Caravansarai : Short Stories from the GT Road (02)

Day 02

Date: 1^st June, 2012, Location: Sirhind, Talanian, Dera Mir Miran

Day two was dizzying. Priyaleen ma’am had joined us from Delhi, and after we picked her up from the station we headed for the first stretch of sites- Mahadiyan, Talanian, Fatehgarh Sahib- Sirhind and Dera Mir Miran.

And this was the longest stretch with more than a 100 structures amongst these settlements. So we started.

Through the course of this day, there were three things that I just had to write about.

1. The Chabutras of Punjab’s villages/ towns
2. Chabeels distributing water as respite
3. The tombs scattered across the fields of Sirhind.

Talanian ka Chabutra – A vantage point

Location: Talanian Settlement, District: Fatehgarh Sahib, Punjab

Photos by Author, Talanian ka Chabutra, Talanian, Punjab

Wikipedia says the word Chabutra or Chabutro is (also) sometimes used to indicate a sitting platform, usually under a tree or beside any water-body like lake, pond, etc. But commonly it is used to indicate the tower-like structure…

Photos by author

This definition of a chabutra / chabutro (being a tower-like structure) is what the rural landscape of Gujarat would substantiate, but in Punjab a chabutra is quintessentially a circular platform about a meter in height built under a large-size tree, which usually bears a canopy of more than 10 m in diameter. This is a community space that may also be used to address public gatherings of villagers like Panchayat meetings (Bollywood style). The older folk of the village, mostly the men-folk are seen gathering at these chabutras playing taash, drinking chai or just chatting in the afternoons.

The menfolk seated at the Chabutra

The Chabutra of Talanian is ideal to peek into the function of a chabutra in an Indian village. Talanian settlement now looks like a town mainly rural which in perhaps two or three decades (speculation) may head into urbanization. As one enters from the narrow lanes of the village shops towards the Chabutra, the large space with a huge shade-giving tree in the center may read as an ‘Incidental Nodal Space’ ( a term  I learnt from a senior conservation colleague) within the rural settlement.  

But a closer look reads the space as more than just "incidental". From this locus various other loci can be charted. Like the village Post Office, the Mosque of Talanian (wherein lies a sacred Sheesham tree), an old colonnaded structure leading to the mosque- arguably a sample of colonial architecture, and a dilapidated building made of nanakshahi bricks in the backdrop of the chabutra, next to the post office.


Standing at this junction, one can just rotate at their station point and see all these loci manifest the critical location of the village chabutra- right at the centre of all the action. One could think on the lines of proposals to use this existent space, or rather build a plan around it to generate awareness and increase local knowledge of the history and the historicity of the settlement wherein the chabutra could function as the landmark / a vantage point.