Kolar - Antharganga - Kolar Gold Fields (KGF)

21st September, 2003
Kolar - Antharganga  -Kolar Gold Fields (KGF)

Lonely Planet (South India) describes Anthargana (aka Antarganga, Antharaganga, Antaraganga!) as 'one of the best places for hiking and scenery'.

Antharganga is a religious place which is quite well maintained by the government. There's a hill, and on the way to top of the hill is the famous temple. But temple was not what we went for. We went for the hill. Its a typical Karnataka-rocks hill where you can follow innumerous trails to the top (no single top acutally: Its flat at the top), or make your own. The rocks are pretty stable and the incline is not very sharp.

We took NH4 (Old Madras Road) from Bangalore and it took us something like 2 hours to cover the 76 kms to Kolar on our mobike. More time taken is on account of the breaks we took to capture scenic NH4!  Reached Kolar by 1100 hrs. At bus stand, we found some hotels and filled us up. From Kolar bus stand, the hill is 3 kms away.

I think the hill is well maintained by the government but not the temple. Temple's holy pond is actually quite dirty. The stairs / path leading up to the temple are well laid with cobble-stones. After reaching temple, we went higher up. The views from different points, depending on the altitude, were great. But since it was quite hot, we didn't go to The Top. While on the way back down, we met three young kids who were more than willing to come under our patronage for getting themselves clicked :-) They also told us the story behind a hut like structure off the main path. Apparently, a part of Chiranjeevi-starrer super hit movie (Telugu? Kannada? Tamil?) Indra was shot at this place! And these kids showed us with full dance and song how the shooting of the song happened! It was nice.

We were back down by 1300 hrs. Back in Kolar, quenching thirst at a nice beverages shop with coke, juice etc, we decided to go to KGF (Kolar Gold Fields) to have a look at some gold mines if possible. It was already 1400 hrs by now and the day was getting better!

Considering it was interior Karnataka, the road was surprisingly really smooth! Passed through Bangarpet, a fairly good-sized town. Reaching KGF, first thing that you see is BEML's (Bharat Earth Movers Ltd, a PSU) township. This company occupies huge amount of space. After passing through BEML, we were still wondering where the heck were the mines. By the way, these mines come under the PSU called Bharat Gold Mines Ltd (99-00 annual report here), which itself falls under the The Ministry of Mines . We of course knew the mines had been closed due to infeasible operations some 3 years back. The case (employees vs. govt.) is pending in the court. However, our intention was just to have a look at the only gold mines in India. Also, we came across the fact that the shaft depth in the open-cast mines at KGF is second highest in the world (after Australian mines). 

Anyways, we couldn't see much of what could be called gold mines in sight. Hence, we kinda made some 2-3 to-and-fro rounds between Ooregaum railway station and the place where road to Ooregaum bifurcates. Finally, we decided to ask auto-wallas. All of them said that nobody is allowed inside the mines anymore. But if we were hell-bent, they said, we could find some kaccha road (trail) on the sides, which would lead to the mine. Hell-bent we were. We wanted to actually talk to any officer at the mines and get inside with permission. But we were told there's no one apart from the security guard at the mines these days. That turned out to be the turth :( Hence we decided to give the trail option a try. Somehow, we managed to reach deep in bushes behind a mine. Parking the mobike there, we started moving towards the concrete fence. The bushes were getting thicker. We were sure there would be an opening somewhere. But when we could reach the fence, there was no opening. There was, however, a not-so-obvious 2 feet high arch-style bush pit which I thought to give a try. Somehow managing to crawl through that pit successfully (and after almost tearing my clothes), I could see a wire fence which had a cut in it. I could and did jump in and found myself in the backyard of a maintenance-shed like thing. Now all that was required was to go around to the front and explore! Somehow, we thought it would be too risky if we got caught, and hence decided to get the hell back outta there!  (Check this Feb 09, 2004 news item in Times of India Bangalore: Gold hunters scour, sieve soil in KGF.  Gawd! Now I realize how lucky we were to come back safe and not get shot really!) 

We then went to the main gate of this particular mine and banged the door several times to call security guard to talk to him but no one came. In the mean time we noticed the board just across the road: "National Institute of Rock Mechanics". I was zapped at seeing such a specialized institute in a god-forsaken town. So we decided to go in the instt. But the guard wouldn't let us in and there was again no director or officer to talk too, as it was a Sunday. But the guard at NIRM, however, was very courteous. We kinda interviewed him :-) and he gave us lot of useful info. Like, there's only things /institutions that work in KGF now : NIRM and BEML! :) He also gave us info on various mines in KGF. There are/were 5 main mines in KGF: 

1) Champion's Reef Mine 

Gifford's Shaft (the venue of our adventure! Bang opposite Naional Institute of Rock Mechanics) Tenance Shaft

Glen Shaft

One Shaft

2) Marikuppam Mine 

Yadgar Shaft 

Petrikal Shaft 

Oncock Shaft 

3) Ooregaum Mine 

Two Shaft 

Bullion Shaft 

Main Shaft 

4) Koromandal / Coromandel Mine 

Henry Shaft 

5) Golkunda Mine

More info on KGF here 

After NIRM, we decided to generally horse around (bike around actuallY) in the town. And thats when we found out the real charm of the place. Its a wonderful place, replete with once-majestic institutions. But today, its almost like a ghost town. The Marikuppam railway station, with all its parallelly-structured waiting sheds and forlorn looks, looks straight out of a movie screen. We also came across the National Institute of Miners Health. The more we roamed around, the more we fell in love with the place. It kinda reminded me of the town in Malgudi Days - a town left in time! 

Just when we were deciding on which way to head back, to our delight, we discovered that a the beautiful branch road after the Marikuppam station leads to Bangarpet! So thats the road we took. Reached Bangarpet by 1630 hrs. Had lunch and moved on to come back to Bangalore. On the way, stopped at a highway Dhaba for tea, and relaxed a bit on charpai (manji /manjhi in punjabi). After clocking a total of 240 kms or so, we were back in Bangalore by 1910 hrs, after which we went straight to Aishwarya Parkland for some dinner!

Pics: I was waiting for pics to come before posting this travelogue but my trek partner, on his next adventure trip, dropped the camera containing the particular film roll in the river Sita!! He was doing white-water rafting, you see. So no pics of this trek :(

Update (Sep 03, 2004): Finally I got around to putting some pics that were salvaged from drowned camera!

Antharganga on_hill_overlooking_whole_antharganga 411 X 596 65 KB	Antharganga_on_the_road 603 X 411 70 KB
Antharganga_on_the_way 600 X 411 58 KB	Antharganga_the_main_temple 562 X 404 91 KB
Antharganga_way_to_temple 413 X 596 71 KB	Antharganga_with_local_kids 531 X 411 77 KB
KGF_champion_mine 589 X 418 67 KB	KGF_champion_reef_mine_clicked_from_piegon_hole 592 X 409 53 KB
KGF_marikuppam_railway_station 596 X 409 75 KB	KGF_national_institute_of_rock_mechanics 574 X 418 72 KB

Recommendation: Nice one-day trip. Dont expect too much, just go in a picnic mood and have fun!

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  Last updated: Sep 02, 2004

Created: Sep 27, 2003