Monuments of Jaipur

On Mirza Ismail Road just outside of Ajmeri Gate stands the King Edward Memorial. Built in 1912 and featuring a clocktower, it is a nice little example of the Indo-Saracenic architectural style.

Indo-Saracenic is an architectural style developed in British India in the late nineteenth century. British colonialists intended it to be the architectural style of imperialism in the Indian Subcontinent. They had also experiment with Tropical Gothic, an adaptation of the architectural style from medieval Europe. Although the British built some spectacular examples of Tropical Gothic in Bombay, eventually they moved on from the style. They considered its association with Christianity inappropriate for India.

Instead, they tried Indo-Saracenic architecture in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As the name suggests, the style is supposedly a fusion of Indian and Arab or Islamic (“Saracenic”) architectural motifs. But as Vibhuti Sachdev and Giles Tillotson point out in Building Jaipur, an Indo-Saracenic building is, at its heart, a European building with Indian styling. In other words, Indo-Saracenic buildings have European floorplans and European functions, but they also have Indian-style domes, arches, columns, and other motifs.

The clocktower of King Edward Memorial has Indian-style cupola, balustrades, and cornices. But the function—displaying a large clock face in public—is European in origin.

Jaipur has many palaces: some big, some small, some actually built during the princely state period, and some fake “heritage hotels” built in this century. In this busy landscape of heritage structures, a few palaces stand out. The prettiest and most unique of these is certainly Jal Mahal, which seems to float in the waters of Man Sagar, an artificial reservoir between Jaipur and Amber.

Jal Mahal (Water Palace) was originally built in 1734, at the same time as the founding of Jaipur. The two-storeyed structure is square in plan, with domed towers at each of the corners and bangaldar roofs at the midpoints of each side. The building’s large, flat roof terrace has a garden with several big trees that rise above the chhatris and bangaldar roofs. Although the palace can be appreciated from afar, it has long been closed to the public. It is maintained in good condition by workers who land at a boat dock on the eastern side.

The Jaipur Development Authority has developed a pedestrian promenade on the lakeshore facing Jal Mahal. Locals flock to the place during the monsoon, to appreciate the greenery and throw food to the fish. The southern half of the promenade, closest to Jal Mahal, is typically full of vendors and beggars. The northern half tends to be less crowded and more peaceful.

Of course, Jal Mahal has its foundations on solid ground, and it doesn’t really float in the lake. In fact, the lake is not particularly deep where the palace is located. A good way to appreciate this is by watching the opening scene of the 1959 British adventure movie North-West Frontier. The film opens with rebels attacking a loyal raja in the Northwest Frontier Province in the early twentieth century. For the shooting of this scene, Jaipur and Amber stood in for the northwest frontier. The raja’s palace is Jal Mahal. At the time of shooting, the lake’s level was very low, and the palace stood on dry ground. The stuntmen rebels’ horses could gallop right up to the palace.

In the architecture of Rajasthan and neighboring parts of India and Pakistan, a baradari is an open pavilion with a flat roof. Traditionally, baradaris have a square floorplan and twelve arches, three to a side (the word literally means “twelve-gated”). Some baradaris have one enclosed side. The name sometimes also refers loosely to any flat-roofed pavilion with open sides. (A domed pavilion is known as a chhatri.)

One of Jaipur’s finest baradaris is Fateh Shah Baba’s baradari, located near the Bisalpur pumping station east of Albert Hall. It is an attractive, well-proportioned baradari standing on an ample platform. The platform, floor, and columns of the monument are made of white marble, while its arches, eaves, and roof appear to be made from a lower-grade stone covered with white plaster.

Fateh Shah Baba’s baradari shares a compound with an Islamic tomb-shrine, Dargah Hazrat Jhadu Shah Baba. The baradari also is a tomb. There are a couple of marble caskets embedded in the floor of the baradari. This is the only baradari I know of in Jaipur or anywhere else that serves as a tomb. (A man sitting outside the dargah told me that the person buried in the baradari is Fateh Shah Baba. There is no inscription or other signage.)

Keshav Dwar is a remnant of the outer defensive works of Jaipur. Located in a valley east of the city, the ruined gate consists of a single arched portal with the tattered remnants of a wooden door inside. Like many ruins on the rural fringes of Jaipur, Keshav Dwar stands surrounded by thorn-forest, a favorite haunt of goats.

In the eighteenth century, a network of outer defensive works protected the approaches to the walled city of Jaipur. A ring of defensive forts encircled the city – Nahargarh to the north, Hathroi and Moti Doongri to the south, and Raghunathgarh and Ambagarh on the hills to the east. The hills themselves formed a natural defensive barrier for the city, but valleys cut through the hills in several places.

The most important of these was the Ghat ki Guni, a narrow ravine with towering walls on either side. In the eighteenth century, the Ghat was a favorite place to build formal gardens, temples, and havelis. Many of them are still there, their buildings all painted a uniform shade of yellow.

Ghat ki Guni was important for Jaipur because the road running up it was the main approach to the city from the east. It was important to keep the road open for commercial reasons. Yet the valley also had to be defended in the event of an attack. Although the defensive gates that used to stand in the Ghat no longer exist, Keshav Dwar still stands where it protected a parallel valley to the north.

Surya Mandir, the Sun Temple, stands on the top of a ridge just east of the old city of Jaipur. The main shrine of the temple, built in Nagara style and painted white, is surrounded by a walled enclosure with a gate and crenelations, looking rather like a miniature fortress. The walls of the enclosure are Jaipur pink, the same color as the walls of the old city below.

A historic plaque placed by the Rajasthan state archeology department states that Rao Kripa Ram built the temple in 1734. He served as envoy to the Mughal court for Sawai Jai Singh II, founder of Jaipur.

Jaipur is a city of temples, and Surya Mandir is not the most important nor the most architecturally impressive. But from its ridgetop setting, it certainly has one of the most dramatic locations of any temple in the city. From the temple, you can see the whole old city in a single glance, along with much of the new city beyond it.

Surya Mandir is located near the ravine of Galta-ji. The ravine has several important temples and was already a place of pilgrimage before the founding of Jaipur. In addition to the temples of Galta-ji, other nearby monuments include Galta Gate and two ruined hilltop fortresses, Ambagarh and Raghunathgarh.

The Jaipur City Palace is located in the heart of the walled Old City, in a district known as the Sarahad. In the princely state period, City Palace was the primary residence of the Maharaja and the seat of state power, as this was where the Maharaja held court with his nobles. After accession to the Indian Union, the erstwhile Jaipur State turned over most of its property to the government of the new state of Rajasthan, but a few properties remained the possession of the Jaipur royal family. City Palace was one of those sites that did not become public property. Today, the palace is operated by the Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II Museum Trust, which also maintains Jaigarh Fort and the cenotaphs of the maharajas and maharanis.

City Palace consists of a series of courtyards and monumental buildings, partly accessible to tourists. Highlights of a visit to City Palace include the richly ornamented Mubarak Mahal and the elaborately decorated gates of the Pritam Niwas.