Town Planning in Ancient India c18.14

c18.14

The fact that Indian towns grew out of camps explains a peculiar phenomenon about them. Any antiquarian about ancient India, or any traveller who has traversed the vast expanse of this sub-continent cannot fail to notice and feel curious about the peculiar juxtaposition of many cities, some or all of which are to-day deserted and lie waste in ruins. Thus there are seven cities of the name of Delhi, some of which lie at present in débris, all in close proximity to one another. Again “ within the valley in which the remains of Taxila lie and within three and a half miles of each other are the remains of three distinct cities: (1) Bhir mound; (2) Sirkap; (3) Sirsukh.”¹ This phenomenon is at first sight quite inexplicable. One explanation I have sought to give elsewhere.² The genesis of Indian cities as partially formulated in the foregoing lines furnishes the clue to two other reasons. The mode of warfare and laying seige as disclosed by the above description of a skandhāvāra or military necessity accounts for one; for these military encampments projected and laid out in the light of the highest science of civic architecture were nothing short of miniature cities. These, more often than not in the event of victory, were turned into royal capitals to the rejection of the conquered city, or in case of reverses, were deserted to be utilised by the victorious adversaries as a suburban colony or extension of their own metropolis. Again the state of perpetual warfare which necessitated camp-life as the inevitable order of the time was responsible for many of these deserted cities. The fourth reason I have given in connection with the expansion and improvement of towns. There were some other minor reasons peculiar to the individual towns. Indian cities were not however always destroyed at the caprice of the monarch who had to abandon it, either chased from it by the enemy or led by a vain-glorious policy as well as suspecting diplomacy to found another. " Some peculiar manufactures had sometimes so firmly established as to survive desertion, and these manufacturing towns sometimes threw out colonies."¹