Ancient idol of Lord Buddha recovered from Chhattisgarh's Sondra

Raipur (Chhattisgarh) [India], March 11 : Ancient idol of Lord Buddha belonging from the 'Panduvanshi' period and other statues of archaeological importance were recovered on Friday from village Sondra on Raipur-Bilaspur road during construction of a house.
The statues were recovered during the construction of Dilendra Banchor's house at village Sondra.
After learning about the recoveries of ancient idols, a team of archaeological department reached to the spot for undertaking inspection of the area following an instruction of Director of Archaeology, Archive and Museum Department Vivek Acharya.

According to the officials of the archaeological department, "The village is located around 16 kilometers from Raipur-Bilaspur road and 2 km from Sankra area in Raipur. While undertaking digging work for the development of columns for construction of house, the idol of lord Buddha was recovered."
The presence of 'tilak' mark on the forehead of a recovered stone statue of Buddha, makes it more unique and indicates that it is more likely to be the meditative Buddha, officials said.
The recovered idol of lord Buddha is incomplete and the upper part of the idol was developed with three-tier technique, said the officer.
"The idols of lord Buddha prepared with this technique are available in Chhattisgarh's Sirpur and Rajim as well as Bodhgaya of Bihar," he added.
While conducting inspection at the site, the information related to the presence of other idols in different forms was gathered, the officer said,
The officer further stated, the antiquities recovered from the site seem to be of Panduvanshi period (6th to 9th century AD).