These are buddhist caves or monasteries where monks practiced their austerities around the first century ad and unlike the artistic extravagance of elephanta they are spartan and bare situated in the heart of mumbais national park the complex contains more than a hundred tiny cells cut into the flank of a hill each fitted with a stone plinth that evidently served as a bed there is also a congregation hall supported by huge stone pillars that contains the dagoba a kind of buddhist shrine