“Look how the fort is difficult to spot.” The history professor explained as the eager students looked out of the window. Roshni had lived in Rajasthan all her life. Her home was in Bundi and she had been enrolled in the history department of the University of Udaipur, from where this trip was planned for the third-year students. She had read too many folklores growing up about the valour and sacrifices this fort witnessed. But as a student of history, she had now learnt the difference between stories and facts. But her eagerness to see the fort was almost childlike. Coming from a lower middle-class background meant that she had few resources growing up, most of which was spent on her education. She wanted to be an archaeologist. She was five when her parents had a fallout and that was the last time she had seen her father. The dreams and anxiety started right after. But it wasn’t until she stepped out of her small town and into college that her roommate suggested therapy. She suddenly felt that her mother would have loved this trip. Perhaps someday in the future, she could bring her here. Ever since her father abandoned them, her mother had focussed on earning and sustaining the house, and she had very little luxury to enjoy things in life. One day, Roshni would become India’s best archaeologist and give her mother her best trips. Her thoughts brought a smile to her face as her project partner jolted her with a poke.
“Oh hello, Miss Chauhan.” Purvi straightened her glasses “Stop daydreaming and get your notebook out. We are here for marks. This is not a picnic.”
“Will you relax, topper?” Mahek grunted from the seat behind them. “Goodness!”
The bus stopped after going up a winding road, at a “Pol” gate where everyone got down.
“This is the Ram Pol, the first of the seven.” The teacher spoke again, “We will walk through the seven gates to the ticket counter.” His words were met with disapproving noises from the group as Roshni glanced over at the arched gateway with sculptures, scenes of Lord Ram’s life depicted on each section of the gateway. There was a watch tower with twin domes on them.
“Can we climb up that?” One of the guys suggested. Before the professor could even nod a few of them were crowding the top.
“Be careful!” the teacher shouted in vain.
“Come let’s see the view from up there.” Before she could protest, her roommate Vamshika held her hand and they reached the tower. From the top, every major monument was visible, as was the horizon of never-ending barren lands.
“The Vijay Stambh…” “ That’s the Meera Temple, right?” “... Is that the museum?” Amidst the chaos, the wind whispered in her ears as though it had a language of its own. It brought back memories of her childhood. As a lonely child, waiting for her mother to be back home and nobody to play with, Roshni used to climb up to their terrace which almost touched the mighty walls of the Taragarh fort and heard the wind whisper. She imagined it was talking to her, telling her stories of kings and queens. Her interest in history grew because of those stories. Today the wind seemed to tell her many more tales. It was chaotic, as though the stories overlapped each other. She frowned a little at the eerie feeling of chaos, to protect her face from the sun, and held one of the four pillars of the Chattri, atop the tower. Almost like a current ran down her spine, she could hear people shouting and wailing. Shuddering a little she jolted away from the pillar as Vamshika glanced over her shoulder to check on her. She was the only one who knew how troubled Roshni was.
“Are you alright?” She asked concerned as Roshni forced a smile. “I am fine. I am just feeling a little cold.”
“You have goosebumps.” Vamshika checked her forehead out of concern. “You seem feverish.”
“I am fine, let's go up to the fort. If I don’t feel fine I will tell you to escort me back to the bus.” Roshni reassured her.
They were at the ticket counter when she glanced over at the magnificent Kumbha Palace that stood with its walls and jharokhas welcoming them. The place looked very familiar and Roshni seemed sure she must have seen its pictures somewhere. Once they were at the courtyard of what was believed to be the Rani Mahal, the professor explained how a quick Jauhar using gunpowder during Akbar’s attack had reduced the magnificent palace to just walls. The students started looking around.
“Look at the highest Jharokha.” Mahek pointed. “It must have been at least three storeys.” The others agreed.
“No, five, there are two more if you count the basement and…” Roshni stopped a little alarmed as her friends stared at her with suspicious glances.
“I think…” she added unsurely.
“Have you been here?” Vamshika asked. “You said you have never…”
“I must have read somewhere…” Roshni shook her head as she followed her friends down a narrow corridor to the spiralling staircase leading down to another open space.
“This must have been where the warriors practised.” Mahek sounded like a know-it-all. “After all, that’s the weaponry house.” She pointed at a separate building in a distance. The others nodded.
“Oh look at that, some of the jharokhas of the Rani Mahal look over this space, what if some queens watched their kings sparring?” Someone gushed. Roshni suddenly felt uneasy. Maybe the fever was getting to her. She sat down on one of the stairs and took out a bottle of water to drink. She then glanced up at the jharokha over her head. She decided to make a note of whatever she had seen in her copy. The professor had by then caught hold of a guide with the ASI identity card on him. She could hear bits and pieces of what he told the gathered students. “Panna Dhai… Meera Bai… Ranisa Karnavati…”
Someone asked an unclear question. She could now hear the guide speak.
“Maharana Pratap had moved his capital to the forest hideout at Chawand. He and his queen both are said to have died there. Maharanisa was from Bijoliya.”
Roshni looked up from her copy at the man a little pale. Maharanisa… It was no name, it was a title. A royal title. Of course, how stupid was she… but… Bijoliya… the name struck a chord. The small town fell somewhere in between her bus journeys back home. She never knew it was remotely significant. She found a vendor selling books on Chittorgarh just outside the Kumbha Palace as they made their way to the Kumbha Shyaam Temple. She picked up two handbooks. One on the life of Maharana Pratap, and another on Chittorgarh.
“If you are looking for history books you shouldn’t buy these.” The voice behind her made her turn as she spotted a man in his mid-twenties with an ASI ID card around his neck. “You are one of the students, right?” She nodded as he pointed at the ID card peeking from her pocket. “If you want genuine books you can look up at the bookstore at our office. It has student discounts.” Roshni’s eyes followed his gesture towards the small office near the Kumbha Palace complex where benches were set up for the evening light and sound show.
“Thank you.” She proceeded towards the direction of the bookstore. He followed behind her keeping a distance.
“Where can I get some information?” Roshni suddenly stopped to ask as he looked up with his brows closing together in an arch. That was the first time Roshni noticed his brown eyes as he looked up at her. “What kind of information do you need?” She cleared her throat and opened her notebook to check. The pen she had carelessly tucked inside fell on the stone-carved road and he immediately knelt to pick it up. He looked up at her as she caught the pen from his hand, carefully avoiding touch as the sun rays fell on his face, and shone on his eyes. She hurried to collect the pen when she found him sitting on his knee, touching the pen to his forehead before giving it back to her. Suddenly at that moment, Roshni felt like she had seen him before. She did the same, with a faint smile, for she had seen her mother do the same for as long as she remembered. She felt uneasy as he asked again, “What information…”
“Oh!” She flipped through the note pages clumsily and found the page. “So you see…” she cleared her throat and spoke “My project is to write a character analysis and … I wanted to do that on some lesser known royals… The guide said that the queen of Maharana Pratap stayed in Bijoliya. Is there anything there to see?” She looked up from her notebook to see him staring at her a little taken aback, his hands in his pocket as she stopped. “Is something wrong?” She seemed to interrupt his chain of thoughts as he shook his head.
“No, I just…Well, there is a lot in Bijoliya. And fortunately for you, I belong from there.” She looked up at him a little surprised as he spoke, “We belong from her lineage, the Punwars. I will give you a list…” He waited for her to find a page and cleared his throat. “Well, the palace and temples. Jain structures, inscriptions…”
“Oh.” Roshni smiled. “That is interesting… will it be okay if I ask you a few questions?”
“Absolutely.” He nodded “I will be glad to help… but…” he looked at his watch. “You see I don’t work in this office. I was here on inspection work. I work independently on a contract basis with ASI so…” he looked around and cleared his throat “I have to be somewhere.”
“Oh. Is there any way I can get through to you?” She asked, a little disappointed “It would help my cause.” He took out a card from his wallet and handed it over to her. “Here, you can contact me and drop by Bijolia any time. I feel my mother can help you more than me.” He smiled. “It's not far from Udaipur.”
“I suppose I can do that. I stay in Bundi.” She smiled nodding. “Thank you, Mr…”
“Pratap Singh Punwar. And you are?” Roshni looked at his extended hand like deja vu hit her, as though she had heard him speak before or was it his name she heard.
“Roshni Chauhan.” She shook his hand lightly and watched him leave. She then checked the card.
Pratap Singh Punwar
Independent Archaeologist with ASI.
“Roshni!” She jolted as Mahek called out to her. “Where were you? We have been looking! Come let's have lunch.” She nodded and walked away from the office deciding to buy some books later on.
The government-funded group of archaeologists travelled through the small village in a convoy of five white ambassador cars, through the winding uneven and soiled road to the large lakeside where the cars were parked. Eager villagers gathered around as Pratap stepped out of his vehicle and put on his pollution mask and gloves. He was leading a group of archaeologists to study and gather evidence from what remained in the rumbled ruins of a palace in the forestland near Bandoli, to learn more and make a possible reconstruction of the palace of the last capital of Maharana Pratap. The Jaipur Circle had decided to restore the palace since it was the only significant one he had built during a lifetime of war. But personally, he was looking for a lot of answers to questions he couldn’t share with the world.
Meeting Roshni only stirred those questions and made him uneasy. He had never had a sense of deja vu as far as his dreams were concerned. He didn’t want to risk sharing his dreams with his widowed mother or his friends who would think he had lost his mind, reading too much history. Yet, strange as it sounded, when he found the girl buying that book, his introverted self had walked up to her and initiated a conversation as though he knew her. Stranger still, she mentioned the person whose name he had been dreaming of for as long as he could remember. Could it all be a coincidence or the universe was telling him something? A part of him wished Roshni would contact him again and they could solve this puzzle together. A part of him wanted to tell her his story. The story he hadn’t shared with anyone ever. What made him trust a stranger? He missed his aunt. Before she had renounced her world and turned a saint, she would give him all kinds of puzzling answers. The one he remembered the most?
We have lived more lives in the past and we will live more in the future. The present is only a small part of who you are, Pratap, a reflection of your past. Do you understand?
So there are reincarnations and afterlives, Meera Ma?
Why not, child? There is everything and nothing in this universe.
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