Jaisalmer Via Bikaner: Part 2- Living Fort of Jaisalmer and Story of Kuldhara

In the earlier blog of the series, I wrote about my experiences of the Bikaner and Karni Mata temple (The temple of rats). After Bikaner we moved to Jaisalmer in a Volvo bus. During travel we passed various cities like Phalodi (The Salt City), historical city Pokharan (the city had a special place in Indian history. It is the city where India test Nuclear bombs twice, that puts India in the list of countries with nuclear capability), Khetolai etc.

We reached Jaisalmer in the night and by then we were completely unaware of the hospitality of the people of Jaisalmer. To much of our surprises, the owner of the hotel that we booked for our stay came to receive us. Mr. Vinay Vyas, The owner of the Hotel Siddharta, is among those gentlemen who follow the mantra of Athithi Devo Bhava( अतिथि देवो भव: ) in their life.

Hotel Siddhartha is built inside the Jaisalmer fort which was another surprise for us. Jaisalmer fort or Sonar Quilla is one of the largest fort in the world and the only living fort of India. Imangination of living inside a fort is a chilling feeling for me. We reached fort within 15 minutes and the atomosphere is completely different from the life which we were used to. The fort accommodated the 1000 families. On reaching the hotel we got the room on the second floor. From the window of the room we feel the beautiful view of the Jaisalmer city. After settling down, we went for the dinner in the roof top restaurant near the hotel and the view from there is very beautiful and soothing to the eyes. Been there itself gave you a feel of the king.

In the morning, we planned to tour the city and start the tour from fort. The fort has narrow streets, on both sides of the street shopkeepers were selling antique stuff, Rajasthani clothes etc. Jaisalmer is the ‘Golden City of India’ due to the yellow sand and use of yellow sandstone in every architecture of the City. Every house, temples and palaces in the city are finely sculptured.

After fort, we left for touring other places in the city. We first reached Bada Bagh, it is the cemetry of the members of the royal family. Other attraction of this place is the wind mills placed to generate the electricity. After Bada Bagh, we visit Jain temples, Lodurva and Amar Sagar. The work of art done on the temples were beautiful and fine.

The most important thing was they were built and maintained very far from the city. But it didn’t took much time to reach there as the roads was awesome. It gave you a feeling that you were sitting in a roller coaster.

After the temples, we reached Kuldhara, the haunted village of Jaisalmer which excited me most. The story of this village is very exciting too. Kuldhara is the biggest village among group of 84 villages of Paliwal brahmins. The administration of these villages came under the rule of Salam Singh, who is the prime minister of the Maharaja of Jaisalmer. Once Salam Singh visited the village and his eyes fell on a Kuldhara village girl. He put the proposal of the marriage to the girl’s father, who in return declined it because both belong to different castes. After the proposal denied, Salaam Singh put heavy taxes on the villagers to put pressure on the girl’s father. When the girl realized that it all happened because of her then she chose to suicide. On knowing this, showing their anger all 84 villages got abandoned in the same night leaving there all property and buried the gold under the ground. Also, they cursed that no-one is able to live in this village. Many years later two foreigners got to knew about the buried gold in the village. They wandered in the village and dug the ground for gold and other stuff. The people who saw them alerted the police in doubt of some. When police reached there to investigate the issue, gold and other stuff was found in foreigners bags. The foreigners was arrested and archeology department was informed. After that it was recognized as a historical place. The work begins to transform it into a tourist attraction and security guards deployed at the entrance of the village.

There are stories in the air that there are ghosts in the village. So to verified that a group of researchers arrived with the hi-tech instruement and cameras. In the midnight, all cameras wer stopped functioning and nothing recorded.

After Kuldhara, we visited Khaba fort. It is a small fort and you can found beautiful peacocks and pigeons around the fort. Then we went to Gadisar Lake. It is a beautiful lake with a temple on the shore. There are artistically carved Chattris built inside the lake. The best time to visit the lake is evening. The shore gave you a feel of perfect sunset and it is breathtaking. We left for the fort with beautiful memories.

This is it in this blog, the story about desert camping will be in the next and last part of the series.