BBC says about Taj Mahal

BBC says about Taj Mahal---Hidden Truth - Never say it is a Tomb Aerial view of the Taj Mahal(image placeholder)The interior water well (image placeholder)Frontal view of the Taj Mahal and dome (image placeholder)Close up of the dome with pinnacle (image placeholder)Close up of the pinnacle (image placeholder)Inlaid pinnacle pattern in courtyard (image placeholder)Red lotus at apex of the entrance (image placeholder)Rear view of the Taj & 22 apartments (image placeholder)View of sealed doors & windows in back (image placeholder)Typical Vedic style corridors (image placeholder)The Music House--a contradiction (image placeholder)A locked room on upper floor (image placeholder)A marble apartment on ground floor (image placeholder)The OM in the flowers on the walls (image placeholder)Staircase that leads to the lower levels (image placeholder)300 foot long corridor inside apartments (image placeholder)One of the 22 rooms in the secret lower level (image placeholder)Interior of one of the 22 secret rooms (image placeholder)Interior of another of the locked rooms (image placeholder)Vedic design on ceiling of a locked room (image placeholder)Huge ventilator sealed shut with bricks (image placeholder)Secret walled door that leads to other rooms (image placeholder)Secret bricked door that hides more evidence (image placeholder)Palace in Barhanpur where Mumtaz died (image placeholder)Pavilion where Mumtaz is said to be buried (image placeholder)NOW READ THIS....... No one has ever challenged it except Prof. P. N. Oak, who believes the whole world has been duped. In his book Taj Mahal: The True Story, Oak says theTaj Mahal is not Queen Mumtaz's tomb but an ancient Hindu temple palace of Lord Shiva (then known as Tejo Mahalaya) . In the course of his research O ak discovered that the Shiva temple palace was usurped by Shah Jahan from then Maharaja of Jaipur, Jai Singh. In his own court chronicle,Badshahnama,Shah Jahan admits that an exceptionally beautiful grand mansion in Agra was taken from Jai SIngh for Mumtaz's burial . The ex-Maharaja of Jaipur stillretains in his secret collection two orders from Shah Jahan forsurrendering the Taj building. Using captured temples and mansions, as a burial place fordead courtiers and royalty was a common practice among Muslim rulers. For example, Humayun,Akbar, Etmud-ud-Daula and Safdarjung are all buriedin such mansions. Oak's inquiries began with the name of Taj Mahal. He says the term "Mahal" has never been used for a building in any Muslim countries from Afghanisthan to Algeria. "The unusual explanation that the term TajMahal derives from Mumtaz Mahal was illogical in atleast two respects. Firstly, her name was never Mumtaz Mahal but Mumtaz-ul-Zamani," he writes. Secondly, one cannot omit the first three letters 'Mum' from a woman's name to derive the remainder as the name for the building."Taj Mahal, he claims, is a corrupt version of Tejo Mahalaya, or Lord Shiva's Palace . Oak also says the love story of Mumtaz and Shah Jahan is a fairy tale createdbycourt sycophants, blundering historians and sloppy archaeologists . Not a single royal chronicle of Shah Jahan's time corroborates the love story. Furthermore, Oak cites several documents suggesting the Taj Mahal predatesShah Jahan's era, and was a temple dedicated to Shiva, worshipped by Rajputs of Agra city. For example, Prof. Marvin Miller of New York took a fewsamples from the riverside doorway of the Taj. Carbon dating tests revealed that the door was 300 years older than Shah Jahan. European traveler Johan Albert Mandelslo,who visited Agra in 1638 (only seven years after Mumtaz's death), describes the life of the cit y in his memoirs. But he makes no reference to the Taj Mahal being built. The writings of Peter Mundy, an English visitor to Agra within a year of Mumtaz's death, also suggest the Taj was a noteworthy building well before Shah Jahan's time.Prof. Oak points out a number of design and architectural inconsistencies that support the belief of the Taj Mahal being a typical Hindu templeratherthan a mausoleum. Many rooms in the Taj ! Mahal have remained sealed since Shah Jahan's time and are still inaccessible to the public. Oak asserts they contain a headless statue of Lord Shiva and other objects commonly used for worship rituals in Hindu temples . Fearing political backlash, Indira Gandhi's government tried to have Prof. Oak's bookwithdrawn from the bookstores, and threatened the Indian publisher of the first edition dire consequences . There is only one way to discredit orvalidate Oak's research. The current government should open the sealed rooms of the Taj Mahal under U.N. supervision, and let international experts investigate.