A stone-and-brick reservoir, believed to be over 1500 years old, has been unearthed on Elephanta Island, showing how ancient inhabitants managed drinking water despite heavy rainfall and rocky terrain that cannot retain it.

Beyond caves

Elephanta is known for rock-cut monuments, but this tank is engineered, not carved, marking a different approach to infrastructure.
“This clustering of caves on islands is not incidental; island cave sites repeatedly occur in zones of intense movement, exchange and patronage. 
Across western India, caves functioned not only as religious spaces but also as institutional nodes embedded in mercantile networks,” said Dr Abhijit Ambekar.