After a landscape resembling the moonscape, the greatest attraction of Ladakh is the heritage treasure in its fully functional and active monasteries. Apart from the continuously worshipping Buddhist monks called Lamas, the monasteries have innumerable statues of even pure gold, hundreds of canvas paintings known as Tankhas and above everything else, beautiful and intricate wall paintings. The most exquisite wall paintings in the form of miniatures are in Alchi Gompa.

These date back to twelfth century and have been done by 100 Kashmiri artistes who had been brought here by Rinchen Zangpo. Some say that the paintings are even better than Ajanta Ellora frescoes! My first contact with Alchi was in 1974 when I visited Ladakh with my colleague Abdul Rauf to survey the infrastructure available for tourists. We were told that a visit to Alchi was a must. Those days there was only a foot bridge to cross Indus River and we had to walk few kilometres to reach the monastery. We found Alchi frescoes quite fascinating. Especially these were not totally related to Buddhist philosophy only as is the case in other monasteries. We found depiction of some court scenes of Arabs and there were some crosses also. The monastery is situated in Alchi village. The frescoes had started deteriorating. The roof had leaked and one could see the lines on the walls made by seepage. At that time no one was taking care of the paintings. Local lamas had painted some walls with gaudy colour. The original colours had been prepared by grounding precious stones and had stood the ravages of time for almost a thousand years. Alchi was made famous by Dr.Snellgrove who wrote a book about its frescoes. This attracted a lot of attention towards the monastery.

On return to Srinagar I got in touch with a number of artist friends and we initiated a process to attract attention of the concerned authorities for preserving these wall painting. After a couple of years, in fact, in 1976, I contacted Mohammad Yusuf Taing who was the Secretary of the State Academy of Art, Culture, and Languages. He had also been to Ladakh and had seen these paintings. He agreed that it was an invaluable treasure and needed preservation. However, in the meantime he felt a need to photograph these paintings for keeping a record for the posterity. He asked me if I could do it. I immediately agreed to take up the assignment. I had a Nikon camera but needed a better one for large format slides. It was decided to prepare slides of all the paintings which would deem worthwhile. I borrowed a Hassle Blad broad format camera from the Information Department. In order to guide me artistically, I requested my artist friend Autar Raina to come along. He jumped on the suggestion and immediately agreed to accompany me. After collecting enough film rolls, lights and other accessories from my friend Jagdish Mehta of the famous photographic shop of Mahattas, we planned to leave in a couple of days. There was now the question of vehicle and provisions for the way as well as for our stay near Alchi. I requisitioned a dependable four wheel drive Wagoner from the State Motor Garages and asked our caretaker in Mountaineering Wing Assadullah to accompany. He was a very hardy fellow as well as a good cook. Thus after getting fully equipped we left for Kargil. The route was by now quite well known to us. In Drass we stopped for a cup of tea and then went up to the spot where there are some old statues. We photographed these. Kargil as usual looked like a typical town on the Silk Route. We stayed for the night in the Tourist Bungalow.

Next morning we started quite early and spent some time in Mulbekh near the rock carving of Buddha. Those days the carving was fully visible and looked very impressive. Now it has been hidden by some constructions undertaken by the local monastery. Driving along after having some snack lunch we reached Khalsi in the afternoon. Again here we stopped for some tea and drove along Indus River to our first goal, the Alchi monastery. At that time there was only a foot bridge and we could not drive to Alchi. Now there is a motorable road right up to the monastery. We had two choices. Either we had to drive to Leh and stay there and shuttle every day between Leh and Alchi or we had to stay in Alchi itself. As we did not know any one in Alchi, we decided to stay in the village on this side of the River known as Saspol. There was a school in the village and the teacher on duty there allowed us to stay in one of the class rooms for night only. We could spend the night but had to vacate the class room every morning before ten when the school started. The arrangement suited us well. We put our things in a small store room which the teacher allowed us to use. Assadullah set up his temporary kitchen and cooked dinner for us. We slept early as we had to walk few kilometres to reach the monastery in the morning.

Next morning after breakfast we drove to the bridge and carried along some pack lunch of prathas, eggs, and some vegetables. After dropping us, Assadullah and driver would go back to Saspol and look for some chickens. They would come back in the evening to pick us up. The walk was first straight along the other bank of the River. Then it turned right into a clearing and we went along a flat plateau which had a long line of chortens. The path then climbed a hillside and descended into the village of Alchi. It was a small village of mud houses with small winding lanes. The monastery itself consisted of a number of mud houses with pagoda type of roofs. The whole village was green with a lot of trees, plants, and shrubs. We did not find any locks on the monastery doors. A young girl conducted us to various chambers. Those days the number of tourists was still quite low. These days Ladakh is receiving over 80 thousand tourists! Our first task was to survey all the wall paintings and other interesting areas of the monastery. Some of the chambers were well lit by the daylight entering through small windows at the top and through the door. Others were somewhat dark and would need light to photograph the frescoes. In the main chamber there were two storey statues of Buddha. The heads were hidden in the top storey. The body and the legs of the Buddha were visible in the ground floor. The walls all round were fully painted with miniatures. Autar examined different walls and the legs of the Buddha statues so as to decide which paintings we would start with. There were very interesting court scenes, portraits, and even some nudes. We decided to start with those paintings which seemed rare to us. Some of the paintings were repetitions. I photographed some court scenes and portraits on the broad format. After finishing first day’s photography we returned to our makeshift home in the school. The walk back to the bridge was easier and the driver was waiting at the bridge.

(To be continued…..)