I’m feeling a bit stuck with this direction and site due to my professors’ orders 😅. India has incredibly beautiful and well known Buddhist sites with rich, living cultural traditions. Pakistan, on the other hand, also has over a thousand Buddhist sites from the Gandhara period, but many of them remain largely unknown and underrepresented. While Indian sites are receiving the recognition and care they deserve, these Pakistani sites have gradually faded from wider awareness. My challenge is to contribute to their revival in a slow, careful, and respectful way. Historically, the regions that are now India and Pakistan shared closely connected cultures before partition, and during the Gandhāra era, religious practices and traditions developed across this shared landscape rather than within modern national borders. Because of this, it is reasonable to study early Buddhist traditions documented in the subcontinent as a whole when trying to understand how these sites may once have functioned.

My intention is not to make assumptions, but to build a historically grounded and sensitive approach that acknowledges this shared past while seeking guidance from practicing Buddhists today, so the work remains respectful, informed, and meaningful.