01Below Raigad
Mahad sits where the Savitri river leaves the hills for the creek, and boats once came up to it from the sea. It was the market town below Raigad, Shivaji’s capital, and the road up to the fort still begins near it. On the hill at Gandharpale, across the river, a group of old Buddhist rock-cut caves looks down on the town.
02The Chavdar tank
In 1923 the Bombay Legislative Council passed a resolution that public tanks and wells must be open to all, and Mahad municipality declared the Chavdar tank open. In practice no one from the excluded castes dared draw water. On 19 and 20 March 1927 Dr Ambedkar held a conference at Mahad, and on 20 March he walked with thousands to the tank and drank from it. A riot followed, and the tank was afterwards purified by some townsmen. Ambedkar came back for a second conference in December 1927, and the matter went to the courts; in 1937 the Bombay High Court upheld the right to use the tank. The day is marked at Mahad every year.
The life of this place
- 1923Bombay Legislative Council resolves that public water sources be open to all.
- 20 March 1927Ambedkar leads the Chavdar tank satyagraha.
- December 1927Second Mahad conference.
- 1937Bombay High Court upholds the right to use the tank.
