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PLACES
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KHATAV
Khatav (Khatav T; 16° 45' N, 74° 50' E; RS. Koreganv 16 m. NW;
p. 5,530) village, eight miles north-west of Vaduj the taluka headquarters, gives its name to the Khatav taluka. Under the Maratha government (1760-1818) Khatav was the chief town in the paragana called after it. The town is walled and has two gates at the east and west ends of its market street, with two or three large mansions belonging to families of importance under the Maratha rule. The surrounding wall and the mansions stand in a much ruined state.
Temple.
To the north-west of the town in an open space is an old Hemadpanti temple of Mahadev, now almost entirely deserted. However, people regularly visit the temple for darshan. It consists of an image chamber and vestibule (17' X 15') shaped in the old cruciform plan. The image chamber is square inside and contains a ling. East of the image chamber is the hall open only at the front, and the side walls are four feet thick at the centre from which they narrow to the front and back. The same style of wall is found at Parali and Mahuli. In front is an open space thirteen feet broad, partly blocked by a balustrade three feet high and four feet broad. In addition to the side walls the roof is supported on sixteen pillars eight of which on the sides are embedded in the walls, and eight in the centre are free. The pillars are of the usual type, a shaft of a single block cut into different courses, rectangular basement, and the rest cylindrical, octagonal or again rectangular with a capital consisting of a bracket branching in four directions. In the centre of the Mandap is a round slab on which the Nandi usually rests. The compartment formed by its four pillars has a well carved roof slightly doomed. The others are of the lozenge pattern, three rows of slabs disposed one on the top of the other so as to form three concentric squares, the diagonals of the upper touching the centre of the side of the lower square. The front of the balustrade is most beautifully carved in a sort of rail pattern as at Parali, Mahuli, and other Hemadpanti temples. The whole structure is of large Hocks of unmortared stone. The roof above is flat and has traces of a spire apparently pyramidal. The usual broad eaves remain but they are probably restorations as the slabs are small and mortar is used. Close to the north of this is a small canopy of still larger blocks of stone and containing an idol of Maruti. About fifty yards west is a modern Mahadev temple (60'X20') with a brick spire and image chamber and a long stone mandap. It is surrounded by rude cloisters lining a court yard (100' X 50'). A fair is held at the temple in July-August or Shravan, In the town itself in a street branching from about the centre of the chief street which runs north and south is another old temple of Narayan restored almost beyond recognition. There is also about a quarter of a mile north of the town a Musalman idgah or place of prayer. Fakirs living near the dargah take care of the holy place. The earliest mention of Khatav is in 1429, when the Durgadevi famine having laid waste the country and the chief places of strength having fallen into
the hands of local chiefs, Malik-ut-Tujjar the Bahamani governor of Daulatabad with the hereditary officers or deshmukhs went through the country restoring order, and their first operations were directed against some Ramoshis in Khatav Desh [Grant Duffs Marathas, Vol. I, 50.]. When (1688-1689), the Moghals invaded the country, Krshnarav Khatavkar was actively assisting them and was made by them a leading deshmukh [Marathas, Vol. I, 305.].
After the death of Aurangzeb Marathas took possession of the territory. Krshnarav Khatavkar, however held his own and tried to raise trouble by joining the side of Tarabai but was soon over powered by Shahu's sardars Balaji Vishvanath and Shripatrav Pratinidhi in 1713.
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