Qutb Minar

The guide's story on Qutb Minar was that Prithviraj Chauhan, the ruler of Delhi had started building the structure for his wife, so that she could pray to the sun and also have a view of the River Yamuna, but he had only reached the first floor, before the invading army took over and their dynasty collapsed. The remaining structure was then completed by Qutb-ud-din. The UNESCO website on the other hand mentions in their brief description about the place that Qutb-ud-din only finished construction up to the first floor, before he passed away and that it was subsequently built by others.

An incomplete structure stands opposite the Qutb Minar, known as the Alai Minar and our guide mentioned that Alai-ud-din had been jealous of the Qutb Minar and had wanted to build his own bigger and better minar and had started the construction but had passed away, by the time he reached the first floor. Odd, all three people I have mentioned here seems to have died after the construction up to the first floor.

UNESCO mentions that the site was completed from the stones of 20 Brahman temples. The evidence lies in the pillars of the ruins and the stones at the site. Our guide put forth an argument for the Hindu origins of the site by pointing at the hindu bells carved on the pillars, the sanskrit inscriptions, the main gate facing the north as opposed to Muslim practice of constructing doors facing Mecca.

An interesting iron rod stood in the middle of the ruins, tall and upright and looking strong. The guide said that it had been part of the older Hindu temples in the place and that no-one had been able to remove it. He said that whoever tried to take it out, died in the effort. This had finally led to people giving up and letting the rod be.

We walked amongst the ruins and came to the Alai Darwaza, a doorway built by Alai-uddin so that he could have a royal passage to visit the mosque. It was a nice doorway and we passed through it to go to the gardens at the back. The old dome had been hit by lightning and a dome was constructed by a British engineer during the British rule. This newly constructed dome of the Minar, however was considered unsightly and removed and placed on the lawn.

The Qutb Minar is a place for good filming experiments as each angle would give an exquisite shot of the same place.