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Introductory
The first author of this monograph had planned a book on the temples in Kumbhāriyā after his visits to that site in late fifties and early sixties when he was working in the Department of Archaeology, Government of Gujarat. He then had undertaken the survey and photo-documentation as well as got prepared the floor plans of all the temples there and also had taken extensive and detailed notes on the architecture, decoration of the buildings and the relevant iconographical details of the divinity images. The monograph could not, however, come through owing largely to the exigencies generated by the then prevailing circumstances. While working next for long decades at the American Institute of Indian Studies—its Art and Archaeology Center in Varanasi (now moved to Gurgaon in Haryana)—he repeated his earlier endeavours at photo-documentation as also got prepared the floor plans afresh, which are here reproduced: the copies of a couple of minor plans, and in one case the elevation of the samvaranā-roof, were earlier acquired from the collection of the Department of Archaeology, Government of Gujarat, by way of filling in the gaps in reproduction. The photo-documented material was meant on the one hand for the AIIS's photo-archive as also for using it for a relevant chapter by the first author to be included in Vol. II, Part 4 of the Institute's prestigious publication, 'The Encyclopaedia of Indian Temple Architecture.'
As time wore on, it became clear that the revised decision (1991) which envisaged completing the remaining two Parts (4 and 5) of Volume I (South India) on priority basis, the publication of Vol. II, Part 4 (North India: c. 1001-1600) where the Kumbhāriyā temples were to figure may take, as a result, some more years. In the meantime, a fresh policy formulated by the Institute contemplated collaboration with other Indian institutions of standing, on specific projects to be precise. In view of this new direction, on the 11th of April 1999, Dr. Pradeep Mehendiratta, the Director-General and
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