Once dubbed an environmental disaster, the iconic Jal Mahal today attracts tourists with its extraordinary beauty.
It was rumoured that the former pleasure palace was haunted; that, as dusk descended on the glittering city of Jaipur, ghosts would frolic and flit in the Jal Mahal. In truth, the edifice that once floated on the mirror-still Man Sagar Lake had become a forlorn bedraggled reminder of its once-regal past; the infamous watering hole of drunks who were oblivious to the stench that rose from the swamp in which it was mired.
Fast forward to the present. The floodlit 18th century water palace now rises from the midst of a blue lake and is bathed in an amber glow as dusk mantles the city and the call of roosting birds waft on the fragrant night air.
A ride back
As our carved wooden barge drifted away from the palace jetty, we felt the pull of a magical past and imagined that we heard the sound of flirtatious laughter, the tinkle of ghunghroos, the flourish of trumpets and the rustle of silks emanating from the sun-warmed edifice. And was that the maharaja seated on a gold throne as though sculpted into it?
The illusion was complete... thanks to the Jal Tarang project, a 100-acre mixed-use tourism infrastructure project by Jal Mahal Resorts Pvt Ltd that brought the resources of the Rajasthan Government and the private sector together in a unique partnership. Jal Mahal Resorts spent Rs. 20 crore and the Government another Rs. 24 crore on bringing the lake, dubbed an environmental disaster, to life; cleaning and dredging two million tons of toxic waste and oxygenating it. The city's sewage still flows into the lake but it is treated by an eco-friendly system, as is the rain water that once carried in its wake 300 tons of plastic a year! Today fish leap in the limpid waters, birds nest on nesting islands and a flock of flamingos recently flew over the water body.
It was no ordinary face-lift, we realised, as project director Rajeev Lunkad related his extraordinary journey of transformation, peppered with highs and lows even as the iconic Jal Mahal glowed in the distance like some exotic extraterrestrial galleon that had strayed into the lake. An architect with a passionate interest in cultural history, Rajeev plunged in at the deep end in 2005 when an agreement was signed granting Jal Mahal Resorts a lease to develop 100 acres along Mansagar Lake and restore the historic edifice.
The government-private initiative happened because Jal Mahal is an unlisted monument, which the powers that be deemed had no real historical value and was ruined beyond redemption. (“If the country has say, 10 listed monuments, it has 10,000 unlisted ones,” said Rajeev, “and there is tremendous opportunity for the private sector to contribute to conservation in the vast spectrum of unlisted monuments.”)
Rajeev and his development team recruited experts from around the world and harnessed the skills of local craftsmen and masons like Bajrang Lal Kumavat, who has been associated with the restoration of Samode Palace and the famous Patwon ki Haveli in Jaisalmer among other vintage monuments. His walnut-brown face glowed with the purity of one who lives in the past tense. “I can build the Hawa Mahal today,” said the unlettered mason-cum-restorer with quiet pride. It would be a remarkable feat for Kumavat has studied neither architecture nor engineering in a formal sense but has the expertise because he was born into a family of masons.
Equally unassuming was Mohan Lal Soni from Shekhawati, an artist who has worked on miniature paintings all his life and has painted the frescoes on the roof of one of the pavilions of the Jal Mahal's terrace garden. What bound all of them – from art and architecture historians, architects, conservationists, specialist in lighting design, environmental engineers, master craftsmen and humble stone masons and artists — was an overriding passion for a pioneering project that would breathe life into a wasteland and restore an iconic monument to glory.
But ultimately much work still has to be done in terms of bringing Jal Tarang, a green leisure destination, from the drawing board to vibrant life. An amphitheatre, a craft market ..........................
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