Hiding The Taj Mahal In World War II – 2 Rare Old Photos 1942
There are two rare 1942 photos that shows the hiding of the Taj Mahal during World War II. The first photo is of an American soldier in front of the disguised Taj Mahal. During World War II British India was on the side of the allied countries.
At the time there were concerns in the government about any attacks by Japan or Germany who where part of the axis countries. One of the preferred targets of enemies in times of war were to destroy famous landmarks. So when WWII broke out the Taj Mahal was one of the obvious targets. Setting off alarm bells to the British India Government.
It was most important for them was to save the famous Taj Mahal from any aerial bombings. The government didn’t want to take any chance after Madras was shelled by Germans in WWI. The German warship Emden bombarded the city. Shelling of the buildings and landmarks took place thus creating terror on the people in 1914. The Taj Mahal’s dome as seen in this photo is clad in bamboo.
The scaffolding acted as a camouflage, resembling a stockpile of bamboos when looking down from the fighter plane. This was to mislead the fighter pilots. At the time, they relied more on the naked eye, since fighter planes lacked sophisticated electronics unlike today. Nonetheless, no attack took place on the Taj. We do not know if it would have had the desired effect since only the dome was disguised, the rest was exposed.
Did you know – in the 1965 and 1971 Indo-Pakistan wars yet again the Taj Mahal was believed to have been disguised.
From the collection – 1964 M. Suriyamoorthy Charcoal Art Abstract (#1)., Madras Gymkhana Club, Old Postcard 1905., Crawford Market Mumbai – Rare Old Print 1874., Maharaja Of Travancore’s Elephants & Sunbeam Car.
