Goa, my favourite place that I love to visit any number of times for its exotic beaches, beautiful churches, Portuguese architecture, clean roads, lanes and few good friends that I made during my third visit to Goa. I first visited Goa in 1989. It was a very short trip. There are not much memories of that visit except for Sher-e-Punjab Restaurant on 16 June Road where we had our dinner. Then visit to few beaches i.e. Miramar, Colungute, Vagator Beach and a Church where the mortal remains of a saint are kept. Besides this the Hotel Om Shanti where we spent our night. This is all that I had remembered about Goa till 2009.
My second visit to Goa in 2009 was a part of a training. We, the whole bunch of 21 trainees visited Goa for a study trip. The other part of the training was state attachment where I chose Goa and spent four weeks in Goa. During my stay at Goa I visited many Government Offices including the prison. For the first time in my life I read few Acts which I found very interesting and realized the importance of Acts. These are the Acts actually which gives the real picture of that state, this is what I realized after reading few Acts.
One of the family friends visited Goa for a vacation along with their family and this visit happened during my one month long stay at Goa. It was, their visit, which introduced me to these wonderful engravings in Goa. They planned their visit to this site with the help of Archaeological Survey of India and when I was asked whether I would like to join them, I accepted with a emphatic YES though I had no idea about the place and never ever had heard about it. I thought there must be few caves as I had seen earlier in other parts of our country.
Before, we start our journey I met a girl from the ASI who suggested me few things about the sight and also suggested that we should pour water into the carving to get the real image. I took note of her suggestion. There was one boy who was working on historical sights, who was accompanied us.
These are the Rock Engravings in Usgalimal village in Southern part of Goa. This village is in the Sanguem Taluka in South Goa District. It is about 57 km from Panjim and by road it is about one hour and 30 minutes drive. These engraving or carving whatever one wants to call it, are situated on the river bed of river Kushavati and most of the months during the year these engravings remain under water as the water level of the river rises.
On reaching the site, we found few carvings, which I couldn't understand. Then we start to pour water on these and images that emerged looked, so beautiful and colourful and it was a treat to eyes.
Peacock in its full glory, I suppose👇👇
It appears a man in the following picture.
The following carving must be of a BISON
Is it a DEER or something else??👇👇
The following picture also gives a picture of a Bison or an OX, I suppose
Two carvings can be seen here in the picture down below. One is clicked after pouring water and one is without water.
I have found this CHAKRA (in the picture below) very beautiful and mesmerizing. Is it a CHAKRA or a MAZE or something else??
Later on found some material on somewhat similar figure in some other part of the world where it is mentioned as circular labyrinth. These are normally found near to the sea-coast and had several names depending on the languages found in that region, as suggested by the study found on the internet. The description given in that study somewhat fits to this figure also.
It was mentioned in the material that I found on internet that the fishermen and peasants said that these were used for children's games, a girl standing at the centre whilst the boys raced for her along with the winding paths. But the historian believed that these are the ancient remains and probably originated in the Bronze Age. It was also mentioned in that piece of information that similar figures have also been found in Iceland and Germany.
Was it carved for playing or it was a map of circular labyrinth or some chakra or it was carved for some other purpose??
Is it some TEMPLE or what, 👇 no idea😔
This is the river Kushavati which takes these rock carvings in its lap during monsoon. Most of the time, as the water level goes up, these carving get covered under the water.
These engravings are supposed to be 20,000 to 40,000 years old and are a very solid proof of human habitat in this area. These probably belonged to the Upper Paleolithic or Meolithic Era. Ironically, these oldest carvings were discovered by EUROPEANS. What are we doing all these years? Why, WE THE PEOPLE OF INDIA didn't have any idea about this area?? When I searched for the material about these engraving, sadly didn't find any thing. Thanx to the Internet that lately found some material on on https://digitalgoa.com/stone-age-carvings-in-goa/.
Who lived here?? I heard only the name of Neanderthals who lived during this Upper Paleolithic Era which is also called the LATE STONE AGE. So no idea about the inhabitants in this area.
We are so proud of our Heritage and every second, we are boasting about it without knowing much about the heritage. Aren't these a part of our rich heritage. In most of the historical sights in India, we come to know that these were found by the British or Europeans be it Ajanta Caves, The Stupa of Sanchi, Khajuraho Temples and I am sure that there can be more. (Ironically, those who boast about the rich heritage, preferred to visit phoren lands for their excursions.)
I am neither an Historian nor an Archaeologist, otherwise could have searched and written some book.
It is really sad to see that most of the people are not aware of this place and it is not even included in the list of places to be visited in Goa. When people talk about Goa, then it means its Beaches and Churches alone. No doubt Goa has excellent beaches and the most beautiful churches.
After the completion of the training, we all participants gave our presentations about the offices that we visited and garnered the knowledge during our state attachment. Since I was the only person who chose Goa, therefore, I had to give my presentation on my own where as other participants were in groups of four to five people. I remember, when I was leaving for Goa, few of my other co-participants gave me instructions or I should put it this way, that they were guiding me about Goa because they had already made 4-6 visits to Goa. After my return, when I gave my presentation on my state attachment, it lasted for two and half hour and it had 97 slides. Incidentally no body got bored. After my presentation, the same co-participants said "We actually haven't seen Goa, you gave us the real picture of Goa and now we want to visit Goa once again." This was an achievement for me.
This is the fact that people actually have not seen Goa completely. In fact it is really very very difficult to see India in one lifetime.
