Since I showed some promise in shooting, he produced from the gun store a miniature air rifle on which I was trained and thus began my shooting career. My father was a keen photographer so it was naturally assumed by him that I too would follow in his footsteps, and thus a little box camera was bought and presented to me. I was also encouraged to paint like him and in Bikaner a tutor was hired to teach me to draw and paint. Finally, it seemed that I must also excel at golf and lo and behold, my father pulled another rabbit out of the hat when he produced a scaled down set of golf clubs that a young child could play with. Where he found all these things I will never know! Quite obviously, our stores in Lallgarh were veritable Aladdin’s caves. I was an individual in my own right and had my own interests and hobbies and there were no way that I could mirror my father or summon up the enthusiasm that he felt for golf, for instance, but it never stopped him from trying.
In 1971 we were in Seoul, South Korea, for the Second Asian Shooting Championships, where my cousin Princess Bhuvneshwari Kumari of Kota and I were the only two girls participating in the competition and so it was a matter of some interest to the Koreans. The local television station had invited my father, my cousin and me for an interview. It was to go out live at the unearthly hour of 4 AM. Of course, my father said we must go. I was exhausted at the time from daily shooting practise and struggling with very bad weather conditions, so I simply dug my heels in for once and refused to comply. There was an angry explosion on my part in the lobby of the Chosan hotel when I categorically refused to do the interview. It must be borne in mind that we were there to shoot in a tough competition—we were not there for a holiday. My cousin and I were up against grown men in the team event, my father pushed us to shoot in all manner of conditions and the practise rounds kept us quite busy. I was quite obviously tired and fatigued and getting up at 3 AM to give an interview on TV was really stretching the matter. I recall bursting into tears and refusing to go. My mother interceded on my behalf for once and told my father, ‘Leave her alone.’ Eventually, my father and Princess Kota went on to the television studio without me.
Like most children, I too dabbled in a bit of drawing and painting. My father of course presumed that I was some child genius in the making and immediately organised art tutors to come home and teach me. This took the fun and spontaneity out of the whole exercise; however, my father was undeterred and practically forced me to participate in the ‘Shankar’s Annual Painting Competition.’ Children up to a certain age were allowed to participate in this competition, and if I recall correctly, I did once win a prize when I drew a nurse wielding a formidable looking thermometer at a recumbent patient. I participated in the competition for the first few years, until I had had enough and flatly refused to participate any more. Forcing a child to do something even if they are good at it is, counter-productive in the long run. I am sure my father meant well and it gave him great pleasure to see his daughter win medals but the pressure of his expectations was not a good thing for me and put me off painting for the rest of my life.
He was a very indulgent father and never denied his children anything within reason. He used to say, ‘You are children only once - enjoy yourselves.’ We certainly took him at his word. He would often take us to toyshops in Delhi and Bombay. ‘Chimalkkars’ in Bombay was a great favourite of ours and we frequented it for our shopping marathons. However, he never spoilt us silly either. As a little girl in Bombay, I was taken to a departmental store called Grand Bazaar by my father and maternal uncle, Raj Singh of Dungarpur. What followed must have been quite dramatic for it made it to the annals of our family history. It all started with my father refusing to get me something I had wanted to buy. I threw a terrible tantrum and ran all around the shop with my father and uncle Raj Singh trying, in vain, to catch me as I dodged and weaved under the counters and around the legs of the startled salesmen! Once they caught me I was taken home in disgrace.
My shopping genes had obviously kicked in very early and another time, a family friend, the Maharaja of Banstha, a state in Madhya Pradesh, who had two little sons around the same age as me, took me out on a play date. On our way back home to Bikaner House in Bombay, he very kindly took us to a toy store. ‘Buy what you want,’ he said and the words were like music to my ears. I trawled the shop, picking out dozens of items at random and the poor Maharaja, courteous gentleman that he was, bought them all without one single word of protest. Happy as a little sand boy, I returned home and went to see my father with an army of staff carrying large quantities of toys and parcels behind me. He was completely taken aback and ticked me off for being a greedy little girl. I bluntly replied that I was told by the Maharaja to buy anything that I liked and that is precisely what I did.
My father was quite sporting, and every time he went abroad he brought back all the things from the lengthy shopping lists that we all provided. These included books, music by the Beatles, posters, and all manner of exotic make up and skin care items as I grew up. He used to say: ‘You don’t need any of this; you look fine as you are,’ which was all very well but what could my father possibly know about make-up?
They had a young teenager at hand and a fashionable one to boot. In my early teens I had a severe breakout of acne, and every inch of my face was covered in spots, much to my anguish. My parents had to bring back dozens of tubes of Ponds ‘Fresh Start’, since the teen magazines that I avidly read, said that that was just what I needed. All manner of lotions were tried over a prolonged period of time and my bathroom sink counter resembled a chemist’s laboratory; but then one day, the acne disappeared all by itself, much to my relief.
Whereas I hated drawing attention to myself, my father relished interacting with other people—which was bad enough—but to make things worse, he went on and on about my shooting abilities and achievements, which no doubt must have bored his poor friends and colleagues to tears. Once, Mrs. Tarkeshwari Sinha, his Parliamentary colleague invited me to the birthday party of her daughter and I was deeply embarrassed when she introduced me to the rest of the children thus: ‘This is Rajyashree, the girl who shoots.’ When his friends met me they said how they had heard all about me from my father, ‘I hope that did not bore you too much,’ was all I could say, most apologetically.
As a child, my universe pretty much revolved around my father—he was the one unchanging point in my life. He provided the absolute security that a child needs to grow into a secure and healthy adolescent and eventually into adulthood. He had a great sense of humour, and quite frankly my father was like a magician in my life—when I was a child he made all my problems and troubles vanish. Generous and far- sighted, he taught us to be financially independent from the beginning. We all got an allowance from the annual Privy Purse received by him. As Justice Peter Wilson – the judge during the time of my divorce in 1996—commented many decades later, it was like ‘an up market child benefit’, for all of us. This verse by Hafiz of Persia always reminds me of my father’s generosity to his children, never once bringing up how much he had given us.
‘Even after all this time
The Sun never says to the earth
“You owe me”
Look what happens with a love like that
It lights the whole sky.’
My father also had his stock of bedtime stories he had the habit of getting into bed and reading to us for an hour or so right before dinner time. He would ask us to sit and chat to him before bedtime. This went on till such time as nanny arrived with a last and final summons to bed, and at which point I usually sought refuge in my father’s room and sat cuddled up to him begging for a few minutes extension to bedtime and ask him to tell me a story. It was invariably the same one, a Rajasthani folk tale of a boy called ‘Jhintia’ and his visit to his maternal grandparents’ house and how he met a wolf on his way and the challenges he faced, it was in fact a kind of Rajasthani version of Little Red Riding Hood. However, despite listening to this story several dozen times, it at least provided a welcome reprieve
from nanny and her last orders, albeit for a brief time.
Growing up surrounded by the most beautiful art collected by his father and grandfather, my father personally preferred abstract art and painted in both acrylics and oils. His paintings would have been very popular today, though at that time they were quite radical. He used to lay down large canvases on the floor and mix all the paints in tumblers and stand on a chair and start pouring; the results were quite pleasing most of the time, resembling butterfly wings and other exotic shapes. Any one passing by was generously invited to pour some paint on. He once painted an abstract mountain and named it after me—‘Mount Rajyashree’—a treasured gift, which is still hanging on the wall of my house in Bikaner.
Though I was born three years after the demise of my grandfather, when the States had merged, I never saw the good old days, but my father had seen the golden age of Bikaner during the time of his grandfather. No one in their wildest dreams could have imagined when he was born that so much change and turmoil lay ahead of him, yet I never heard him complain. He always maintained that he was the ‘custodian’ of the properties and legacies that he had inherited.
When my father died in 1988, the love and affection and warmth that had permeated every inch of the vast Lallgarh Palace vanished overnight and it was never to be the same again it was as though the oxygen we breathed during his lifetime had now vapourised. It took us many years to get used to the new order of things. I was thirty- five years old at the time: there was much that he taught me in my life time but then there was also much more that I could have learnt from his wisdom. He built a solid foundation in my life and one that I have confidently expanded as I have gone on in my life; I think that is what he would have wanted for me.
My mother is a formidable woman with traces of a fiery temper from her younger days, now in her late eighties, she has mellowed down, but she still remains the matriarch of the Bikaner family. Married in her mid-teens, she came to Bikaner as a young, impressionable bride. At the time, the daughters in Rajput families were married while still very young—the reason being that since she was going to be living with her husband and his family, it was best that she was sent there while still relatively impressionable so that her adjustment to the new home would be easier, and though I am vehemently against child marriage, I must admit that there was some semblance of logic in this opinion.
I feel that part of her lifelong insecurity stemmed from the fact that she never had a ‘normal’ adolescence, but was plunged into adulthood quite abruptly. My mother was the eldest of six brothers and sisters; only one half- sister was older than her, the Rajmata of Muli, married into a state in Saurashtra. She had two younger sisters; Hitendra Kumari married into the state of Danta in Gujarat, and Krishna Kumari into Suket in Himachal Pradesh. The eldest of her brothers Mahipal Singh was married to my father’s first cousin sister Princess Dev Kanwar; the second brother, Jai Singh married Anupama Kumari, the princess of Tehri Gharwal; my uncle Raj Singh was the youngest among them and he remained a bachelor all his life devoted to his many nieces and nephews and their children.
My mother was mostly influenced by her middle sister Hitendra Kumari, the Maharani of Danta—they seemed to have a similar mind set, and it seemed that my mother formed some of her opinions under the influence of my maternal aunt. In any event, it was quite clear in both their cases that neither made any particular effort to get on with their in- laws in their respective families. There was an underlying air of hostility that existed with their in laws and though it was never overt, nonetheless it always seemed to be simmering beneath the surface.
The youngest of my aunts, Krishna Kumari, Maharani of Suket, on the other hand, was the exact opposite of her two older sisters and made every effort to forge a warm and loving relationship with her in-laws. When she passed away a few years ago, the Suket family were genuinely grieved and mourned her loss. Since my mother never told me exactly what my paternal side of the family had done to her to arouse her antipathy, it is difficult for me to gauge the exact cause of her hostility towards them; the very subject is the proverbial elephant in the room and remains unexplored to this day. Thought both she and my Danta aunty were quite verbal in their criticism of their in-laws, it is to the credit of my paternal grandmother, aunt and uncle that they never ever said one word against my mother. Equally, the few times when I visited Danta on my hunting expeditions and called upon the elderly Rajmata at the old fort, I found her to be a dear sweet old lady who welcomed me most warmly and made affectionate conversation.
My mother was a very handsome woman—slim, tall and good looking; as children it was a treat to see her getting dressed in the morning. First, she used to sit before the mirror at her dressing table and apply sindoor (vermillion powder worn in the parting in her hair denoting that she was a married woman) and then some light kajal or kohl to her eyes and a touch of lipstick. After a vigorous brushing of her thick hair, the maids would arrive carrying the sari, which she had chosen to wear that day out of the many hundreds that she had in her cupboards. There was a large full-length mirror with a heavy golden frame hanging on the wall of her dressing room. She would stand before it and deftly tie her sari, and finally sprayed herself with perfume; ‘Caleche’ by Hermes was a firm favourite of hers and even now reminds me of my mother. All the time while this ritual was carried out I used to sit fascinated and watch her getting ready.
My admiration of mother’s toilette did not stop there. Mother and father dined together in the evening and after dinner. Mother was in the habit of sending one of the maids on duty for a bottle of hand lotion which was kept in the Zenana. I have a vague recollection that I took a great liking for the taste of the hand lotion which was called ‘Larola’, and I would eagerly volunteer each evening to fetch the bottle for her. Bearing in mind that I did not volunteer for any other chores so easily, there obviously was a hidden agenda here. Sure enough, I liked to drink the sweet tasting lotion. Squarely in the middle of the Zenana and the men’s apartment was a tiny room which was a veritable’ no man’s land’. Having collected the lotion from one of mother’s maids I used to pause in this room where they could not follow and then making myself comfortable on the only chair in the room, pour myself a generous capful of the lotion and savour it. When finished, I would duly take the bottle to mother. Needless to say, one day an officious maid raised the curtain at the very moment that I was about to down the lotion and screamed her head off. Mother was informed of my secret lotion drinking habit and I was roundly chastised.
Mother had very decided views on just about everything in life; everything was either black or white and there was no room for any grey areas in her thought process. She despised drinking, had no time for infidelity of any sort and was absolutely strict regarding financial probity. Anyone who did not live up to her high moral standards of acceptability was not to be tolerated within the palace, though most times all manner of things used to go on in the palace in a clandestine way without her knowledge.
Several scandals broke out during the sixties, involving members of staff and in some cases, well-known people like a Thakur who had a long-standing secret love affair with the daughter of another Thakur. These delicious tales of scandal and skulduggery will remain for the time being, firmly locked in my memory, as I do not wish to tarnish the reputation of people who are still living
My mother was an extremely strict lady and growing up we followed a regime where we were never left alone for any length of time even when we were quite grown up. We had nannies, governesses, maids, male members of staff and a comptroller of the household in Delhi who was the overall incharge when we were there during term time. To unlearn one’s parents’ thoughts and beliefs that are instilled into one as a child may take an entire life- time; I know that in my case it took me most part of my adult life to break through the barrier of my mother’s creation of a particular mind set.
My father read extensively, whereas my mother did not read at all, apart from the newspaper and so
me Hindi periodicals. Nonetheless she needed to keep track of what I was reading as I grew up and so Thakur Raghubir Singh of Bidasar was appointed as the censor to read the various books that I brought home in my teens and to pronounce them suitable or not as the case maybe. This went on for some time and eventually thankfully this practice petered out. Sergeanne Golon’s ‘Angelique’ series were considered risqué and deemed unsuitable by Thakur Raghubir Singh, though I avidly read them all anyway and without any lasting ill effect.
Mother’s verbal battles with our nannies and her maids were legendary. On one particular occasion, we were all travelling by our private saloon to Bombay. En route some argument ensued between mother and one of our Rajput ‘Ayahs’ or nanny called Mangesh Kanwar or ‘Jiji’ as she was more commonly called by us. She was a widow who was married to a Thakur in Lakhasar village of Bikaner, and had come to the service of my mother since the time of my brother’s infancy. She played a key role in bringing us all up, particularly my sister Madhulika with whom she remained till the time that she died in 2011.
Returning to the brawl on board the saloon, the heated argument continued unabated much to our distress, since Jiji was not one to take things lying down, no matter who the opponent was. Unable to win the fight, my mother asked my father to let Jiji off at the next station. Jiji refused point blank to get off and said that she was a respectable Rajput Thakurani and was not about to be off- loaded at a station like a piece of baggage. Finally, my father restored some calm and told mother that there was no way that she could be left at the station and if she wanted to fire her then she must do so when they arrived in Bombay. We continued our trip with Jiji still on board. My admiration for her in standing up to my mother remains undiminished to this day.
My parents were very different personalities but they had somehow managed to make a successful marriage and create what I would describe as a reasonably stable home for their three children. I read somewhere that most marriages consist of two people—one who wants the window open and the other who wants it shut – in my parents’ case, this was quite literally true. Travelling with them in the same car is what nightmares are made of. I used to be very car sick in my youth and liked to breathe fresh air, my father too liked to keep the window open for purposes of ventilation. However, my mother always had different ideas on the subject and wanted all the windows to be kept closed as she was convinced that a breeze would inflame her sinuses! The number of arguments that the three of us had while travelling were both routine and legendary. Since I was the one who travelled most with them in cars on our way to endless shooting ranges and hotels both at home and abroad, I had to bear the brunt of these arguments. My father believed strongly in trying to keep the peace in the family at any cost, and though I disagree with this sentiment, he made it work most of the time, until eventually the problems mounted within the family to such an extent that his health began to suffer.
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