As one drives along the Grand Trunk Road, popularly called the ‘GT Road’ or ‘Generali Sarak’, from the Wagah border coming from Amritsar past the Lahore Fort and onto ancient Peshawar and then Kabul, one thinks of the different rulers and religions that Lahore has experienced.

Of the rulers this city has had, at least the documented ones, include the Chola Dynasty, the Maurya Dynasty starting from Chandragupta from 321 BC to the eighth ruler Brihadratha who died in 180 BC, to the Sungas to the Kushans from 01 AD to 300 AD, to the Guptas till 550 AD and then came the Chalukyan rulers till 700 AD followed by the Hindushahi Palas till 975 AD, only to be destroyed by the Turko-Afghan invader Mahmud. So, with these ruling dynasties came their religions. Both rulers and religions came to our city by this ancient highway.

It is interesting just how rulers came and disappeared, just as various religions over time came and almost faded away. The average lifespan of religions in Lahore as a norm seems to be 700 years plus-minus a few. But then just as humans come and go, so do belief systems. After eons of idol worshipping of things natural, the formal structure of this idol belief came in the shape of Hinduism, which was created in the land of Pakistan as it is known today. From the Indus Valley it was pushed to lands on both sides of the Ganges.

So, the oldest known religion that arrived in Lahore, naturally via the highway, was Hinduism. Then we see the emergence of Buddhism with the challenge to the bigotry of the caste system, which seems primarily a structured form of exploitation of the people. Gautam the Buddha saw through this, and his belief structure was humanistic. He came to Lahore for a few weeks and so for another 700 years this was the State religion.

Come the nomadic Alchon Huns and all Buddhists were slaughtered, and a mix of Hinduism and Zoroastrianism emerged. It was in that period that the Sun Temple to the south of the Lahore Fort was built, which come Mahmud was decimated, as he did other structures, especially religious ones.

Though the highway and beliefs are not directly related, but there is this connection that humans travel with beliefs. So let us, briefly, describe the probable history of the GT Road, which starts from Kabul and ends in Chittagong near Burma now called Myanmar. Most researchers inform us of its old names, they are Uttarapath, Sarak-e-Azam, Badshahi Sarak and the Long Walk.

Greek records tell us that this road existed before 322 BC when Alexander came, at least KM Sarkar the historian claims in his research The common theory is that it emerged naturally as people over the ages walked, or rode their carts, first oxen-driven and then horse-driven, over thousands of years. So, in this part of the world this is the oldest highway – a natural creation. It’s exact age just cannot be pinpointed.

In the documented world there are three rulers who are well-known to have expanded and improved this road like no others. Everyone contributed to some extent, but it was Chandragupta Maurya and his Adviser Chanakya, a renowned teacher, strategist and economist who undertook to rebuild this highway, and build ‘serais’ and plant trees along this highway.

The second ruler who did a marvellous job on the highway was the Pushto-speaking Sher Shah Suri (born 1472, died 1545 AD) the founder of the Sur Empire, to improve fast communications. Between important urban cities he added another 1,500 ‘kos’ to the existing road. One feature of Suri construction was that he raised the road level by almost two feet.

Now a ‘kos’ is traditionally as given in the ‘Arthashastra’ written by Chanakya, at 3,000 metres. Mughal emperor Akbar standardised a ‘kos’ at 5,000 metres. But the last change was by the British who standardised it at 33 inches making the ‘kos’ 13,750 feet long.

Sher Shah rebuilt the road from East Bengal to the Indus, another ran from Agra to Burhanpur, the third from Agra to Jodhpur and the Chitor Fort, and the fourth from Lahore to Multan. What also Sher Shah did was to plant shade-giving trees along the highways, as well as ‘serais’ (rest-houses). At each ‘serai’ was a post office and the very first pony express was put into operation. Each ‘serai’ also had an intelligence office, who every day sent reports to the ruler, so that he could act fast on any trouble. At each ‘serai’ was a ‘Kos Minar’ which provided timely visual information.

At each ‘serai’ was an office of the local police to tackle local crimes. A local court also existed here, and the next higher court was that of an ‘Amin’, then a ‘Qazi’, then the highest court, like our current Supreme Court, was ‘Mir-e-Adal’. It is amazing how this road, or ‘route communication’ set into motion a justice system that is almost like what it is all over the world today.

The success of the roads of Sher Shah, his ‘serais’ with equal Hindu-Muslim food and settings, with a justice system based on their beliefs, and an environment of peace, was made sure by an amazingly secular government. In the history of Medieval India there is no doubt, and this is true till today, there has never been a ruler whose rule was based on justice and justice alone. All this was backed by a strong military with an excellent intelligence system.

After Sher Shah the next ruler to work on the GT Road was Mughal ruler Akbar. But his contribution was restricted to his military’s movement between Lahore and Delhi. The last major contribution was by the British, whose main concern was to halt the assumed advance of Imperial Russia towards their colonial empire of India. To supplement troop movement, they also built a rail line to Landi Kotal.

The British built the road to Kabul, though Sher Shah had improved the old road that had been built by Lahore’s Hindu Shahi rulers, the ones that Sultan Mahmud had defeated in 1021 AD. But the ancient road that passed by the Lahore Fort had always served a very important commercial use.

The GT Road coming from Amritsar curved inward and touches the fort, or let’s say touched the northern portion of the River Ravi as it then flowed opposite Khizri Gateway. This was in its day the most important river port of the entire northern sub-continent. At this point Akbar’s talented wife Mariam Zamani built warships and ships to take pilgrims to Haj.

This Mughal seafaring shortcoming has been primarily blamed for the coming of colonial powers -- first the Portuguese, then the Spanish and then the English. So, the GT Road from the ancient days of the ‘Arthashastra’, or probably even earlier, was used to bring in goods from inner India to be sent down the river to faraway foreign lands.

Over the last 30 years Pakistani rulers have concentrated on building three-lane motorways at amazing costs. But even today most traffic, a police source says about 95 per cent, flows along GT Road. A former prime minister to please a neighbouring country widened the GT Road from Lahore to the Indian border, in the process knocking the irreplaceable ancient water filtration plants built in Shah Jehan’s days opposite the Shalimar Gardens.

The story of the GT Road and how it changed the history of Lahore, as also other major ancient cities, needs to be researched more. Most important is that the entire highway should have green shady trees restored. That would be ‘natural justice’.

Published in Dawn, December 24th, 2023