The three places in karnataka are treasure troves of chalukyan art.
I had visited Badami several years back. I did not have sufficient background for finer appreciation, but even without that I was spell bound. Set along the big and beautiful agasthiyathirtha lake, there are 4 cave temples (or 5 ?) - 3 hindu and one jaina. First cave shiva, second and third vishnu and fourth jaina. Rare sculptures
Not only cave temples, there are also temples above the small hillock. These are very old and contain one of the oldest representations of mayavathi dreaming buddha's birth. I have no words to express. The second cave has some of the finest representations of vishnu - lord kevala narasimha being the best (neril paarthal bayandhe viduveergal !). Lord shiva with 16 hands in dancing pose (I think chatura pose not sure) !
Not just badami - there are two other important places very closeby : Patthadakkal and Aihole. Aihole has the oldest surviving south indian temple called Lad khan temple. It is a cave temple. Pathadakkal has virupaksha temple built by devi of vikramaditya with sculptors bought over from kanchi (remember vikramaditya's kalvettu in kanchi ?)
AND THERE IS ONE MORE IMPORTANT POINT :
Vatapi konda narasingap pothrathisaasan (Narasimhavarman I) blazed vatapi (today's Badami) to ashes. But this great man saw to it that not a piece of artwork was touched. Every single sculpture - be it structural or cave - is left untouched. Probably that was one of the reasons vikramaditya did not disturb temples of kanchi. There is just one stone pillar in badami today with an inscription talking about the victory of narasimha - just one small memory etched in time to celebrate a great victory.
I got into a debade with Dr.Kalaikkovan on one of the structural temples in badami - this temple is strikingly similar to shore temples of mahamallapuram. Dr.Kalaikkovan was saying it is one off structure and was surprised to hear about badami temple.
I had planned to write a travelloge with all photos - it never happened till now
Kalki's portrayal of Pulikesin as a villan and iron hearted is a great injustice. True, he was a sworn enemy of pallavas - but he was a big art lover. Every stone of badami will sing his praise and also of his villanish chitappa mangalesan who swindled the throne from him :-)
Moreover, he had come upto Kaveri but not waged war against Chola, Chera and Pandyas. And hence, his intentions was not to conquer Tamilaham, but to defeat Pallavas.
So this also indicates, his motives and vengeance.
As I mentioned once before, I was discussing the origin of "vathapi ganapathy" with a kannadiga friend and mentioned that Paranjothi the great chief of the Pallava king Maamallan is said to have brought it back. His version was that the Pallavas looted and pillaged it from Vathapi. Gave me quite some perspective. We revel in the victories of "our" (Tamil) kings over others but heck, they too have looted and pillaged the cities of their enemies. We seem to see things in black and white but in actuality there are large swathes of grey here. Not everyone was entirely "divine" or entirely "evil". We need to be careful here lest we start sounding like Dubya Bush! :-)
But, this is what is called love for mother and mother land.
Every man eyes on a beautiful girl, but, will some one accept that fact that, his father had been eyeing every beautiful girl and going behind them in his teens?.
Same, everywhere, this is not a mistake. When a Kannadiga, does not give up his emperor, a Malayalee his emperor, and same with Andhras, finally not to speak about North Indian's. Why should we give up our's?
For a mom, what so ever her child may be, but it is good. Like wise, If you say, RajaRaja Chola, plundered Chalukyas, he did that for his country. Did not Abhaya Kulothunga, avoided duty for Chola country?
You miss my point. I didn't say we shouldn't celebrate our own chaps. I am just saying that we ought not to deify them. There are shades of grey in every character. Same with RRC or RC. They were certainly enlightened rulers but they must also have committed atrocities. After all, NO war is without its share of atrocities. All I am saying is that if we truly are lovers of history, then we should look at it dispassionately.:-)