ALAI-MINAR
Alai Minar, New Delhi India
The ambitious rubble Alai Minar started by Alauddin Khalji but the sultan
lived to see it only the height of 24.5m. It was built to match the enlarged
Quwwat-ul-Islam masjid (which was also Khalji's work). Today it is used
more like an illustration, by parents, of what-happens-when-you-get-over-ambitious;
viz the plans remain unfinished. Ambition has never really been encouraged
as a virtue in India.
Ala ud din Khilji started building the Alai Minar, which was conceived
to be two times higher than Qutub Minar. The construction was abandoned,
however, after the completion of the 24.5 meter high first storey; soon
after death of Ala-ud-din. The first story of the Alai Minar still stands
today.
Ala-ud-din conceived a very ambitious construction programme when he
decided to build the second tower of victory when he returned in triumph
from his Deccan campaign. However, the Sultan died before even the
first storey was finished and the project was abondoned. Ala-ud-Din,
felt compelled
to increase even further the size of the Quwwatu'l Islam mosque. His
scheme called for increasing the size of the enclosure four times,
providing ceremonial entrance gateways on each side, and a great
minar, twice the
size of the Qutub. This is the unfinished base of the mammoth tower
begun by Alauddin Khilji intended to give competition to Qutub Minar.
With
an arched entrance and spearhead of fringes, identified as lotus
buds by scholars, the Alai Minar is a gigantic rubble structure. A short
distance west of the enclosure, in Mehrauli village, is the Tomb
of Adham Khan
who, according to legend drove the beautiful Hindu singer Rupmati
to
suicide following the capture of Mandu in Madhya Pradesh. When Akbar
became displeased with him he ended up being heaved off a terrace
in the Agra Fort. There are some summer palaces in the area and the tombs
of the last Mughal kings of Delhi.
An empty space between two of the tombs was intended for the last
king of Delhi, who died in exile in Rangoon, Burma, in 1862, following
his
implication in the 1857 Indian Mutiny.
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