Heritage halo at the Ajanta caves? Yes! Adventure t r e k t h r o u g h the Meghalaya caves? Yes! Ferry ride to Elephanta? Yes! A peek into Khandagiri-Udaygiri? Yes! Gingerly stepping down Borra Caves? Yes! On the trail of renowned artists Asit Kumar Haldar, Nandalal Bose and Surendranath Kar to Bagh Caves? Where?!

Madhya Pradesh is home to a priceless fifth-century legacy comprising exquisite Buddhist cave paintings and sculptures on the deserted southern slopes of the Vindhyas. The remarkable aspect is that the state teeming with tourists finds few takers for the Bagh Caves in Dhar district, although these paintings are considered the direct descendants of the Ajanta school of art. Unesco has accorded world heritage site status to Ajanta, and Bagh could rightfully claim that tag with a little endeavour on the part of the MP government. Given its fascinating link to Santiniketan’s Kala Bhavana’s celebrated trio — Haldar, Bose and Kar — I was stunned to discover the lack of interest in this treasure trove during a recent visit to Mandu, another destination teeming with history and heritage, but with little preservation effort.

Bose had told litterateur-dancer-painter Rani Chanda, daughter of Rabindranath Tagore’s friend Kulachandra Dey, that he, Haldar and Kar were invited by the Gwalior state on an all-expenses-paid (plus Rs 200 per head) assignment in January 1921 to copy the cave paintings, since Halder had completed a similar project at Ajanta.

So off they went, by train from Howrah to Mhow via Khandwah, and thence to Sardarpur via Dhar by bus, and the last stretch to Bagh via Tanda on bullock cart, camping in tents, under the care of the archaeological department of Gwalior. Over the next two months, they painstakingly completed the project.

In 1923, Haldar had written in The Burlington Magazine, London, “These ancient caves, which my colleagues and I visited in January 1921, are situated south of the village of Bagh, and form a half-circle, like a crescent moon, from southeast to south. They are surrounded almost entirely on the west, and partly on the north, by hills, at the foot of which the River Bagh(ani) runs through level fields dotted with cypress woods.” Tigers prowled in the surroundings, as evident from pug marks near the tents.

Bose was immensely enthused by this venture. He sent his students little notes of information and advice and on his return, decorated the walls of a room in the old library building in Santiniketan, floor to ceiling, with floral scrolls derived from those in Ajanta and Bagh.

Driving the 100-odd kilometres from Mandu, through lush countryside amid intermittent rain, it took us nearly three hours along state highways and then a sharp turn left along meandering roads to reach Bagh village.

The entry ticket to such a treasure trove of ancient art is Rs 25. Given the negligible footfall, the revenue generated must be a pittance. The caves, situated at a slight altitude across a bridge over the river, are today under the Archaeological Survey of India’s salvage operation.

Anthropologist Nirmal Kumar Ghosh has recounted in his book Bharat Shilpa that the Bagh paintings go beyond the Ajanta frescoes in that they depicted the lives of common people, not just religious Buddhist annotations, although both were drawn by Buddhist monks.

Out of the nine caves, two are in a shambles. Caves 3 and 4, the latter known as Rangmahal, have the main frescoes, although most of the larger and more spectacular paintings have been shifted to a museum alongside. This “storehouse” of priceless (and irreplaceable) art is, however, crying out for attention.

In an account in Rupam, Haldar had recounted: “The paintings can be seen only by saturating them with water. It is a task which calls for the exercise of patience. The people about the place are utterly ignorant of the significance of these paintings and many of them have thought of acquiring merit by scribbling their names on the shrine of ‘Panch Pandu’ (as they have named the Bagh Caves) while some have scraped out portions of the colouring matter.”

The trio traced out the frescoes, often using paddy starch to make them clearer. A century later, not much progress towards preserving them is in evidence.

According to Devendra Richhariya, a senior ASI official, “The seepage of water is posing a threat and damaging the existing wall art.” The friezes on the columns have also been intricately done, but like elsewhere across the country’s heritage sites, preservation efforts are unable to replicate the centuries-old workmanship.

Today, the settlement subsists on a cottage industry of hand-printed fabric, called “Bagh print”, using traditional dyes and wooden blocks. But none of the designs has taken any thematic motifs belonging to the caves.

Asked why the Bagh Caves are practically unheard of, despite being a repository of Buddhist art comparable to Ajanta, Sheo Kumar Shukla, the state’s principal secretary (tourism and culture), and Yuvraj Padole, deputy director of the Madhya Pradesh Tourism Board, said plans were afoot to develop niche tourism there through involvement of locals, employment generation and a publicity blitz. “A Mandu festival will draw tourists, who will also visit Bagh,” they added.

Should these plans go the way of government promises and fail to take off, even the lure of a Unesco tag will crumble in the face of the existing apathy!