PLACES

KARANJA

Karanja or Uran Island (Uran peta) about eight miles long and four broad, lies, in the south-east of Bombay harbour, about six miles south-east of the Carnac Pier in Bombay. On the east it is cut off from the mainland by the Bhehdkhal creek, which at high tides is filled through its whole length. The island rises in two bare rocky hills, smaller in the north and the larger in the south, between which lies a stretch of grass and rice lands wooded with mango trees and brab palms. On the east the salt pans have broken the creek into several small branches, but one arm, running from Mora Bunder in the north to Uran, is large enough to allow boats to pass to Uran at high tide.

The rock of the island is trap-crossed by dykes of black basalt. The trap beds, which are greenish and bluish and more or less amygdaloid, vary in structure and density. The water-supply is good. There are three built reservoirs, one along the roadside about half way between Mora Bunder and Uran, a second between Uran and Karanja and the third and the largest, called, Bhimala, in Uran is about a quarter of a mile round. Besides these three built reservoirs, many ponds and wells hold water for several months after the rains. The drinking water comes from springs of which the best, on a little hill not far from the Customs House, runs with a full and constant stream into a reservoir built by Pichard Spooner, Commissioner of Customs in the nineteenth century. In a narrow ravine in the larger hill, is a small square rockcut room with a narrow entrance formerly protected by masonry. From the roof of this chamber a constant dropping of clear wholesome water forms a pool three or four feet deep on the same hill, close by a ruined church, is a closed well or reservoir of excellent water.

Besides its rice crop the island exports salt. The chief other industry is fishing. There are a number of fishermen's Co-operative Societies at Uran. Motor launches are used when deep-sea fishing is undertaken. The salt pans lie in the great tidal marsh to the cast of the island. The marsh is crossed by a long winding creek with numerous arms. The great area of the works, the shining white pans with their regular boundaries and rows of salt heaps, in spite of monotony and barrenness, have a curiouf impressive effect. The Uran salt pans are probably very old. But the only reference that has been traced is Mandelslo's (1638) notice of the salt of Oranu-Bammara, apparently Uran Mumbai. [Mandelslo's Voyages, 222.] Uran salt was thought better than any salt made further south. [Description of Hindustan, II. 175.]

A metalled road runs along the whole east side of the island, and a state-transport road, 16 miles long, is made between Uran and Panvel. Steam ferry boats carry daily passengers and holiday makers between Bombay and Mora excepting rainy season. The number of trips often increases to three or four depending upon the volume of traffic. The fares from Bombay to Uran, a distance of six miles is about 75 nP.

History.

The only early remains as yet found in Uran are, on the east face of the Kharavali or Kharapuse hill a small plain rock-cut chapel, cell, and cistern apparently Buddhist, and some plain cells in Dronagiri hill. Three land-grant stones have also been found, showing, that in the twelfth century, under the Silaharas, the island had gardens and villages. [Details of the Kharavali or Kharapuse caves and of the three grant stones are given under Objects of Interest.] Under the Portuguese (1530- 1740) Karanja was the extreme south of the Bassein province. In the sixteenth century it was a populous island with two forts, one on the east, in the present town of Uran, and the other on the top of the southern peak. The fort on the southern peak was built in the form of a square, with an armed bastion at three of the corners. Close to it were the garrison barracks. A hundred armed men were maintained for the defence of the island. In 1535 Fr; Antonio do Porto built the church of Sam Francisco and two other churches, Nossa Senhora de Salvacao and N. S. de Penha. All these are now in ruins. There was also the church of N. S. do Rozario and a Dominican hermitage built by Father Gen. T. Jeronimo da Paixao. A long winding flight of stone steps ran up the south hill, and, on the top, besides the fort were garrison barracks and the ruins of the church of N. S. de Penha. It is said that when the foundations of this church were dug a blue stone was found with an image of the Virgin. [Da Cunha's Bassein, 202. Bishop Osorio (1504-1580) states that the Portuguese found a majestic Christian temple in Karanja. This is probably incorrect. The figure of the Virgin Mai y may have been one of the Mothers or Matrikas suckling the infant Kartikeya the Hindu god of war, like the figure found in Elephanta island. The blue stone may have been covered with the blue enamel which has also been found in Elephanta.] In 1538 the island is described as two hills and a plain, between, very rich with orchards and rice fields. [Prim. Rot. da Ind. 64.] In 1550 it is mentioned as having a tower and bastion and other houses. [Col. de Mon. Ined. V. 2, 216.] In 1571 it was attacked by a party of Ahmadnagar troops from Ceul, but the garrison put them to flight leaving the island covered with dead bodies. [Col. de Mon. Ined. V. 2, 216.] In 1585 the Franciscans are mentioned as having got charge of Karanja. [Archivo V. 1083 in Nairne's Konkan, 53.] In 1613 Karanja was the scene of a great riot which was quelled by the courage of Captain Fernao de Sampayo da Cunha. [Da Cunha's Bassein, 273.] In 1634 Karanja (which now forms part of the Uran municipal area) is described as a walled village, a gunshot from the fort, with thirty Portuguese families and slaves. In the same year it is mentioned as bounded by six Ahmadnagar townships, Karanala, Drago (Dizoda), Pen, Sabayo (Shahabaj), Abeta (Apta), and Panvel. From there the Moors could easily pass to the island, and the river between could be crossed drysbed at low tide and at high tide was not more than knee deep. The soil was fertile and there was a good manufacture of a cloth called teadas. [o Chron. de Tis. III., 261. In 1634, besides a balance to the state, Karanja paid £. 87 (5,000 pardaos)a year to the bishop of Cranganor and £. 30 (800 pardaos) to the pan Jesuits.] In 1682 Karanja was taken from the Portuguese by Sambhaji, appa-rently without resistance, and held by him for nearly a year, when it was recovered by the Portuguese. [Orme's Hist. Frag. 126., Mendonca's Topography of Karanja, 9; Da Cunha's Chaul and Bassein, 67.] In 1720 Captain Hamilton notices it as a Portuguese island, with no trade but furnishing eatables for Bombay. [New Account, 242.] In 1728 the fort had six pieces of ordnance varying from one to six pounders. The defences were out of repair. [O Chron. de Tis. I., 32.] In 1737, when the Marathas attacked Thana, the commandant fled to Karanja. But Karanja was soon after taken in 1774, after the fall of Versova, Colonel Keating marched to Karanja and took possession. [Forbes' Oriental Memoirs, I., 453.] In the following March, the conquest was confirmed by the treaty of Surat, the confirmation was repeated in March 1776 by the treaty of Puran-dhar, and it was finally ratified by the treaty of Salbai in 1782. [Aitchison's Treaties, V. 21, 33, 41.] In 1775 the town was described as lying between two lofty moun-tains on the west side, in size nothing more than a large Maratha village, with low straggling houses near a pond covered with wild duck and waterfowl. On its banks were a small fort. a Portuguese church, and a Hindu temple. [ Forbes' Oriental Memoirs, I, 453-54.] In 1781 a resident was appointed. [Nairne's Konkan, 103. In 1781 the revenue of Karanja chiefly from rice, was estimated at £. 6000 (Rs. 60,000). Bombay in 1 781, 3.] In 1788 Hove, the Polish traveller, found it poorly inhabited. The soil was fertile, but the people spent their time either in fishing or in palm-juice drawing for which they found a good market in Bombay. On one of the hills were the ruins of a fort. [Hove's Tours, 189. Hove also mentions, but apparently incorrectly, seven marks of a former volcano, and, in the chasm, pieces of iron are both solid and in the form of ashes, and two species of Zeolite.] In 1820 Hamilton noticed that convicts were sent from Bombay and employed in cleaning ponds, repairing banks and keeping the roads in order. [Desc. of Hind. II., 174.]

The island, which is now generally called Uran, forms a peta of 44 villages. At high tide the Bendkhal creek surrounds it and cuts it off from the mainland. Mora now forming part of the Uran municipal area lies at the foot of a range of low hill in the north. The beach is rocky and muddy, and most of the people are fishers living in low ill-built huts. Mora is the chief port of the island where passengers land and embark for Bombay. There is a customs house, and, on a plateau about 100 feet above the villages, a residence for the excise officer. Karanja in the south is a small fishing village with little trade and only a few good houses. The details of the town of Uran, which is a place of some consequence, are given separately.

The Christian population has a church dedicated to Our Lady of Purification. It was rebuilt in 1852 by Manuel Desouza, Mamlatdar of Salsette, and measures 65 feet long by 27 broad and 30 high. The priest has a house. There are three ruined churches, St. Francis, 124 feet long 58 wide and 30 high, has the nave unroofed but the sanctuary still arched and in good order; Our Lady of Salvation, 70 feet long by 26 broad and 20 high; and, on the top of Dronagiri hill, Our Lady of Penha, well preserved, and measuring 50 feet long by 15 broad and 14 high. There are also two chapels, St. John the Baptist's, the Buddhist rock-cut chapel in the east face of Kharavali hill, and, at the foot of the hill, Our Lady of Help, on the site of which a Hindu temple now stands. In the village of Seva is a ruined church of which the broken walls of the graveyard are the only trace.

Objects of Interest.

The chief objects of interest are the ruins on the top of Dronagiri, the southern hill. They include the Portuguese fort, the guard house, and the church of Notre Senhora de Penha, and are approached by a long and winding flight of steps. On the slope of the hill are some plain cells generally filled with water. On the east face of the north hill, which is called either Kharavali or Kharapuse, is a small rock-cut cave (25'x 24'x 10') apparently Buddhist. The front of the cave is supported on two square pillars with pot capitals. Opposite the middle of the entrance, in a rectangular recess in the back wall, nine inches deep, is carved in the rock what looks Christian altar, but may be a small relic shrine or daghoba which is now removed. The cave has signs of white-wash. To the north is a small room about eight feet square with a water cistern about two feet deep.

Three of the inscribed stones in the Collector's garden at Thana were brought from Karanja, two from Canjeh three miles to the south, and one from Ranvad about a mile to the north west of Uran. The earliest is a Canjeh stone (3' 6" x 1' 3" x 6"). The inscription of sixteen lines is well preserved. The characters are Devanagari and the language is Sanskrt. It is dated Sak 1060 Magh Suddh 1 (January-February, A.D. 1138) and records the grant of a field named Arnhe in Nagum, [Nagum is probably Nagaiv three miles north-west of Chanjth and of a garden belonging to one Joiak, by the Silahara king Aparaditya, to Sridhar, learned in the kramas, [ Krama is a peculiar method of reading and writing vedic texts, 'going step by step so called because the reading proceeds from the first number (word or title) to the second, then the second is repeated and connected with the third, the third repeated and connected with the fourth and so on.] for the spiritual benefit of Aparaditya's mother LiladevT. The inscription records, on the occasion of an eclipse of the sun, another grant by Aparaditya of a garden in the Chedija (Carijeh?) village to worshippers of Mahfulev batus or badvas and to Vistikas (?). The next in order of date is the Ranvad stone (3' 8" x 1' 6" x 9"). Above are the sun and moon with an urn-shaped water pot between them. The letters are well preserved in Devanagari, and the language is Sanskrt mixed with Marathi. The inscription records a grant of land in Padivas in Uran on Sak 1171 Caitra Vadya 1 (April-May A.D. 1249), the day of a solar eclipse, by the Silahara king Somesvar. The king's ministers were Jhampada Prabhu the great councillor, Deva (?) Prabhu the great minister of war and peace, and Dada Prahhu the chief justice. The last in order of date is the other Canjeh stone. It records the grant of 162 pdruttha drammas, [The paruttha dramma was probably a Kshatrapa coin current in the Shilahara territory. Its value was about 4 as. But 4 as. had then probably as much purchasing power as Re. 1 has now. Pandit Bhagvanlal Indrajit. This would now easily come to about Rs. 15.]  the fixed revenue of some garden land of Kothalsthan in Chadiche 'Canjeh?) in Uran. to Uttaresvar of Sristhanak (Thana). The grant was made in the reign of Somesvar, on Monday Caitra Vadya 14th sak 1182 (A.D. 1260). Somesvar's ministers were Jhampada Prahhu the great councillor, Maina (Ku?) Bebala Prahhu and Peramde Pandit ministers of peace and war. and Padhi Goven (Ku?) the minister of justice and of finance.

On a small hill about two miles to the south of the village of Mora are two Government houses, one for the use of the Customs office, the other for the resident officer of the customs department.

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