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PLACES
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DASAGAON
Dasaganv (T. Mahad, 18°05' N, 73°20' E; p. 2,361; RS.
Mumbra, 88 m.) is a small town, on the right bank of the Savitri or Banakot river, five miles west of Mahad and twenty-four miles above Banakot at the mouth of the river. [In 1771 Mr. Forbes (Oriental Memoirs, I. 192) wrote the following account of the voyage from Bankot to Dasagaon. It affords an inland navigation of great variety. The river, which is seldom wider than four or five hundred yards, winds through a chain of hills, stored with timber or covered with forest, and the banks are covered with salt weed, an evergreen resembling the laurel. An opening valley some times presents a view of arable land, villages, and cattle; succeeded by woody mountains, waterfalls, and precipices. In the narrow parts the branches unite over the stream which is enlivened by monkeys, squirrels and various kinds of birds.] There is a stone jetty at which country crafts discharge and load. The bed of the river, between the Ratnagiri town of
Mhaprai four miles west of Dasaganv and Mahad, is rocky and almost dry at low water spring tides. Neap tides rise six feet and spring tides ten feet affording tidal communication for vessels of that draught only.
During the fair season (October-May), a small steamer plies daily (except on Sundays), between Banakot and Dasaganv. It takes from four to five hours in its passage to Dasaganv. By the new road from Poladpur to Mahabalesvar, which is throughout of a very easy gradient, communication has been opened in a direct line from Satara by Mahabalesvar to the coast. Leaving Poladpur eighteen miles from Dasaganv, the line goes by the old Kinesvar road for five and a half miles. It then branches to the left, gradually climbing round the western and northern shoulders of Pratapgad, for sixteen miles, to the pretty station of Vada on the first plateau. From Vada the road winds ten miles more, round the valleys between Sydney and Bombay Point in Mahabalesvar, and passing close under Bombay Point, rises easily from the east of it into the Bombay Point Road by the terraces. Those who choose to ride up the old road from Kinesvar will save ten or eleven miles, but will find the pass at Radtondya in a very bad state, as it is now abandoned. Dasaganv is not a trade centre. It is inhabited by many palanquin bearers. On a hill close to Dasaganv was a fort known as Bhopalgad.
Near Dasaganv, along the creek from Goreganv to Mahad are two old rock-cut cisterns filled with earth and stones. One is on the edge of the creek, near the Bhuivada to the south-west of Dasaganv fort hill, the other is on the left of the Mahad road a mile and a half away. Both are under-cut into the rock so as to be mostly under its cover. There is no image on either; only red paint on the rock. The cistern near the fort is presided over by a local deity; the other by a goddess named Asra, of some local repute in exercising spirits, when she is propitiated with the blood of cocks. [Mr. W. F. Sinclair, C. S. The position of these cisterns seems to show that, when the cisterns were cut, the road along the creek was on the same level as it is now.] Dasaganv is well known for the Sav and Kondivate hot springs in its neighbourhood, which attract a number of Hindus and Muhammedans. There is a fine garden of coconut trees and betelnut vines which serves as a picnic spot. In a treaty made with the Marathas in 1756, Dasaganv is mentioned as 'a pass for the fishermen or country merchants'. [Aitchinson's, V. 17.] In 1771 the English Resident at Banakot or Fort Victoria had a small villa on the Dasaganv hill above the village. [Forbes' Oriental Memoirs, I. 192.] Dasaganv was one of the two villages, belonging to the English on the Banakot river, which were taken by the Marathas in 1775, and kept by them till 1784.[Bankot Diaries (M. S.) in Nairne's Konkan 99.] In 1817 a body of Pendharis plundered Mahad, but did not attack Dasaganv.
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