Skip to main content

Baroda delights - Gujarat Diaries

Baroda is a sheer delight. It's classy, and is the cultural capital of the state. The old and the new sit cheek by jowl here. It feels like Mysore in some respects, thanks to its royal heritage. We went to the awe-inspiring Laxmi Vilas Palace, where some members of the royal family still live. The palace is in great condition; a nicely presented audio tour is also available. We also visited the museum, which is housed in a beautiful red structure. But for me, the piece de resistance was the Tambekar Wada, a 19th century structure belonging to Bhau Tambekar, the erstwhile diwan of the princely state of Baroda. It is an old wooden building hidden in Raopura, in the lane opposite Dhuli Ram Pendawala, a famous vendor of sweets, and am sure the cab driver was amused to see us enter that crumbling old building. Wadas are typical Maharashtrian joint family homes, much like the waade manes of North Karnataka. This Baroda wada (traditional home) is in a state of disrepair. One of the portions is covered in mud, has bats inside and wooden planks have crashed onto the floor. The other portion has brilliant murals in vivid colours, and is a treasurehouse of all that is brilliant in terms of art and architecture.

Everywhere you look, you see old structures with intricate jaali work, window shutters with ornate work on them and balconies with floral motifs on their grills. Raopura is a great area to go to if you want to look for such structures. Also, many offices and educational institutions are housed in heritage buildings.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Keep it simple, stupid

Every now and then, we all need to tell ourselves to be Rahul Dravids. Don't gun for glory. Get down to the basics, and do the simple things well. I have always tried to keep it simple: Keep your head down, just score the singles, keep the scoreboard ticking. This philosophy makes things easy. It is only when I act against my true motto that things tend to go wrong. A Rahul Dravid innings, the way he has conducted himself in his professional life has many lessons in there for us. In fact, 'Keep the scoreboard ticking' brings back many happy memories because it was my first ever blog. Back when no one had even heard of what a blog was. It was when I was a struggling journalist that I started to watch Dravid carefully. This was way back in 2002/03. The way he planned an innings was the way I was beginning to plan my years in the newspaper I worked for, back then. Keep it simple, and the big runs will come later, I would tell myself as I slogged on the moffusil desk, doing ni...
Post a Comment
Read more

#TeatimeTales #History

From Glasgow to Pattikonda: The journey of Sir Thomas Munro Sir Thomas Munro, a Glasgow-born Scotsman, who became the Governor of Madras Presidency in the early part of the 19 th century, made a deep impact on the people of the Rayalaseema region. I was reading up on the palegar (local chieftains) strife in Rayalaseema region, and read this interesting snippet: In many parts of Ananthapur and Ballari regions, Munro was so respected that the locals named their first-born son after their favourite administrator – Munrolappa (Kannada and Telugu are the local languages). I haven’t seen it, but there’s a famous statue of Sir Thomas Munro in Madras, near the Gymkhana, according to a piece in The Hindu . ( Sriram’s piece in The Hindu .) What triggered my interest in Sir Thomas Munro was that he was the Collector of Anantapur district. My ancestral village is in the same district, and many of my family members continue to live in the district. I came across a letter Sir Thoma...
Post a Comment
Read more

Star-struck in Gujarat

My favourite part of our Gujarat trip was how Hindi cinema references kept popping up at every stage. Hindi cinema served as a nice reference point to draw people to history, it seemed to me. Here's my piece in The Hindu Businessline's weekend supplement, BLink http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/features/blink/watch/starstruck-in-gujarat/article6986679.ece
Post a Comment
Read more