Aurel Stein’s Memorial Stone at Mohand Marg: A Journey of Installation to Vandalization and Re-installation

Known to Kashmiris and the world for his classic translation of the twelfth-century Chronicle of Sanskrit poet, Pandit Kalhana’s Rajatarangini, Sir Marc Aurel Stein has contributed to Kashmir what no one could even imagine.  Unfortunately, he has been treated  shabbily by certain disgruntled elements, under some sinister plan, who have not  even spared  an engraved  memorial stone bearing  his name and works at Mohand Marg where he used to camp to decode Kashmir’s  ancient manuscripts.

Stein’s Memorial of 1947, damaged in 2011

While in transit, the memorial stone was first time displayed and photographed in 1947 in Tyndale Biscoe’s residential lawn at Sheikh Bagh, flanked by Biscoe and Ram Chand Bali, Stein’s typist- cum- Camp Assistant. It was later taken to Mohand Marg for final installation there on August 15, 1947, coinciding with India’s Independence Day. Unfortunately, despite several attempts to target it, the disgruntled elements succeed in 2011 to hammer it to pieces. There is no trace of the original stone now.

According to Dr S N Pandita, a noted researcher and author of `Aurel Stein in Kashmir’,  after  vandalising the original memorial stone, the  new tri-faced memorial stone with added Sanskrit epitaph was installed to replace the original dual face (Urdu and  English) stone installed on August 15, 1947,  four years after Stein's death. A Muslim guy etched the stone with Sanskrit orthography at his “Mashhoor Marble House” Khanyar, Srinagar.

Installing New Stone in 2017

Dr Pandita says the new stone was installed on his recommendations made during the September 2017 International Conference on Aurel Stein and Central Asia at Kashmir University. “It was during my Key Note address, I made the recommendation, which was fortunately adopted favourably’’, he said. The new stone, weighing 368 kilograms was taken on shoulders of 57 men by rotation over 19 days from Anderwan to top of the meadow (Mohand Marg), Dr Pandita informed, adding that  it was  later physically laid on 23rd December 2017 at the exact spot in the meadow where Stein would pitch his tent.

A Trifaced New Stone

Having nine books and about 80 research papers to his credit, Dr Pandita further informed that   the epitaph was etched on Panjal metamorphic stone, sponsored by Yasin Zargar, CEO and MD, Indus Discoveries, London, supported by University of Kashmir. Prof G.N.Khaki,  the then Director, Centre of Central Asian Studies, University of Kashmir and the Department of Tourism, J&K Govt, then headed by  Mahmud Shah. The Sanskrit orthography for etching was made by Apeksha Pandita, then a PG student in Delhi and translation from original English to Sanskrit  was made at Dr Pandita’s request by Prof. Dev Kanya Arya, of Delhi University.

A significant support on the entire effort of reinstalling the memorial stone in 2017 had also come from the Kashmir Chapter of INTACH, headed by Saleem Beg.

Mutilating, Uprooting New Stone

Even after installing the new memorial stone with much fanfare, the same was also first mutilated by breaking two sides of its edges (English and Sanskrit side), possibly in 2021-2022 and further uprooting it in February 2023 by the very disgruntled elements who had broken the original one in 2011. Journalist R. C Gangoo’s picture with the stone ( carried by Kashmir Rechords on Janauary 20, 2024 https://kashmir-rechords.com/a-meadow-in-kashmir-where-aurel-stein-worked-on-rajatarangini/) is an ample proof that the new stone was already mutilated in July 2022. Thereafter, an attempt had been made to even uproot the stone.

However, in February 2023 this mutilated and toppled down stone was again placed upright, thanks to the efforts of Mr Zargar and that of the J& K Government. The latest photograps show that the stone presently still exists there but with mutilated edges on the English and Sanskrit side.

Serenity of Mohand Marg

Dr S. N Pandita   describes Mohand Marg as an alpine grazing ground hidden in the mountains to North of Srinagar about 20 Kms along the road to Leh in the Sindh Valley. Small hillside settlements up the rocky crags open out across the mountainside to the Marg giving views of the Sindh Valley on one side and the Valley of Kashmir on the other. Trees skirt the Marg and slopes below. Flowers fill it in summer.

The noted researcher informed that while peregrinating across Kashmir in connection with his antiquarian tours beginning 1892, Stein came across Mohand Marg for the first time in the summer of 1895 and the mere sight of the vast meadow flushed with flowers of blue and yellow tints seized his heart and mind both that he felt instantly in love with the meadow.  “Not long after it became his other home or what he called his “private alpine kingdom”. The Marg remained Stein’s private world where he could be at peace. There he would be alone, but never lonely. He called it as his kingdom that was scarcely matched by any King’’.

Aurel Stein, according to Dr Pandita  was “so charmed by the vast expanse of the meadow and the sight of Mount Haramukh Peaks, sacred to Hindus in the front ,that his own work and response to nature epitomized in his beloved Mohand Marg. He termed the meadow as the best carpet in the world’’.

“Stein simply fell in love with this paradise that he never preferred camping anywhere else in Kashmir as long the weather permitted him to stay at that altitude of 9000 ft above the sea- level. Once located, the Marg radically changed Stein’s inner orientation and he was thence no longer magnetized by Budapest and Europe. Regardless of the season and however strenuous his activities would be, Stein was never too tired or too pre-occupied to enjoy the atmosphere of the Marg’’.

“One result of so many years of life (intermittently nearly five decades) in and out from Marg, Stein found it difficult to work anywhere else.  It was impossible to give his attention properly to his written reports of his expeditions as long as he stayed away from the Marg. In fact, he completed writing the editions of his Rajatarangini and all the four expedition reports of his Central Asian explorations on the Marg’’.

Stein-`Marg Ka Babu’

To the locals, Aurel Stein was “Marg Ka Babu’’.  Dr Pandita says, “Stein longed to do without delay and that was to return to Mohand Marg and in doing so he even used delicate health reasons by way of excuses. He never left the Marg without a wrench in his heart but was always happy to return there and live in the tent pitched in the meadow. At the Marg, he enjoyed the dazzling views and breathed the pine – scented air that he called as “avalanche perfume”.

The author of “Aurel Stain in Kashmir’’ recalls that villagers always identified him as “Marg Ka Babu”. “In short and to sum up Stein and Mohand Marg are synonymous. The two are inseparable. Since the time of Stein’s death in faraway Kabul in October 1943, Mohand Marg has remained forgotten and forlorn until a few years ago when steps were set afoot to revive his memory and legacy’’.

“One wish that Stein had hoped for but remained unfulfilled was that he had wished to be cremated there if only death came to him in his beloved alpine paradise. That, however, was not to be. One companion who gave Stein a life- long company during his stays at Mohand Marg was his faithful dog Dash. Stein had seven of them in all during his entire life. But each was always Dash. Stein gave no other name to his dogs.’’

Stein’s love affair

Stein was a bachelor and confirmed monogamist and it is generally acknowledged that he had chosen Central Asia as his bride. “But given his affairs with Mohand Marg, one may say with his death Mohand Marg lost its first and only lover. If Central Asia was Stein’s bride, there is no doubt that Mohand  Marg was his open love affair as he eloped with her time and again uninterruptedly for nearly five decades’’.

Aurel Stein left Mohand Marg in September 1943 never to return.  He died in Kabul at about 5 PM on November 26, 1943. “He was thankful to fate that at least after more than four decades later and after four Viceroys had supported his wish to explore Afghanistan, he saw Kabul but was not fated to explore Afghanistan. Since then, Mohand Marg continues to wait for its “Babu” to return.”, exclaims Dr Pandita.

Text Editing: Dr. Rajesh Bhat

Photo Courtesy & Text Inputs: Dr. S.N.Pandita