Jaisalmer Fort, The Golden Fortress

Jaisalmer Fort is one of the largest of desert forts of the world. It is situated in Jaisalmer city in Indian state of Rajasthan. It was built in 1156 AD by the Bhati Rajput ruler Rawal Jaisal, from where it derives it name. The fort stands proudly admist the golden stretches of the great Thar Desert, on Trikuta Hill and had been the scene of many battles. Its massive yellow sandstone walls are a tawny lion color during the day, turning to a magical honey-goldas the sun sets and camouflages the fort making it appear a part of the picturesque yellow desert. Thus, no wonder, it is also known as the "Golden Fort". The stunning Jaisalmer Fort made of golden yellow sandstone set is like an amber jewel in the Rajasthan desert. Situated on Trikuta Hill in Jaisalmer. It is one of the oldest forts in Rajasthan. The golden - yellow sandstone of Jaisalmer Fort, over 800 years old, crowns the Trikuta Hill. Within its walls, defended by 99 turrets, lies the old city, nearly a quarter of modern Jaisalmer. Seen from outside, the sight must be almost identical to what was seen by merchants on their overland camel caravans to central Asia. Once this desert outpost was an important gate for the trade route, and Jaisalmer grew wealthy on the proceeds. But the advent of commercial shipping relegated the town to relative obscurity.

The famous Indian film director Satyajit Ray wrote a detective novel and later made it into a film — Sonar Kella (The Golden Fortress) which was based on this fort. The Sonar Kella rises from the sand and merges with the golden hues of the arid ambience blending medieval temper with modern day vibrancy.

Every part of Jaisalmer Fort, from its outer walls to the palace, temples and houses within, is made of soft yellow Jurassic sandstone. The narrow winding streets are flanked with carved sandy facades, and from the barrel-sided bastions, some of which still bear cannons, you can see the thick walls that drop almost 100m to the town below. Two thousand people live inside it; seventy percent of them are brahmins and the rest, living primarily on the east side, predominantly Rajput.

A paved road punctuated by four huge gateways winds up to the Fort, built when the city was founded in 1156. Traitors and criminals were thrown into the "death well" by the second gate. The fourth gateway leads into Main Chowk, where terrible acts of johar once took place, women choosing death rather than dishonour for themselves and their children after their husbands left for the battlefield. The chowk is dominated by the old palace of the Maharawal (daily: summer 8am-6pm; winter 9am-6pm; Rs70, plus Rs50 for camera, Rs150 video; guided tour Rs100-200), whose five-storey facade of balconies and windows displays some of the finest masonry in Jaisalmer. The monarch would address his troops and issue orders from the large ornate marble throne to the left of the palace entrance. The interior, painted and tiled in typical Rajput style, has been converted into a museum. Displays are quite minimal, but look for the family tree showing the maharaja's 21 different wives and their respective lineages. You'll also see an assortment of royal garbs, weapons, thrones, and most curiously, Raj-era royal stamps. Thanks to restoration work supported by Jaisalmer in Jeopardy, the zenana (women's) quarter known as Rani ka Mahal was recently reopened. The fact that this richly filigreed edifice is standing - it was little more than a pile of rubble a few years ago - is a minor miracle. Although the Fort holds temples dedicated to Surya, Lakshmi, Ganesh, Vishnu and Shiva, none is as impressive as the complex of Jain temples (daily 7.30am-12.30pm; Rs10, plus Rs50 for camera, Rs100 video; usual restrictions on leather and menstruation apply). Built between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries in the familiar Jurassic sandstone, with yellow and white marble shrines and exquisite sculpted motifs covering the walls, ceilings and pillars, the temples are connected by small corridors and stairways. In a vault beneath the Sambhavnath temple, the Gyan Bhandar (daily 10-11am) contains Jain manuscripts, paintings and astrological charts dating back to the eleventh century, among them one of India's oldest surviving palm-leaf books, a copy of Dronacharya's Oghaniryaktivritti (1060).


Shopping in Jaisalmer
Jaisalmer's flourishing tourist trade has made it one of the best places in India to shop for souvenirs. Prices are comparatively high and the salesmen notoriously hard at work, but the choice of stuff on sale puts the town on a par with Pushkar and Jaipur. As well as embroidered patchwork tapestries, good buys include woven jackets, tie-dyed cloth, puppets, wooden boxes and ornaments, camel-leather slippers (jutties) and Western-style clothes. Most items can be found at Shree Art Palace and the adjacent stores inside the first Fort gate.Every conceivable kind of traditional Rajasthani textile is sold at shops in and around the Fort. Most of the pieces on offer are specially made for the tourist trade, but you can occasionally find older garments, or patches worked into wall-hangings, at the more established dealers. A good place to start looking is the Barmer Embroidery House, near the Patwon-ki-Haveli, Gangana Para, in the north of town. Stock here ranges from standard Jaipuri block-printed bedspreads and mirror work or appliqué cushion covers to rare door-hangings (torans), ornately embroidered cradle covers, sari blouses (choli), Lamani chillum pouches and silk-woven mashru skirts from the remote Muslim villages of Kutch. Also worth a visit is Light of the East, near Kund Para Chowk, which sells high quality emeralds, amethysts and other rare minerals, along with crystals. One item is not for sale - the football-sized apophyllite, which the knowledgeable owner keeps under lock in a glass case.


Jaisalmer in jeopardy
Signboards, banners and electric wires may have horribly disfigured Jaisalmer, but the tourist boom has created a far more serious, potentially irreversible threat to the town's survival. Erected on a base of soft bantonite clay, sand and sandstone, the foundations of Rajasthan's most picturesque citadel are rapidly eroding because of huge increases in water consumption. At the height of the tourist season, around 120 litres per head are pumped into the area - twelve times the quantity used fifteen years ago. Many believe the troubles started in the late 1980s when the city spent Rs9 million on replacing the open sewers with covered drainage; unfortunately their technological trick backfired and large quantities of water ended up seeping into the soil, weakening the citadel's foundations. Compounding the problem has been the increased planting of trees, which keeps the ground moist. The result has been disastrous; houses have collapsed and significant damage has been done to the sixteenth-century Maharani's Palace. In 1998 six people died when an exterior wall collapsed, and five more bastions fell in 2000 and 2001. (Ironically, recent drought in Rajasthan has dried the fort out and no great damage has been reported since - although a normal monsoon could change that quickly.) Jaisalmer is now listed among the World Monument Fund's 100 Most Endangered Sites.

The Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH: www.intach.net) has spent more than $100,000 repairing the Maharani's Palace, and an international campaign, Jaisalmer in Jeopardy (JiJ), has been set up to facilitate repairs throughout the fort. JiJ has already upgraded more than half of the 350 homes in the fort with underground sewerage, repaired their facades and replaced grey cement with traditional material. To see some of its work, visit the new Heritage Centre inside the palace. Despite the repairs, city authorities still think the best way to save the fort is to evacuate the 2000 people who live there and start the drainage repairs over from scratch, an expensive and time-consuming venture much opposed by the thirty-plus hotel owners inside whose earnings depend on tourism. The JiJ campaign relies substantially on donations. If you'd like to help, contact "Sue Carpenter at 3 Brickbarn Close, London SW10 0UJ ( & +44(0)20/7352 4336", www.jaisalmer-in-jeopardy.org). Bear in mind, too, that you can make a small difference by not staying in the fort or, if you do, by conserving water as much as possible while you're there.

Jaisalmer now has a good range of places to stay and eat. Some of the best and inexpensive places of accomodation are :-

• Deepak Rest Home
• Deoki Niwas Palace Hotel
• Desert Boys Guest House
• Dhola Maru Hotel
• Golden City Hotel
• Gorbandh Palace Hotel
• Fort Rajwada
• Heritage Inn Hotel
• Rangmahal Hotel
• Rawal Kot Hotel
• Himmatgarh Palace Hotel
• Gangour Hotel
• Narain Niwas Palace
• Mandir Palace Hotel
• Priya Hotel
• Rajwansh Resorts

If you are planning to visit Jaisalmer you can refer the Jaisalmer Accomodation Guide.
Its worth visiting.