Jhulta Minar
JhultaMinar, also known as the Shaking Minarets, they are playful but with a whir of quivering mystery. They have left the best of architects and pioneering design engineers intrigued and in unresolvable wonder. What they cannot unravel is when one minaret is shaken the other begins to vibrate, though the connecting passage between the two remains vibration-free, what causes this vibration is unknown. There are two well-known pairs of Shaking Minarets in Ahmedabad, one located opposite the SarangpurDarwaja and the other near the Kalupur Railway Station Area. The one near SarangpurDarwaja is within the vicinity of the Sidi Bashir Mosque built in 1452 AD by Sidi Bashir, a slave of Sultan Ahmed Shah. They are three storeys talls with carved balconies where visitors were once allowed to climb all the way up. The other set of minarets near the Railway Station is taller in height. However, these are not in a very good condition as it is believed that the British had dismantled them to understand the cause of vibrations. They could not resolve the engineering and it was not possible to put them back in their original condition. Demonstrations of the minarets shaking or vibrating are not carried out anymore.
History
It is believed that the mosque was constructed by Sidi Bashir, a slave of Sultan Ahmed Shah. A conflicting story is that the mosque was built by Malik Sarang, a noble in the court of MuhammedBegada, another Sultan of Gujarat. The mosque was completed in 1452. Only the minarets and arched central gateway remain; the body of the building was destroyed in 1753 during the war between the Marathas and Khan of Gujarat Sultanate. Two minaretes of ruined mosque, now in Ahmedabad railway station, 1866. On the north side, as the train enters the station, the two tallest minarets are in Ahmedabad. All traces of their mosque and the memory of its name and date are gone. The style and material of the minarets point to the close of Mahmud Begada's reign (1511), or perhaps rather later. Though much damaged, especially near the foot, the stairs inside the minarets may still be used.An Englishman made an attempt to demolish one of the minarets of the mosque, but all in vain. He did so to unravel the mystery behind the swaying of minarets. The mechanism that leads to vibration is still a mystery. An interesting thing about JhultaMinar is that, it can even withstand the pressure of fast moving trains that pass from a distance not lying very far from the minaret.This minar was built layer by layer that is why it can resist that much shaking without collapsing. It’s around 600 years old.
Minarets
There are two minarets in the mosque, each of which is three stories tall with carved balconies. A gentle shaking of either minaret results in the other minaret vibrating after a few seconds, though the connecting passage between them remains free of vibration. The actual cause of this is not yet known. This phenomenon was first observed in the 19th century by Monsier M. Williams, an English Sanskrit scholar.
Visiting Hours: 5:30 am to 9 pm
Visiting Fees : No Entry Fees
Address
Saka Bazar,
Kalupur, Ahmedabad, Gujarat