By Kunda Dixit
KHAJURAHO, INDIA, Feb 19 1995 (IPS)

Today India is going through a sexual revolution as traditional taboos are broken by the advent of satellite television, girlie magazines and sexually-explicit musicals.

But ancient temples in this central Indian town provide evidence of a similar openness in attitudes 1,000 years ago. Built by the Chandela dynasty of Central India at the beginning of this millennium, the ‘temples of love’ contain some of the most exquisite stone sculptures of erotic art in India, or indeed in the world.

Voluptuous celestial nymphs prance across the intricate balconies and columns of the 40-metre high temples. One thousand years after they were chiselled, beads on the necklace of Shiva or delicate folds of muslin on devotees are still sharply etched in handsome sandstone.

Sensual figures, youthful and vigorous, are captured in various stages of sexual congress. They writhe along the friezes with movements languid and free in a wild celebration of the act of love-making.

The gaze on the faces of the human and divine lovers is tender and tranquil, striking a harmonious balance between body and soul, between the mundane and spiritual.

When the Chandela dynasty collapsed in the 12th century, the temples of Khajuraho were taken over by jungle. In 1838 a British engineer travelling through the region chanced upon them. Removing the vines, he was shocked by what he saw.

“Some of the sculptures here are extremely indecent and offensive, which I was at first much surprised to find in temples,” he wrote.

In 1953, the temples were partially restored. Later, hotels and an airport were built to open up the area to visitors and pilgrims. Today, the Khajuraho temples have been declared a World Heritage Site by the U.N. Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

“Perhaps no other collection of mediaeval art used the body- metaphor as voluptuously as these sculptures,” says Pramila Poddar, author of a book on Khajuraho, called “Temples of Love”.

She adds: “unabashed, incredibly frank, the erotic quality of Khajuraho is disturbing, but also cleansing. This is the love sanctioned by the gods, a love unaccompanied by guilt and one which knows only the language of pleasure.”

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