousness and dignity as it maintains its palaces and museums, in spite of them being reminders of one of the darkest periods in their history, can we as a future 'super power' not have the simple initiative of maintaining monuments that are markers of one of the most golden moments of our own?
Having done some more sightseeing in the vicinity, we drove back to Pune, having relived a golden chapter in this city’s history.
