Dinesh Wagle on Nepali Society

This amazing structure lies north of Arjuna’s Pennance.

Says the book “Mahabalipuram: a journey through a magical land” by Srinivaas & J Prabhakar:

“Actually this is not a boulder placed so very precariously on a rock. In reality, the flat rock at the bottom and the irregular sphere shaped boulder on top are just two different portions of the same rock.

Difficult to believe, isn’t it?

Initially this huge rock must have remained a single unit. For many, many thousands of years, it must have remained exposed to the forces of nature, heated by the sun, drenched by the rain and corroded by the wind. Slowly but surely the rock must have shed its skin. Fissures might have been formed, which must have widened, with flakes of rock washed away by rain, resulting in rounded forms. And ultimately it must have got the shape of a boulder standing on top of a rock!

Not easy to believe, but it is a fact. This can be termed “Optical Illusion”.