PLACES OF INTEREST

BALAPIR

Balapir (Dapoli T.), on the top of a conical hill about half a mile from Dabhol creek and tour miles north-east of Dabhol has a ruined mosque and a shrine [The story of the shrine is that a Dakshini Vani named Balaseth, becoming a Musalman, let loose a bull, and vowed to build a mosque wherever the bull stopped. The bull stopped on the top of the hill, where the Vani built a mosque and a tomb. The graves in the tomb are those of the builder, his wife and his child, and those outside are raised over his horse and bull.] of soft red laterite, both domed, very-simple, and of rough workmanship. In the tomb are three graves without any inscriptions, and in the enclosure outside are three more. An endowment, originally granted by the Habshi about the year 1650, and continued by Angre and the Peshva, was (1874) confirmed by the British. Of the date of the buildings there is no trace. The Habshi's grants show that they must be at least as old as the beginning of eighteenth century, and their battered weatherworn stones seem to. point to a much greater age. The ruined step well in the plateau of the hill top is said to be the quarry from which the stones for the mosque were cut.

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