The
saga of the hunt for gold, taken up by none other than The
Archaeological Survey of India, is becoming more and more curious as
the days go by. As mentioned by me, in my blogpost 'Incredible
India,'
ASI took up this unusual assignment from the pressure by a federal
minister, who in turn got inspired by a dream of a seer, Shobhan
Sarkar. The seer had said that gold would be found at the dilapidated
fort of Raja Ram Baksh Singh in the Buxar area of Unnao district in
the state of Uttar Pradesh, India. He had claimed that the king
appeared in his dream and told him about the treasure and the gold
would be found after 15 feet of digging.
14
days after the digging began, ASI officials have had no luck so far.
There is no trace of any gold at the site. The excavation work has
reached a depth of 4.8 metres and has reached a level of Kankar
(gravel) formation, which started from 4.6 metres. The site has so
far yielded only few odd sherds of pottery and artefacts supposed to
be dating back to 1st century BCE. The ASI Director General (DG) says
that few pottery sherds were of black slipped ware, a sherd of
northern black polished ware along with red ware sherds of early
historical periods. In addition to these, the antiquities that have
been recovered so far from this trench, includes glass bangles, iron
nails, hopscotch (a game), fragmentary miniature stone figure of
lion, and terracotta arecanut shaped beads. A burnt brick structure
consisting of a burnt brick wall (1.46 metre long) having brick size
— 47 x 24 x 6.75 cm and another brick wall (0.97 metre long )
having brick size — 48 x 24 x 6.75 cm and two hearths also have
been found so far.
There
were reports in the media that the gold hunt has been called off by
the ASI. However ASI DG says that no such decision has been taken.
Only thing that ASI has done is to stop the excavation at the first
trench and it was being readied for photography drawings of the
trench. ASI DG says: "We are also planning to extend the area
of digging in the same trench, after removing the structure of the
bricks wall." After consultation with the ASI officials at the
site, the Geological Survey of India team has suggested another area
at the site close to river Ganga for next phase of trial excavation.
DG says: "Accordingly, a new trench XA2 has also been laid-out
with proper cleaning of the surface and the digging would take place
from tomorrow."
The
seer, who gets these divine dreams has now come up with a new theory
that is even more bizarre and a super howler than even the first
one, in which he dreamt of gold. He now says that the digging must be
completed before the first day of Diwali festival (2st
November 2013)or else the gold will turn into ash. Can you beat that?
It is obvious that he is now providing an escape route for everyone,
Federal Government, ASI and himself.
It is
better for ASI to jump and take this escape route to avoid further
embarrassment, and before they becoming laughing stock of the world,
they should simply say that there is no point in continuing the
excavation because anyway it would be turning to ash. (HaHa)
30
October 2013
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