Report of a Tour through the Bengal Provinces/Afsand
AFSAND.
Afsand is a very small village 3 miles to the south by a little east of Párvati; here are several ancient remains, the principal of which is a high conical mound, the ruin apparently of a temple; there are also several statues, but mostly Brahmanical, among them a large varaha, the finest in Bengal I have yet seen, and a few, a very few, Buddhist statues. There was once an important inscription here which was removed by Captain Kittoe, and which he sent back to be replaced here, or rather to be let into a pillar or pedestal here, but it now exists no longer. I have been able to trace it to the Magistrate’s kachari at Nawâda; beyond this there is no clue; the loss of this inscription is much to be regretted, as it was an important one, and was not so clearly copied and read to render its loss now of no consequence; this should be a warning to officers to be careful in removing inscriptions and statues, &c. That Captain Kittoe gave orders for its being sent back to Afsand, there can be no doubt; but he did not take sufficient care to see his orders obeyed, and this is only too common a fault,—so common as to be almost a national fault. I refer to Captain Kittoe’s original paper in the Asiatic Society’s Journal for an account of the remains at Afsand, to which I can add little.