Asirgarh: The Fort Where Ashwatthama Is Said to Still Come

The story attached to this fort is one of the darkest in the Mahabharata, and it needs telling properly.

Who he was:

• Ashwatthama was the son of Dronacharya, the teacher of the Kuru princes, and a great warrior in his own right
• He was born with a gem set in his forehead, which was held to protect him from hunger, thirst and fatigue
• He fought on the Kaurava side, and was among the few survivors of the eighteen days

What he did:

• After the war was effectively over, Ashwatthama entered the Pandava camp at night and killed the sleeping sons of Draupadi, along with others, in revenge for his father's death
• Pursued afterwards, he released the Brahmastra, and when asked to withdraw it he was unable to, and directed it instead at the womb of Uttara, carrying the last heir of the line
• Krishna protected the unborn child, who was born and became Parikshit

The curse:

• Krishna cursed Ashwatthama to wander the earth for three thousand years
• He would carry a wound that would not heal and would give off a foul smell
• He would find no shelter and no company, and would be shunned wherever he went
• The gem was taken from his forehead, leaving an open sore

Why this is not a story about a monster. The Mahabharata does not present Ashwatthama as evil by nature. He is a brahmin's son who was a warrior, whose father was killed by a deliberate lie, and who broke completely. The epic's judgement is on the act, and the punishment is not death but the removal of every consolation, including death.

He is counted among the chiranjivi, the immortals, along with Bali, Vyasa, Hanuman, Vibhishana, Kripacharya and Parashurama. His immortality is the only one on the list that is a sentence rather than a gift.

What the villages below the fort hold, and have held for a long time, is specific.

The belief:

• Ashwatthama comes to the Gupteshwar Mahadev temple in the fort every day before dawn
• He bathes first in the Utavali river, or in a tank on the fort, then climbs and offers at the linga
• The offering is a flower, sometimes said to be a red one
• People report finding flowers already on the linga when they arrive first thing in the morning, before anyone could have climbed
• Some accounts add that he asks passers by for oil or turmeric for his wound, and that those who meet him are unsettled for a long time afterwards

Why this fort. The choice is not arbitrary, and it says something about how such beliefs attach themselves.

• The fort is remote, high and lonely, which suits a figure condemned to be without company
• The temple is called Gupteshwar, the hidden lord, and a hidden shrine suits a hidden visitor
• The fort's own history is one of sieges and violence, which is the right register for the story
• The route it guards was travelled for centuries by armies, and an immortal wanderer belongs on a road

How to hold a belief like this. It would be easy to write it off, and it would be a mistake to treat it as a claim that requires either proof or debunking.

What the belief actually does is keep a difficult moral story alive in a particular place. Ashwatthama is the Mahabharata's hardest case, a man who did something unforgivable and was refused the ending everyone else gets. A village that says he still climbs the hill each morning is keeping that question in circulation, which is more than most of us do with the epics we say we admire.

Ashwatthama belongs to a small and interesting category, and setting him beside the others shows what is distinctive about his case.

The chiranjivi, the long lived or deathless, as commonly listed:

• Ashwatthama, cursed to wander
• Mahabali, the asura king sent to the netherworld by Vamana, permitted to return once a year, which is the festival of Onam
• Vyasa, who compiled the Vedas and composed the Mahabharata
• Hanuman, who remains wherever the Ramayana is recited
• Vibhishana, brother of Ravana, made king of Lanka
• Kripacharya, teacher of the Kuru princes
• Parashurama, the sixth avatar of Vishnu, awaiting the training of Kalki

A verse listing them is recited in some households as a morning remembrance, on the understanding that recalling those who endure is auspicious.

What the list reveals. Six of the seven remain for a purpose. Hanuman remains to hear the Ramayana. Parashurama remains to teach. Vyasa remains because the text remains. Bali returns to see his people. Vibhishana rules. Kripacharya endures as a teacher.

Ashwatthama alone remains as a punishment, with no task, no place and no company. He is the negative image of the category, and his presence in the list is what makes it more than a collection of favoured figures.

The tradition is making a point that is easy to miss. Deathlessness is not treated as straightforwardly good. What makes the other six enviable is that they have something to be deathless for, and what makes Ashwatthama's condition the worst punishment the epic could devise is that he does not.

The fort is best combined with the town below it, which has a history entirely out of proportion to its present obscurity.

Burhanpur was a capital, a Mughal provincial headquarters and a major centre on the route south. What survives:

• The Shahi Qila, the riverside palace complex on the Tapti, with a hammam whose ceiling paintings survive in part
• The Kundi Bhandara, an underground water supply system of the Mughal period, built on the qanat principle with a chain of vertical shafts feeding a tunnel. It has supplied water for four centuries and parts are accessible
• Mughal era gardens and tombs, in varying condition
• The old textile quarters, since Burhanpur was a major centre of cloth production

One piece of Mughal history belongs here. Mumtaz Mahal died at Burhanpur in 1631, after childbirth, while accompanying Shah Jahan on campaign in the Deccan. She was buried here initially, in a garden by the Tapti, before being moved to Agra for the tomb that became the Taj Mahal.

The garden where she first lay is in Burhanpur, and almost nobody goes there.

Why mention this in a piece about a Shiva temple. Because it makes the point about this whole region. Asirgarh and Burhanpur sit on the hinge between north India and the Deccan, and everything passed through: the Mahabharata's afterlife, the Faruqi sultans, Akbar's armies, the Mughal court, Maratha power and British administration.

The fort has watched all of it from the same hill, and a story about a man who has been walking for three thousand years does not feel out of place in that landscape.

Getting there

• Asirgarh fort, about 20 km from Burhanpur, Madhya Pradesh, on the Satpura spur above the pass
• Burhanpur has a railway station on the Delhi to Mumbai line via Bhusawal, which makes it easy to reach
• Indore is roughly 180 km and Aurangabad about 180 km, both with airports
• A road climbs to the fort. The last stretch is rough, and a local vehicle or taxi is the sensible choice

When to go

• October to March. Summers here are severe and the fort is completely exposed
• Early morning, both for the temperature and because the belief attaches to the hours before dawn
• The monsoon makes the hill green and the road difficult
• Mahashivratri brings local devotees to the Gupteshwar temple

At the fort

• The Gupteshwar Mahadev temple, which is the reason most pilgrims come
• The tank and water structures on the plateau
• The gateways and ramparts of the three tiers
• The views over the plains in both directions, which explain the fort's entire history in one look

Practical notes

• Carry water and food. There is very little at the fort
• Wear proper shoes. The paths are rough and there are unfenced drops
• The fort is largely unmanaged, with few staff and little signage. Do not climb on ruined walls or explore alone at the edges
• There is snake activity in the scrub, particularly in the warmer months. Watch where you put your feet and hands
• Mobile signal is patchy. Tell someone where you are going

Combining the visit

• Burhanpur for the Shahi Qila and the Kundi Bhandara, both worth an unhurried visit
• The garden where Mumtaz Mahal was first buried
• Maheshwar and Omkareshwar on the Narmada are within a longer drive north

A closing thought. Most Indian forts are sold on their sieges and their views. Asirgarh has both, and the thing people actually come for is a flower that may or may not be on a linga before sunrise. Whatever you conclude about that, it is a more interesting reason to climb a hill than the architecture.