Bissau Fort via #savetheHeritageFoundation #Shekhawat #Shekhawati

Bissau Fort via #savetheHeritageFoundation #Shekhawat #Shekhawati

Bissau,founded in 1746, is a princely Mamlaguzar thikana of the Jaipur State . There were originally 16 Mamlaguzar thikanas which consisted of the most prominent families of the Jaipur State. Most were closest to the King and his family, others were extremely prominent and possessed their own army and served directly under Mughals in Middle Ages. At present only 9 Mamlaguzar thikanas hold the gaddi in Jaipur Durbar (as compared to the earlier 16). The Mamlaguzar thikanas had special privileges in the Jaipur Durbar; the Maharaja had to rise for the Mamlaguzar Sardars, they were allowed to wear all their ornaments and were allowed to carry their swords in the Jaipur Durbar, whereas the rest of the Jaipur thikanas were not allowed these privileges.

 Keshari Singh, son of Thakur Shardul Singh of Jhunjhunu, got this village in Jagir. In it, Keshari Singh constructed a war Fort and a defensive boundary wall for defence with four gates in each direction. He named it Bissau in 1746 AD. Keshari Singh belonged to the famous Panchpana or five sons of Thakur Shardul Singh in Shekhawati. The rulers of Bissau belong to the Bhairo ji clan of Shekhawats and are the descendants of the famous ruler Maharao Shekha who was the son of Rao Mokal ji, a grandson of Maharaja Udai Karan of Dhundhar.

In times when technology makes us feel that the future is not on the horizon but inside an electronics store, one often finds the monarchy of the yore busy trying to monetise royalty under the garb of hospitality… nowhere is this more evident than Rajasthan, where more hotels and havelis dot the landscape than, say, camels…

But as the saying goes — nearer the church, farther from god… for every section of the royal edifice that is able to make this transition, there are dozens of others that are left to stare blankly at the dusty canvas in a tattered disposition, stripped of all treasures and sounds, the groans stifled by termites and mice… and the rest strangulated by whatever dregs of humanity still congregates around its bastions…

The shanty town of Bissau is one such relic… named so in 1746 by Keshari Singh, one of the five sons of the famous Shekhawat ruler Thakur Shardul Singh, it's undulating fortunes are quite evident, as is the case with any town where the sewers run open and the cows are unruly…

The fort, Keshargarh, is a crumbling massif somehow managing to hold its architectural integrity despite an apparent lack of dignity… the supposed resident-cum-owner, or so was the claim, took us around the compound, dominated in the visual and olfactory by the bovine…

The frescoes, contrary to those in its precincts in Ramgarh or Mahansar, are rather basic in nature, although there was a lot of stained and painted glass work that was not so prevalent in some of the other parts of Shekhawati… the Havelis in the city are similar to this of their counterparts through when it comes to the resplendence of the frescoes though…

I’d have wanted to loiter around more, but the owner refusing to get off your back is a discomforting proposition, the insecurities of an encroacher or a dejected owner are rather tough to wash off I guess… for a town whose benefactors even hired French mercenaries for inorganic expansion of the state’s treasury, these are still better days… and thus we wound our way back from the dingy lanes to the winter sun of the highway…

Keshargarh Fort, Bissau, Jhunjhunu District, Shekhawati region, Rajasthan

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