Garden hunt: Red Fort

New Delhi, Dec. 20: Historians are on the scent of a lost treasure at the Red Fort — a “perfume garden”.

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has decided to excavate a patch within the Red Fort where a sprawling Mughal-era garden once stood before being flattened by British soldiers during the 1857 uprising.

ASI officials said excavation would start in a week on the patch covered with red sand and used as a parade ground, first by the British and later by Indian troops.

One ASI official said the garden had been designed “as paradise as described in the Quran”. The swathe almost as big as an Olympic-size stadium — 135 metre by 135 metre — was called Mehtab Bagh or moon-lit garden.

Located a little away from the palace dwellings, it was a haunt of the Mughal royalty who came there to take in the sights — and the fragrance.

“Mughal garden literature describes Mehtab Bagh as a white night garden full of flowering trees and vines. It was a perfume garden reserved for the royal family,” said Syed Jamal Hassan, the director of excavations, at the ASI.

When the British troops marched in during the 1857 mutiny, the fort did not have enough space to accommodate them. They demolished several structures and constructed barracks in their place, ASI officials said.

When it was originally built in 1648, the Red Fort had two gardens, Hayat Baksh and Mehtab Bagh. The first was left more or less intact and is open to visitors even now. Hayat Baksh, or Life Bestowing Garden, was meant to be used during the day.

“Soldiers required a parade ground, so they uprooted trees and plants in Mehtab Bagh and flattened it. The Indian Army inherited the ground and used it for the same purpose,” said ASI superintending archaeologist Vasant Kumar Swarnkar.

The Indian Army vacated the Red Fort in 2003, after the ministry of culture and tourism argued the presence of troops came in the way of efforts to preserve and maintain it as a site of historical importance. Four years later, in 2007, the fort won World Heritage status.

Archaeologists were aware all along that Mehtab Bagh lay buried under the area occupied by the army but excavation plans never took off.

Before it finally decided to begin digging, the ASI dusted off maps in a Jaipur museum and some from private collections dating back to the 17th and 18th centuries to locate the exact site of the garden.

“Our objective is not just to study the layout but also the canal network and what remains of the fountains,” Swarnkar, the ASI archaeologist, said.

Waterworks and extensive canal networks are hallmarks of all Mughal gardens. Those at the Red Fort drew water from the Yamuna, which runs alongside the edifice.

Hassan, the ASI excavation director, explained this feature in the context of Mehtab Garden.

“The garden has been designed as an imitation of paradise as described in the Quran. (Red Fort builder) Shah Jahan wanted to replicate all features of the heaven’s gardens.

The canals have been essential part of all Mughal gardens and we see that breadth of the canals widened with each Mughal descendant. Shah Jahan built the widest at the Taj Mahal and the Red Fort.”