Town Planning in Ancient India c6.40

c6.40

arts and literature, to follow thither and thus to develop the royal citadel into a magnificent metropolis. We all know how Uday Sing, the Rānā of Chitore, father of the great Pratāp, defeated by Mahammadan arms under Akbar, took refuge in a sequestered mountain valley where he had already excavated a magnificent lake. Now he had his royal palace built on the embankment of this lake. The subjects followed their king and what followed was the gradual evolution of the noble town of Udaypur, extolled by all travellers for its splendid plan, architectural beauty, natural setting, and imposing grandeur. It is scarcely a hyperbolical expression to say that the royal home of Jeypur presents to the view a garden of palaces. At one side of the compound, surrounding a big courtyard stand erect the Court of Judicature and all the other offices. At another courtyard stands the public Darbar House (Dewan-i-am), while at a third rises the steeple of the private Darbar palace. And in the centre of the compound, the imperial mansion Chandramahal lords it over all. At the back of this lies a large flower garden intersected with drains and embellished with fountains. The garden terminates at the shrine of Govindji, the presiding deity of the royal house. Thus we see centralised in the compound of the imperial castle all the edifices for judicial and executive functions of the state.