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| Raja Man Singh's Palace, Fort, Gwalior |
On
summer nights we used to sleep out in the open on the terrace over the second
floor rooms. It was a biggish terrace which used to be cooled with a lot of
water earlier in the evening before the beds were made up right on the floor.
We had a water outlet on the second floor and it used to get the public supply
with enormous pressure. There were no personal tanks or pumps for water those
days. It was 24/7 metred uninterrupted supply with such pressure that it would
facilely climb on to the terrace. What is more, we could drink it right off the
tap without any fears of infection; it was so well filtered and treated. It
seems to be crime today to have wasted all those hundreds of litres of water
for cooling the cement terrace that relentlessly received the heat during the
long summer days from the overhead sun. But, there was no alternative. Separate
lines for untreated water were just not there.
From
the terrace we could see the famed Gwalior Fort that was built on a 300 to 400
ft high hill dominating the town on the north. Its ramparts used to face us.
Beyond them were the Houses which had the dormitories of the boys of the
Scindia School, a public school for the children of the feudal gentry or those
who could afford those high expenses on their wards. One such House was visible
from our terrace with its dim lights. What was, perhaps, more interesting was
that guns used to boom twice daily from behind the ramparts marking the hours
of 12 noon and 9.30 at night. I wonder whether these would boom were meant to
tell the people the time as most of the households could not afford watches and
time-pieces or whether it was a practice continued since it was an army
cantonment of the Scindias. The guns ceased to boom after the state was merged
in the Indian Union.
The
Fort remained a mystery for quite some time until the family went up to meet a
former neighbour who was appointed a teacher at the School. The Fort has two
approaches – one from the north that steeply climbs on to the Fort through a
series of gates ending at Man Singh’s Palace. The climb was so steep that no
motor vehicle could make it to the top in those days. One daring Air Force
officer posted at Gwalior during the fag end of the Great War drove his station
wagon up to Man Singh’s Palace creating quite a flutter in the town. However,
for those who did not have motorised conveyance this was the access that was
used as tongas would go right up to the entrance around which the Old Gwalior
town had developed. Likewise, for the return trip tongas would be available
down below. I remember going with the family climbing the steep slope on foot
and then trudging about a kilometre and a half to the House where our
acquaintance used to reside being the warden of the dorm.
The other
approach was from the west and it was a more gradual climb to allow motor
vehicles to go up. It climbs on to the fort with precipices on both sides with
thick vegetation down below where tigers were reported to have been seen. On
one side, across the precipice, there were huge rock cuts of Jain Tirthankaras
on the rock face. This approach was the access for all those who used to visit
the Fort or the Scindia School. I have fuzzy memories of the historic monuments
located on the Fort but I clearly remember the elation I felt on spotting
father’s Victoria College as I looked down from the parapets at the town
sprawled in front. The Maharaja’s Jai Vilas Palace, of course, could very
easily be spotted with its expansive grounds full of trees and manicured lawns.
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