Jaipur – Grandeur at The City Palace

“Anna Singh, Ramola Varma, K.P.Menon, Rohit , Sohrab, and Amol “ A collective relieved sigh went around in the classroom. After the lecture, we met outside at the canteen and gave each other a high five after the group for the field trip was announced. We were en route to Ladakh for our site visit.

A half egg fry, and a lassi and we all huddled our heads over the table at the canteen. We had a week before joining at Ladakh. If we left a week earlier we could visit some tourist spots. We checked out on K.P’s laptop and arrived at a consensus. Jaipur! All of us said it together. Easily approachable by air , or train, we also contemplated of reaching there by road. Finally we were in the Ashram Express taking us to Jaipur.

All of us knew Jaipur is also known as the Pink City. Forming a major attraction for tourists, this city was most famous for its beautiful Jaipur Palace. This is what we were mainly interested in.

A month ahead we booked tickets for Jaipur by the Ashram Express. There were some others who were joining us by flying down from Sikkim. The day dawned and all of us in Ashram Express. Jaipur Calling!.

As we entered Jaipur the pink city, the city of elegance, hospitality and warmth, we felt the air scented with the perfume of love, care and expectation. People here are more encouraging towards making your visit fruitful and memorable. There are various ways we can make our trip enjoyable, entertaining, and nostalgic. Our travel kitty can be  filled to the brim, by buying to our heart’s content. Some of the items of shopping are blue pottery items made out of crushed quartz, lac bangles, semi precious and precious stone ornaments, earrings, bangles, trinkets etc. We can also indulge in purchase of handicraft articles, sanganeri textile prints and tie dye prints. Famous shopping centers are Chandpol Bazaar, Choti Chaupar, Badi Chaupar, Tripolia Bazaar, Johri Bazaar, Nehru Bazaar, Ramganj Chaupar,Suraj Pol Bazaar etc.

After checking in at the hotel, we got ready to go round the city. After shopping around a little we decided to take the walk around the site seeing spots in Jaipur. The walk is around 4 kms and involved seeing many places. The walk started at the Royal Cenotaph at a place called Gaitor. This showcased the finest structures made out of marble and many cenotaphs of past kings of Jaipur. Their descendants were also depicted here. Sawai Jai Singh of the 18th century started the lineage. The trees and the greenery around the cenotaphs added to the carvings of Lord Krishna engraved on them, mesmerized all of us.

“What a lovely piece of architecture.” Said Anna and said she was glad she was an Architecture student. She would create designs which would be famous in the next coming centuries.! We hushed her as we got to have a lovely panoramic view of the fort at Navgarh from here. I had my cap, Sohrab and Amol had decided to go a little authentic and were in Rajashtani clothes with headgear and all, Ramola too joining in , K.P had his cap umbrella ( he had got it from Kerala), Anna looked her usual with her English style hat on. We proceeded as the group leader showed us the way. We were walking along small lanes behind a palace called the Hawa Mahal. This is how we could get to the City Palace in Jaipur which is an area full of old buildings. This is the place where we felt we could spend the entire day. The lovely vessels, the museum for arms, the gates, the huge rooms. Yes we decided to stroll around here while the rest of the group went ahead.

We bought tickets to get in. We paid extra for the cameras we were taking. Then we entered a hall. It had lovely windows made of pink sandstone. In the centre we saw a huge chandelier from the ceiling. The chandelier was running on electricity!

“Just read what you know about City Palace on your phone, Rohit” said Ramola. I got the details and read out, “Jaipur City Palace is a major tourist attraction and is also a major landmark here. It has a mixture of Mughal and Rajashtani architecture. Almost most of Jaipur is covered by this palace.”

Next we reached a courtyard. This was made of pure marble and the statues of elephants were a feast for our eyes.

“Unbelievable!” I said and Ramola added that her grandfather had told her that this was made out of a single marble piece. There were peacock carvings in the doorway and as we walked on, we saw some areas where there were old carriages as used by the kings. Some carriages had wheels while others had none as they were carried by servants on their shoulders.

We walked on, and reached Chandra Mahal . This had beautiful scenery of the entire city and a vast expanse of greenery.

“Wow,!” exclaimed K.P. He is an artist so was quite taken in by the paintings displayed here.

“Look at these mirrored walls, and these lovely floral on the walls.” Ramola said and we looked at the amazement with which she was admiring them. The sheer expanse of the place overwhelmed us.

We went to the first floor. This was again a museum which depicted the life of Sawai Man Singh. The third floor, had the dining and the drawing room of the Maharaja. Anna had a ball looking at the walls of mirrors in the fourth floor and wondered why it was there. Sohrab said, that his father had told him about this mirrored wall and added that this was made for the king to enjoy light even in darkness. We just shook our heads in disbelief and wondered at the grandeur that the past Indian kings experienced. We were even more taken in when we saw the retreat spot for the Maharaja during the rainy season. It really was kingly to be a king ! Then on the sixth floor we went up, and got to have a lovely view of the hills around.

We were tired and exhausted with the sheer magnificence of the whole ambience and when we saw the topmost floor of Chandra Mahal, we felt we had it. This was known as the Crown of the building and rightly so, where the Shobha Nivas and the Sukh Nivas is still the place where the present Maharaja lives.

After this we went across to see the Mubarak Mahal. “ This was built by Sawai Madho Singh.” I said referring to my phone. “And you know, this was built as the entertainment zone for the guests.” Added K.P Anna looked behind to see how K.P gave information and soon enough all of us were logging on to our phones to get the details of the place we were in.

“We should have got a tour guide along.” Said Ramola. “Arrey rehney de na,” said Sohrab and danced a small Rajasthani dance. We all laughed and proceeded to the first square and entered the Mubarak Mahal.

“My my what costumes !” said Anna even as we were looking around at the display of costumes here. Costumes worn by the kings of yesteryears.

“What’s that beautiful structure there>?” asked Amol. We looked towards the gateway we were walking towards. “That is the Diwan-i-khas” the person walking next to us told us. We turned around and saw Abhinav, Akshay and Ria with us. Whoopee!!

“Arrey ! how did you guys join us ? When did you come from Sikkim>?” we all asked in unison.

They said they tracked us with the GPS in their phones and thus the entire group was together now. All of us entered the Diwan-i-khas which was then a hall for the private audience. There were two vessels made of silver displayed here.

Ria, a history student said,” This is supposed to be the world’s largest silver vessel.”

“But why would anyone have such a big silver vessel?” I asked

Ria said that it was made for the Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh to carry water when he went to England.!Next we went to the Diwan-i-Aam, which was a hall for the public audience. This was an art gallery which had the best of paintings of those times. The ceiling had a lovely work or manuscripts of the past written on Hindu scriptures.

“Aur main yahaan ki rani hoon!” ( And I am the queen here ) Anna swung with her hips swaying like a Rajasthani folk dancer. We all laughed and told her we were aptly in the Maharani’s Palace too. We looked around at the weapons kept here in the palace. Badal Mahal was the next destination and it was just opposite the Chandra Mahal where we had come after a full circle. We went to a temple here – The Govind Dev temple. Whoa! There was a restaurant here.

All of us, rested and relaxed here and it seemed as if we were all kings and the girls were all queens. We had a good lunch here and enjoyed the ambience and the surroundings.

“Okay , I get it now, the Palace actually has two divisions. One division has the Museum and the other has the Residence. The main part has the citadels like Mubarak Mahal, Chandra Mahal and the Badal Mahal.” I said. Everyone agreed in unison.

After lunch we had a look at the Chhavi Niwas which was a hall full of images. The floors were extremely well polished here and the walls were all painted in white and blue. This was a celebration venue for the kings during the rainy season.

“Hey see another temple.” Sohrab said and we went towards the Ananda Mandir also called the Temple of Joy. There were walls at the top of the temple which had beautiful colors . At the temple top there were halls that had arms and weapons used by the Jaipur kings of yore.

The City Palace tour over we came back to our hotel tired but happy, exhausted but excited. The next day we planned to go to Jantar Mantar and the Johari Bazaar but for today we were really happy with our visit to the City Palace.