Nahargarh Fort in Jaipur is an eighteenth century hilltop fortress that overlooks the city and whose extensive walls connect to the Jaigarh Fort. It is far less visited than the nearby Amber Fortress and has some beautifully decorated rooms inside as well as extensive views over the city.
Visiting Jaipur Nahargarh Fort
The fort is quite a trek to get to, being on top of a large hill! It is certainly off the tourist track and the best way to get there is via taxi. The fort is open during the day but be aware it occupies a huge area and will take a while to walk around. Beware of monkeys too!
My Experience
We visited on an extremely overcast and muggy day so the views really weren’t what we hoped for! We were also the only tourists there and for most of our trip had a group of teens following us through the otherwise deserted fort so that was a bit unsettling.
The interior of the Nahargarh Fort in Jaipur is really incredibly beautiful. It is not gem and gold encrusted like the earlier Mughal palaces but uses paint and plaster to create a real feeling of opulence. The fort never actually saw combat and the fortifications we saw were more based on the natural strength of the site. I’m quite sure what we saw wouldn’t have withstood serious assault. It is again the scale of the structure that is amazing compared to contemporary European buildings.
Our visit to Nahargarh Fort was after visiting the more famous Amber Fort, on the other side of Jaipur. We were in India for 10 days touring the sites of the Golden Triangle, detailed in my blog here.
Jaipur Nahargarh Fort Photo Gallery
History
Built mainly in 1734 by Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh, the king of Jaipur, the fort was constructed as a place of retreat on the summit of the ridge above the city. Walls extended over the surrounding hills, forming fortifications that connected this fort to Jaigarh, the fort above the old capital of Amber. Though the fort never came under attack during the course of its history, it did see some historical events, notably, the treaties with the Maratha forces who warred with Jaipur in the 18th century. During the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the Europeans of the region, including the British Resident’s wife, were moved to Nahargarh fort by the king of Jaipur, Sawai Ram Singh, for their protection.
The fort was extended in 1868, during the reign of Sawai Ram Singh. In 1883-92, a range of palaces was built at Nahargarh by Dirgh Patel at a cost of nearly three and a half lakh rupees. The Madhavendra Bhawan, built by Sawai Madho Singh had suites for the queens of Jaipur and at the head was a suite for the king himself. The rooms are linked by corridors and still have some delicate frescoes. Nahargarh was also a hunting residence of the Maharajas.
Until April 1944, the Jaipur State government used for its official purposes solar time read from the Samrat Yantra in the Jantar Mantar Observatory, with a gun fired from Nahargarh Fort as the time signal.
References
Information on visiting the fort can be found here.
The history above is copied from the Wiki page here.