Buddhist Caves around Lonavla

Lonavla is ideally a hill station and popular in the rainy season with lovely views, fun trekking and lots of good local food. Well, that's what local hosts expect of tourists and frequenters from nearabouts to come there for.

I was a dapper for my simple, lovely-natured autowalla with whom I struck off on the first day outside the Lonavla station itself. Local, and familiar with all interesting things to do/see, and completely adept at predicting the daily vagaries of nature, as in, rains will become heavier/lighter, can we catch views or will clouds cover up the different peaks, and all such details that a visitor may get bogged with, I had it all laid out conveniently by this amazing man! I did get a few looks from him the first day, when at the end of a visit to the popular Karla Caves I told him the names of two other caves I wanted to go and kept bugging him on wanting to visit Shivaji's Lohgarh fort, which apparently is not frequently done in tour rounds and so the location may be desolated.

Well, I persisted on my requests in a nice way while respecting his local info, while he was adventurous and decided to check it out, after all, what with a nagging customer and it was a whole new revelation to both of us and a fantastic friendship was struck!

Karla caves and Ekvira Devi Temple

My autowalla dropped me off at the parking lot of the temple and the caves (located next to

each other) and told me its just a temple and a cave and it would take about 10 minutes. He

was completely bugged up when I landed there one and a half hours later...I was feeling

guilty too!

From where the road ends it is a good half an hour's climb up. Not tough to cover, a lot of

footfall and so climbing company too.

Ekvira Devi Temple is held is high faith by the local fishermen community, the Kolis of the area. On certain occasions, they walk from home in a procession singing and carrying items

of worship for the Devi and climb up to to the temple, often barefoot and irrespective of the weather. 

A local belief is that it was built by Pandavas during their exile when the Devi appeared before them and asked them to do so. Pleased with their faith and the temple

having been built overnight the Devi is believed to have granted them the boon that they

wouldn't be identified during their exile in the forest.

Karla caves estimated to have been made in the 2nd century BC is one of several such

caves that were built in those days for Buddhist who travelled all over and would often sit in

penance for over several years. Cave temple with rooms for stay and a dias for penance and stupas were cut out of rock faces, up in the mountains, away from local riffraff, protected from the rains so they the Buddhist yogis could peacefully pursue their life's purpose. 

The Hindu Theatre Fest, Bangalore 2018

It started on August 17, 2018, with a selection of three exclusive plays, the first of which was “Aurat, Aurat, Aurat" directed by Naseeruddin Shah. 

The place was abuzz with excitement, expectations high from the director and actors’ game, and with big names like The Hindu providing the platform.

Aurat, Aurat, Aurat: The play was on a very commonplace topic. One that’s been beaten black and blue across various mediums. Though still relevant after two odd generations of war against it, it’s still a little too mundane.

In the presentation of the subject, the story of Ismat Chughtai was good, though the dialogues were verbose. The brilliant acting added a little merriment and lightened up the otherwise beaten topic.  

Most importantly, it was predominantly an Urdu play, not one of the common Hindi spoken and oft-familiar language. So it is very likely that many in the audience would have missed the nuances of the story, that were presented is such a lovely jovial way by the actors.

The other two, much to the delight of all were lighter, and more easily enjoyable plays by women directors, with convenient subtitles cast high up on the stage backdrop which allowed for ease of watching the acting and occasionally catching up with the essence of the repartee. The language barrier was overcome, and so casually.