Rasalgad

Rasalgad

Type:

Region:Konkan

Height:200

Base Village:Madave

Places of Interest 

The fort is entered from the north by a very massive gate guarded by a tower and high battlements. In a crevice in the wall opposite the gate is an image of Maruti. About eighty yards inside is a second gateway, also strongly guarded by a tower and battlements.

Further south, where the ground broadens, there is a temple with some rich wood carving. This temple, dedicated to the goddesses Zolaya and Vaghya, is of some local sanctity forming every year the gathering place for bands of worshippers from fourteen neighbouring villages. Both the spurs of the hill beyond the temple are fortified. On the south-east spur is a roofless building once used as a storehouse.

Beyond the storehouse are some pools with near their banks several memorial stones with very dim weather-worn tracery. The spur after about 300 yards ends in. a battlement' known as the Pusati's Tower. The south-west spur is much more strongly fortified. The defences known as the upper fort, bale killa, about 186 feet by 126, are surrounded by walls, with, at each corner, an embrasured battlement. Inside are the ruins of a powder magazine and of the commandant's house. The temple of Zolaya and the image of Maruti show that the fort was built and for a time held by Hindus. The only trace of Musalmans is in the Upper Fort, a battlement known as the saint's tower, pir buruj. At present (1960), there are six guns on the fort.

How to Reach
Rasalgad Fort (Khed T.; 17° 45' N, 73° 30' E;), at the south end of the spur which further north is crowned by the Sumargad and Mahipatgad forts, has an area of about five acres. Less elevated than either of the above forts, Rasalgad is approached by an easy ascent which begins on the west and is about three miles from the village of Madave. Narrow in the north, the fort gradually broadens, dividing in the south into two spurs, one running to the south-east, the other to the south-west.

back