Rajasthan: A state that beckons
By Reeta Sharma

I was under the impression that while travelling in Rajasthan for 12 days, I would be able to see all this historically rich state had to offer — forts, palaces, monuments, paintings, folk music and dance, handicrafts, jewellery, blue pottery, etc.
Rajasthan humbled my presumptuousness at my first halt in Jaipur itself.

I had allocated three days for the Pink City. But the Rajputana heritage is so enormously rich that one needs to spend a lifetime to feel and perceive it. I was reminded of Benjamin Cohen, an American settled in the UK, who has been visiting Rajasthan regularly for the past 27 years. And he is not an exception, for there are many Benjamins who are in love with Rajasthan and keep returning to it year after year.

Rajasthan is a highly developed state from the tourism point of view. It has innumerable possessions of pride, scattered all over the state. This second largest state of India has a well-maintained network of roads, making even the remotest of areas accessible to tourists.

Hotels of Rajasthan Tourism are found all over the state. These hotels, though reasonably priced, are plagued by "government apathy". They are managed by government employees who it seems are not accountable to any higher authority. You can get rooms from Rs 500 to Rs 800 per day. A look at the rooms, and you are likely to wish you could opt for something better. The rooms and the bathrooms look as though they have never been dusted or cleaned. You have bedsheets with stains and blankets with holes. The dining rooms in these hotels are even worse. You will have to wait for your order for at least half an hour because there might be just one man serving six tables. No, there is no shortage of staff. The staff members indulge in mutually-agreed-upon bunking and then they readily cover up for one another.

While Ajmer’s Circuit House is better kept, the Jaipur Circuit House is simply pathetic. The bedsheets are, perhaps, washed once a year. The canteen looks like a pig’s sty. Interestingly, if you happen to complain about it to anybody outside or to the managers of the place, they all have the same reply to offer, "Very strange! Even the IAS and IPS officers live in this very circuit house". What they don’t reveal is that there are four rooms secretly coded "for VIPs" which are appropriately maintained.

Justice J. C. Verma and his wife, Swaran Verma, rescued me from the Jaipur Circuit House. They literally declared a ‘contempt of court’ against me for
having dared to stay outside their home despite their
invitation. The next two days, I thoroughly enjoyed the warm hospitality showered on me by the jovial Verma couple.

While visiting the market, I felt very upset upon seeing school-going children from the lower-middle class begging from foreign tourists. It was also extremely painful to witness foreign tourists being cheated, fooled, ill-treated and harassed by auto-rickshaw drivers, shopkeepers, guides, beggars and even caretakers of tourist places.

Despite hassles of stay and other irritants, Rajasthan suitably rewards you by unfolding its rich heritage and culture before you. Stand before Albert Hall Museum, Jaipur, and you will witness the majestic and carefree flight of thousands of pigeons. The scene reminded me of the Trafalgar Square in London. Rajasthanis, extremely religious-minded people, dutifully feed the pigeons at this spot.
At least one full day is required to cover each fort — to go to each nook and corner of the vast structures and to recapture the scenes of battles fought from their ramparts.

I shall share more about Rajasthan’s rich heritage in my next column. There is, however, one more observation I would like to make before I end. After Orissa and Bihar, Rajasthan is perhaps the poorest state in the country. For the past three years there have been no rains, thus resulting in scarcity of food and loss of livestock. But amazingly, in the middle of barren mountains, thatched roof-huts and sand stones, there is no dearth of brightly coloured odhnis and pagris worn by women and men, respectively. Almost all big villages of this state have schools at least up to class eight or ten. The state has succeeded in creating a market for all kinds of handicraft items made by villagers. In a remote village called Salawas, about 80 km from Jaipur, members of every household is into weaving durries, which have a domestic as well as an export market. The children of this village go to school up to the tenth class, and then by and large, take up weaving as a profession. There are families whose eight generations have been only weaving durries. Rajasthan, an extremely bewitching and fascinating place, remains with you even long after you have left its sandy dunes.