I have been to a few continuously living cities spread around the older parts of Asia, Africa and peninsular India and I have been to Benaras. Bagdad saw utter destruction at the hands of the Ilkhanate forces led by Ghengis' grandson Haluga and the brother of Kublai Khan. Cairo, Damascus, Constantinapole, Jerusalem never saw complete destruction at the hands of the new nation of Islam under the Chaliphs.
Benaras being as as old these cities was destroyed more times than living memory can recall for certainty. India then being a politically fragmented entity with temples that loved to hoard offerings to the idols in them, attracted the attention of the Muslim conquerors.They satiated their greed for gold and bloodlust by looting and demolishing idols and their sancturies by obliterating non believers as sanctioned by the quran. The writings from their scriptures was used as a license to justify the genocide perpetrated by them, which according to the ulema was not considered as any crime, but rather meritorious acts that guaranteed them virgins in heaven...
Benaras being the centre of the idol worshipping, world periodically faced such onslaughts. After every carnage the city rebuilt itself over time on the debris scattered by thoughtless intolerant barbarians like Ghazni in 1025, Ahmed Nialtjin a general of Ghazni in 1033, Muhammed Ghori in 1194, Qutub uddin Aibak in 1194 and 1197, Illtutmish in 1226, Allauddin Khilji in 1296, Firoz Shah Tuglaq in 1374, Mahmud Shah Tuglaq in 1436, Shikandar Lodhi in 1489, Babur in 1529 and finally Aurangazeb in the 17th century. This bigot through his over zealous act sowed the seeds of discord between the Hindus and Muslims in present India.
Aurangazeb demolished the Kashi Vishwanath Temple, the holiest shrine of the city and built a mosque over it making it the cause for another Ayodhya like situation in modern secular India. Primarily because of his iconoclastic deeds unbecoming what a few of his ancestors like Akbar, Jahangir and father Shahjahan stood for, this bigoted Emperor of India used his unbridled powers to dmolish all that he considered sacriligious to Islam. His murderous rule alianated the non muslims scattering acrimony as a cultural memory so plagued with injustice that over the past centuries it festered like puss filled blisters, only to be exploited by the extremistists of both religious hues. At present even after his death in 1707 the majority of Hindus look at their fellow Muslim citizens with suspect. On the other hand this fire of mistrust is fuelled when Indian Muslims unmindful of his past wrongs put Aurangazeb on a pedestal and peddle him as an ideal ruler. Apart from this stupidity on the part of the Muslim community any sort of acrimony against the muslim umma makes no sense, because how can you blame a community for the crimes of their ancestors. Also 90% of the present Muslims in India are the descendents of low caste communities, who were and are always denied their due dignity at the hands of the upper castes Hindus.
Not being an apologist for the past misdeeds of our uneducated ancestors or delving into socio-political aspect of India's complex and bloody past, I would rather concentrate on the creative aspect of Indians as my strength. Getting back to Benaras, no other city on the face of the earth has seen such misery and untold bloodshed over a span of nearly 700 years. Not for nothing is this place called the city of death. For according to the beliefs of the Hindus, its is spiritually meritorious to die and be cremated here. The pyres at the two crematoriums namely the Manikarnika and the Harishchandra Ghats never go out.
Benaras after each wave of destruction rebuilt its places of worship. One must give it to the tenacity of its residents and the vanquished rulers, those that still had their heads on their shoulders, to carry forward tales of the intended existence of the city to rebuild what was desecrated, and this went on and on. Ultimately creation prevailed over destruction and we get the city as it is today.
Post the fall of Islamic kingdoms in India, various resurgent Hindu powers like the Marathas, the Bundelkhand Rajputs, Zamindars from Bengal, Royals from Nepal and South India contributed to the work of rebuilding this ancient place that saw constant habitation from about 1000bce.
Set between the confluence of Varuna and Assi with the Ganga, Benaras is a colloqual pronunciation of an amalgamated name formed by joining Varuna and Assi, Varanasi. This city is also called Kashi, which comes from the root word kas (shinning brass) meaning the city of eternal light/learning due to the knowledge monopoly of Brahmins who dwelt there. It is also called the city of Shiva as many myths related to the god of destruction are associated with it. The Buddha, lived here for many years and preached his first sermon at the north end of the city at Saranath.
Benaras finds mention in the Mahabharata, Puranas, the Buddhist and Jain texts and in the works of later day travellers. In the pan Indian psyche since ancient times and in the sacred geography of the subcontinent, this city is akin to an ideal, which by nature is utopic. Thus any town or city in India, with a considerable number of temples in it, is often termed the Benaras of the east, west, north and south. It is also a favourite destination for foreign tourists, who through the Eurocentric notion of an exotic land lost in time, gets a microcosmic experience of India by just walking along the many Ghats of this ancient city.
Travel with me...