What is the story of thousands of years old stones at the site of Diamer Bhasha Dam?

 

Pakistan's Diamer-Bhasha Dam, once accomplished, will be the major water storing project in the country so far, which is predictable to produce about 4,800 MW of electricity. The building of this dam will not only raise Pakistan's water storing capability but also increase the life of Tarbela Dam.

 

However, about 5,000 of the most significant ancient mountain carvings from 7,000 BC to the 16th century could be flooded when the dam is completed.

Dr. Jason Nellis, a researcher who has been researching remains in the northern areas of Pakistan for many years, says that since the Karakoram Highway has been open to the Karakoram and Himalayan mountains. Since then, Pakistani and European specialists have exposed between 30,000 and 50,000 mountain carvings and about 5,000 different types of documents.

Dr. Jason is the Head of the Department of Belief and Culture at Wolfed Laurier University in Canada.

 

He says these archeological resources of mountain carvings and inscriptions are situated in Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa around the Indus River.

 

The Karakoram Highway, constructed in the twentieth century, links Pakistan to the Chinese region of Xinjiang, through which Pakistan can be connected by land to Central Asia.

 

Prof. Dr. Jason Nells said that these mountain carvings and inscriptions tell us how (before the construction of this highway) in early times tourists used to travel on diverse routes in the mountains of Hindu Kush, Himalayas and Karakoram.

 

Separately from seeing and understanding the beliefs and culture of the ancient peoples living in the northern regions, these mountain carvings and inscriptions also show us about the foreign tourists who come here from other parts of the world.

According to Dr. Jason, these objects can be said to deliver data about civilizations that date from a thousand years to 2500 years.

What do these mountain carvings and inscriptions tell us?

The village of Thalpan in Gilgit-Baltistan's Chilas district is said to be a probable prey of the dam. In Thalpan, specialists have so far exposed many ancient mountain carvings and inscriptions.

Dr. Jason, citing a similar rock carving in Thalpan, said that the drafts of animals, humans and some of the landmarks on the rocks in the area are primeval and post-history, most of which are The mountains fit to goats and other animals, while in adding to predators and horsemen, there are various other landmarks and buildings that belong to every age.

 

Similarly, with orientation to the old writings on some of the mountains in Chilas, he says that some of the writings are with orientation to significant characters of earlier periods.

He said that apart from mountain carvings, some pictures and landmarks, there are also captions in the old languages of South Asia, Iran and Central Asia. The earliest inscriptions are in the Gandhara language, which is in the Khrushchevite script, courting to between 2,000 and 1,700 years ago in the area.

 

The sketches on it are scratched with the names of Baladiva, Vasudeva and Rahula in Khrushti script.

Denoting to another mountain map, Prof. Dr. Jason Nells said that the Buddhist drawing is written in Gandhara language which indicates that Bakhsh i.e. monks are worshiping in the stupa building.

 

These mountain carvings are similar to those found in Taxila, Swat and Gandhara.

According to Prof. Dr. Jason Niels, there are other sketches of stupas across the Indus in which the inscriptions are in Brahmi writing which is used for Sanskrit language.

 

They are about 1500 years old and perhaps post-Gandhara. The sketches depict Gautama Buddha and his first five students.

He is supposed to have given his first lesson in a deer park in Sarnath, close the Indian city of Banaras, so deer can also be seen in these sketches.

 

According to Dr. Jason, another mountain image, which includes images of predators, various tools, landmarks and mountain goats, proposes that these are post-Buddhist images, in which principles and civilizations are changing.