NAVLAKHA PALACE : The Heart and Soul of Mithila
SHAMBAVI SINGH (IInd Year, Miranda House)
While clichés and stereotypes of states and cities are frequently used to describe India’s cultural diversity, many of us have been unkind to Bihar for a long time. Granted, much of it stems from ignorance and bad taste, as a result of the state’s politicised history, but it has come at the expense of ignoring the beauty and spectacle it offers.
To counteract this perception and show Bihar’s true beauty, I will try to capture the wonder of one of the state’s gems, Navlakha Palace.
Today, I’ll try to paint a picture of a heritage that most of us have never known or have forgotten, a heritage that has, in most of the cases, been systematically kept out of our history books and curriculum, first by the British Raj, and then due to other reasons, a heritage that has been washed away by the idea of modernity.
The exquisite and haunting ruins of a forgotten royal capital rise out of the undergrowth in a town in North Bihar. But these aren’t just any old ruins. The regal complex features fluted pillars, tall pilasters, ornate cupolas, intricately carved porches, and scalloped arches designed in distinctly European style but blended with Indian elements. I am talking about a place in Bihar’s present-day Madhubani district, which was once the seat of the Maharaja of Raj Darbhanga. This royal capital, located 50 kilometres from Darbhanga and 190 kilometres from Patna, was clearly built with great care and attention to detail.
Navlakha Palace, also known as Rajnagar Palace, is a royal Brahmin palace in Rajnagar, Bihar, near Madhubani. Darbhanga was lawless when Akbar took over from Sher Shah’s descendants, and the emperor needed a caretaker to collect taxes and keep the peace on his behalf. Because the Brahmins dominated the region, Akbar appointed Pandit Mahesh Thakur as the local zamindar, making him the local ruler by default.
Three centuries later, the idea of constructing a grand centre for the zamindari – akin to a capital in a kingdom – was conceived as an act of brotherly love. Because it was customary to give land grants to the younger brother while the elder brother sat on the throne, Maharaja Laxmeshwar Singh (1860 – 1898) gave Rajnagar to his brother Rameshwar Singh (1898 – 1929). But he took it a step further. The Maharaja also devised plans for Rajnagar to serve as Rameshwar Singh’s “royal abode.” As fate would have it, Rameshwar Singh succeeded his elder brother as King of Raj Darbhanga after his elder brother died childless in 1898.
Rameshwar Singh began developing Rajnagar as a royal township in 1904, following in his brother’s footsteps.The Navlakha Mahal was the centrepiece of this opulent capital, which was built from the ground up. M A Corone, a renowned Italian architect, designed this massive Secretariat in a classical style. Within Rajnagar’s royal complex, several magnificent temples dedicated to 11 gods and goddesses were also constructed as well as several forts and palaces. This complex encompasses 1,500 acres.
Maharaja Rameshwar Singh was a skilled tantrik, and as a result, the palace complex boasted a stunning Kaali Temple made entirely of white marble. The presiding goddess of Raj Darbhanga was Dakshineshwari Kali. The Kali temple, which resembles the Taj Mahal, is made of ivory and white marble. The monument was built with up to 22 layers of carving, which is more than the Taj Mahal, which has a maximum of 15 layers.
These buildings were adorned with Madhubani or Mithila paintings, an artform that continues to make this region famous even today. Few people are aware that the world’s oldest Mithila painting (only 100 years old!) can still be found on the walls of Gasauni Ghar, the room where the family deity is kept, in the Rajnagar Palace. The painting was created when Maharaja Rameshwar Singh’s daughter married in 1919, but it is now in disrepair.
Interestingly, the Rajnagar palace complex contains a number of firsts. For example, in India at the time, architects and engineers were just starting to use cement to build buildings. Corone, the architect-in-chief, is said to have told the Maharaja that a “pillar made of cement would be so strong that even an elephant would not be able to break it.” The Maharaja, amused by the claim, asked Corone to build an elephant out of cement. The architect agreed, and the Maharaja was so pleased with his work that he asked Corone to include cement elephants in the design of his Secretariat. There are very few written or photographic records of the palace.
The construction of Corone’s grand capital at the request of Maharaja Rameshwar Singh coincides closely with the construction of Lutyens’ Delhi. This prompted historians such as Prof Ayodhyanath Jha (HOD, Department of History, Mithila University, Darbhanga) to observe that “due to the grandeur and glory of Rajnagar, as well as the coincidental close proximity of Rajnagar’s development and Lutyens’ Delhi, one can call Rajanagar the ‘Italian Lutyens’ of Raj Darbhanga.”
Rajnagar is now a shadow of its former self, with many of its structures reduced to beautiful but shallow facades that still tower over the landscape. The allure of Rajnagar is unmistakable as you enter the royal complex through one of the four arched gateways.
This enigmatic architecture was severely damaged during the 1934 Bihar–Nepal earthquake. The government currently owns the palace but it has never been repaired after the earthquake. It is constantly being encroached upon. Locals have long advocated for its conversion into a tourist attraction, but no such action has been taken by the government.
It remains a cruel irony for a diverse country like India where we are forgetting a history as rich as the hidden diamonds in the crust of the earth. So, while continuing our step towards modernity, let’s try to embellish ourselves with the jewels of our past.
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