A bridge to Jharkhand’s past: Haradih’s semi-excavated temples call for greater exploration

Over the last few years, bridges in Bihar have repeatedly made the news by collapsing. What seems to have escaped mainstream media attention is a similar incident in the neighbouring state of Jharkhand. Less than an hour and a half’s drive from Ranchi lies the village of Haradih. Here, a bridge across the Kanchi River collapsed in 2021.

When a visitor drives to Haradih, he finds the grass growing on the edge of the bridge. Village folk point to a path on the left of the bridge as the way to take. Wondering how any pathway can help him cross the river in the absence of a bridge, the traveller moves to the path. The villagers have worked out a makeshift way to get across. Taking advantage of the river being reduced to a stream for most part of the year, they have set up a sandbagged track which allows even vehicles to cross. Having made up for the absence of government effort with their own ‘jugaad’, they follow officialdom and levy a minimal ‘toll’ for this service.

Not trusting the sandbagged track, this author chose to walk across the largely dry riverbed – crossing on foot was ‘toll free’. After a few hundred meters, Haradih’s heritage highlight came into view – two small temples that clearly belonged to an ancient period. Built of stone and looking as if they have been restored in a makeshift manner, the temples looked fragile.

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According to research done by scholar Mithilesh Kumar Choubey, these shrines first came to light in 1935, when they were discovered by a local called Shashi Bhushan. Bhushan apparently saw the upper part of the temples. Over the next five years, efforts made by the local villagers saw these temples emerge from the sand that periodic flooding of the Kanchi had buried them under for centuries.

This informal, yet effective ‘excavation’ revealed the existence of two temples, which were dated to the 13th century CE. Going by the structure, they resembled the Deul style of architecture popularly seen in Bengal and Odisha. Of the two ancient shrines, the larger one is dedicated to Durga while the smaller has a Shiva linga within. While the larger shrine seems a complete structure, and has been protected by a shutter in front, the smaller one has only three sides standing, with the front wide open.

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The two temples are surrounded by remains of other shrines – pillar fragments, carved pieces, numerous Shiva lingas and even a few sculpted statues. The entire place seems to stand on a mound, not yet excavated. Within the same complex is a third temple, a modern one dedicated to the Goddess. When asked about the Haradih temple, it is this modern shrine that is top of mind for locals as the deity here is considered powerful and sees a regular stream of worshippers flocking in.

There is also a local story, half-legend and half-history. This holds that the two visible, ancient shrines at Haradih are merely parts of a much larger temple complex that stood here. In that grand complex the two most significant shrines were those of Mansa Devi and Surya, the sun god. It is said that the Kanchi River repeatedly breaching its banks caused the site to be flooded and covered with alluvial deposits. Locals still believe that the Mansa and Surya shrines are buried under the mound at Haradih, waiting to be excavated one day.

More evidence of the lost temples, albeit circumstantial, comes during the annual Tusu festival. This festival is held during the Makar Sankranti period each year and sees huge crowds converge on Haradih’s newer temple. While the harvest festival of Tusu has been ‘secularised’ over time, its traditional practices involving sun worship and singing songs in praise of the mother goddess continue to this day. Perhaps the crowds at Haradih follow a memory of an earlier era when Tusu songs were sung in the temples of Mansa Devi and Surya.

One of the reasons for building a bridge over the Kanchi at this spot was to facilitate the passage of large crowds to the Haradih temple. However, the bridge did not last for even a fraction of the time that the temples have. Some attribute its fall to excess rainfall during Cyclone Yasa in 2021, others to illegal sand mining from the riverbed while a third set has a more prosaic explanation for it – corruption in construction.

Apart from the aspect of faith, there is ample reason to reconstruct the bridge. From a heritage explorer’s perspective, the area is rich in prospects. As per Choubey, within a 1 km radius of the Haradih temple site are numerous sites with temple remains. Choubey says that even more temples may be underground ie unexcavated. Could a sustained and well-organised archaeological dig here reveal a vast temple complex? Maybe such an excavation may also reveal an inscription giving the true history of Haradih and Jharkhand’s ancient past. Until then, Haradih lives on with its semi-excavated heritage and makeshift river crossing.

The author is a heritage explorer by inclination with a penchant for seeking obscure sites. A brand consultant by profession, he tweets @HiddenHeritage. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.