Murud-Janjira Fort Visit

This visit was the highlight of our Kashid resort trip just before the year-end.

Since my driver had returned to Mumbai, I had the challenging experience of navigating the road to Murud Village (from Prakruti Resort). This was a hair-raising exposure to the hazards of driving in India. There was hardly any traffic, so we did enjoy the first 15 Kms of the way enroute to Murud. At one point when we were climbing up the hilly terrain, we saw the beautiful rocky beach of Murud coming up. And, suddenly, the Janjira Fort came into view in the middle of the sea. I thought that the fort appeared to be far away into the sea, which was not true. Due to the curving beach all along the coastline, it could appear that way, but really speaking from another point after crossing the village, the Janjira Fort is hardly two Kms into the sea from the nearest coastline (atleast from the ferry boarding point).

I drove through the village, the road quickly becoming a narrow piece of lane, and had to traverse traffic coming headon with quite some skill. At couple of places, I had to even reverse the car, since there was just no space for a bus or a lorry to pass through. It was terrible infrastructure, I don’t understand why the main highway needs to pass through a small village. The only solace is that the poor, simple local people are very helpful when you end up going in the wrong direction. They always help you out of the morass and guide you to the right road. All this happened to me, and it was interesting to see that people still stop and stare at you, as though they could not understand why we were taking all this trouble in the first place !

We reached Murud Village, stopped for a while, and walked around the pristine white-sands beach. I was surprised to note that the beach was quite clean. I expected lot of plastic waste on the beach, so it was good to look at and enjoy the beach like what it should be. Great place to go to and may be take a horse ride ! Several people were doing that.

I looked around for the boat jetty but could not find it. So, asked around, and drove another 4 Kms to another end of the village (after climbing a hill !) and landed at the point at which they take people on a boat ride to Janjira Fort. We took the regular boat service, but I was aghast to discover that they did not follow any safety rules at all. It was not a regulated service, and I am sure nobody would take any responsibility for mishaps. There were no safety belts, or life-saving devices on the boat which actually goes out into the sea for a couple of KMs ! Anyway, we wanted to experience such a boat ride (!) and having been assured that the ride is “perfectly safe” (by office colleagues as well as some other tourists), we took the plunge. The boat was struggling to go forward due to all the extra stuffing of school-going children into the small boat, and it took more than 30 minutes to actually reach and disembark all the passengers. Getting down from the boat was a bit scary because one had to jump out from the boat onto slippery footsteps leading upto the main entrance of the Fort.

You can read all about this impregnable sea fort at these websites - “MurudJanjira” and “Wikipedia”

The Fort could have been maintained well due to its tourist attraction value, and more for its archaelogical and historical significance and beauty. But that was not to be - this was one of the worst maintained historical places that I have visited in India - in fact, I don’t think it is under any kind of Government (Archaelogical Survey of India) maintenance at all. The fort had been thoughtfully laid out as anyone could see walking around the dilapidated ruins. Such a beautiful fort has been laid to waste and stripped of any assets, just lying in the middle of the sea not able to reclaim its 400-year old legacy. There were lots of tourists, especially lots of children.

I took several photos of the Janjira Fort (I really liked the place, don’t get me wrong), and the sea around it. It could have been transformed into a beautiful resort, or converted to a museum. Take a look !

DSC07799, originally uploaded by padmavs.

The Beautiful Janjira Fort in the middle of the sea

DSC07805, originally uploaded by padmavs.

The Fort from another angle - notice the deteriorating condition of the walls after 400 years of lashing by the sea !

DSC07819, originally uploaded by vjsri99.

The Entrance to the Fort and the passenger alighting point

DSC07795, originally uploaded by padmavs.

The view of the serene beach and the village from the Janjira Fort

DSC07876, originally uploaded by padmavs.

The swimming pool of the fort which has turned green !

DSC07879, originally uploaded by padmavs.

The beautiful view of the sea from a vantage point inside the Fort

DSC07859, originally uploaded by padmavs.

Dilapidated Status of the Fort……..almost all parts of the Fort are similar in their extent of deterioration

DSC07857, originally uploaded by padmavs.

Broken Structures everywhere……obviously due to vandalism

DSC07843, originally uploaded by padmavs.

Great Architectural Designs all over the Fort — if only these had been preserved for posterity………..

DSC07839, originally uploaded by padmavs.

Another view of the broken structures - the cannons seem to be all right !

DSC07831, originally uploaded by padmavs.

A majestic palace view from a bygone era

Hope you enjoyed the pics !

Have a great weekend !!

Cheers

Vijay Srinivasan
5th Jan 2007
Mumbai