Gyaraspur - A Heritage of Excellence

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The valleys of Betwa and Bes, in Madhya Pradesh the central state in India, have cradled, since time immemorial, great centres of culture and civilization. Gyāraspur, which is now just an obscure village in a gorge of low steep hills, in one of the valleys, had been such a centre. The place abounds in relics and ruined temples belonging to Saivism, Vaisnavism, Buddhism and Jainism. Ancient relics and monuments such as Mālādevi Temple, Hindola Toran, Bajramath, Athakhambā, Bud dhist stūpas, Katarmal Bhairav and renowned sculpture of the nymph Śālabhanjikā speak a lot about the architectural and artistic splendor of Gyaraspur. These monuments and sculptures are of great interest to historians of culture and art. They did attract the attention of archaeologists and historians in the past, and stray mentions of them appeared in Archaeological and administrative reports but no serious studies have so far been done.

Dev Raj Birdi, who belongs to Indian Administrative Service, has an excellent multi-disciplinary academic career. He has written a number of articles on art and archi tecture and ancient history which ere published in various journals. He has presented a number of research papers on psychology phi losophy and economics in various conferences which were widely acclaimed and appreciated by the scholars. He is the editor of 'Vidisha Through the Ages', an art book published in the year 1990. A hand book entitled 'Vidisha' is his recent publication. Presently he is working on Sculpture, Art and Coinage of Dasarna Region.

Being an administrator I always kept out of my diction ary the terms like delicacy, tenderness, sensuousness and so on. As a routine tour to the villages I saw some monuments, idols and some decorative stone slabs and gazed at them but I paid no attention. But to my ease, sometime, I felt something deep into my heart, as these ancient relics wanted to reveal some mystery that I could not understand.

My district has a museum which, now I can say, has a beautiful collection of sculptures, excavated material, coins and so many things alike, belonging to bygone heydays that the district had enjoyed. In the course of repeated visits to the museum, these too, stamped upon me an impression and evoked the same feeling.

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