Rajgharana? What’s that?

Rajmahal Palace hotel jaipur land issue 

12 bighas. A sadharan Indian wouldn’t even be able to comprehend how much land that is. How much of drama that land could cause!

On a Wednesday morning, an ordinary day started with an extraordinary incident and became the town’s talking. In a strong action, Jaipur Development Commissioner Shikhar Agarwal sealed the main entrance to the Rajgharana’s Raj Mahal Palace at a high-class C-scheme location bordering Civil Lines.

It came as a shocker to many people for many reasons. For starters, the proximity and relations of Chief Minister of Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje with the ‘Royal’ family was questioned. The arrogant behavior of a rather ‘small-time’ officer Shikhar Agarwal was frowned upon. People saw pictures of the ‘Princess’ and ‘Rajmata’ of Jaipur actually standing on the humble earth, pleading JDA to stop taking any action – the pictures may have won sympathies, but defy logic altogether.

70 years of Independence and we still can’t get our heads out of the Royal fancies! What RajKumari? What Rajgharana? We tend to forget the precious blessing of democracy gifted to us by our ancestors. Let me put things in perspective – it was never their lands, or their palaces or their crowns. Everything and anything these rulers call their own was theirs because the people followed them as their leaders. Lucky for us, we have the right to chose OUR representatives now than the shaahi maharajas!

It’s appalling to see well-read, well-educated and assumingly civilized people actually committing the crime of land grabbing! It’s even more horrifying to see the so-called elite-class wearing their holier-than-thou cloaks and shedding forged, well-timed sympathies. What is wrong with these people? If someone seizes their properties tomorrow, would they react the same? It is a matter of concern of every citizen of Rajasthan that the Rajgharaana is using their elite status and ‘royal rights’ to generate a mad-cry about losing a piece of land that doesn’t even belong to them and sensationalising the Rajput community for the gates of a hotel where the rich make merry in their wine glasses, where a middle-class citizen would never be able to eat.

If the land belongs to the JDA, it belongs to the people. JDA’s effort to actually standing up to this dictator kind of behavior is actually laudable. People have started creating stories of how Raje has always been jealous of the Rajgharana and hence she’s orchestrated the entire thing. One would think, does the Chief Minister of the State have nothing better to do?

Incidentally, Princess Diya Kumari was given the ticket for assembly at Raje’s behest. It was Vasundhara Raje’s efforts that had actually won the Rajkumari her seat from Sawai Madhopur. But no righteous Chief Minister would try to aid or conceal or defend or protect this out-rightly wrong attempt at occupying Government’s land. In a statement, Rajmaata said that she called Raje and asked for help. Help for what? For protecting the dishonest? How would a Chief Minister defend the wrong, how could anybody in their right mind defend the wrong? If the Government of Rajasthan has the resilient determination to actually go out and treat the royals just like they would treat any other citizen, this should be seen as a beacon of hope for the future of this country.

Time will tell if the Royals have committed a blunder in making a public scene out of the whole fiasco. One would think that the entire havoc is being created to pressurize Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje into taking an action against her own ethically correct officers. But Raje is known to be a strong woman and even stronger administrator. She will ensure that the Government’s standing is right in the Court. She knows that the Courts don’t look at misleading-sympathy-gaining pictures. Courts look at the facts. And the facts do not look an eerie-bit sympathetic towards the Shaahi Rajgharana.