ASI wants to ensure medieval relics aren’t destroyed by an expanding golf course

In another instance of modern technology coming to the aid of medieval heritage, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) will be using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) to map the contours of the area around the Bagh-e-Naya Qila excavated garden inside the Golconda Fort. It has roped in the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) to carry out the mapping.

This medieval garden in Hyderabad is the only one of its kind still intact. All the others – built during the Qutb Shahi rule (1518-1687) -- have either been built over or have disappeared. The contour mapping was necessitated by the impending advance of the Hyderabad Gold Club, which wants to expand its 18-hole course into a 21-hole one by taking over some of the land adjoining the Bagh-e-Naya Qila site. A GPR map would reveal any medieval relics that may lie buried under the ground, and could thus be saved by the ASI.

“The Hyderabad Golf Club, which has built a golf course in the Naya Qila area, wants to add a few more holes on the other side of the garden. We don’t want to lose any more history. We want to ensure that there are no relics of the Bagh-e-Naya Qila underneath and hence we are planning to map the area with GPR. We would have liked to do this with a Light Detection and Radar (LiDAR) but for that we need the permission of the Defence Ministry,” said ASI Superintending Archaeologist Milan Kumar Chauley.

The Naya Qila garden inside Golconda Fort was built by successive rulers of the Deccan and is one of the few symmetrical gardens extant. In 2014, when the ASI excavated the area after diverting the water flow, it discovered water channels, settlement tanks, walkways, fountains, gravity pumps, and a host of other garden relics.

An earlier excavation unearthed gold coins in the area where the golf course has been created. According to author Ali Akbar Husain, the Naya Qila area also has multiple chabootras (raised platforms) which are remains of garden structures that pre-date the Qutb Shahi rule. In the 1940s, the garden was even used for celebrating Basant Panchami.

The team from IIT-Madras will do a preliminary survey to ascertain the path for the contour-mapping. “We have told the IIT-Madras team that the survey and mapping have to be finished before the monsoon sets in. We will do the preliminary study by end of this month and the mapping might be completed in May,” Mr. Chauley said.

While there is a semi-collapsed ‘baradari’ (a gazebo-like structure with many pillars) in the garden, historians believe that another baradari might lie buried in the ground. GPR uses electromagnetic radiation in the microwave frequency for imaging sub-surface area.