November 2015

In the 19th century Jaswant Thada , a royal cenotaph was built in commemoration of Maharaja Jaswant Singh II, the 33rd Rathore ruler of Jodhpur. The son of Maharaja , Maharaja Sardar Singh, in the memory of his father, built the Jaswant Thada.

It is a white marble memorial, built out of intricately carved sheets of marble. These sheets are extremely thin and polished so that they emit a warm glow when illuminated by the sun.

View of Umaid Bhavan from Jaswant Thada

View of Mehrangarh Fort from Jaswant Thada

Om Banna is a temple located in Pali district near Jodhpur, India, devoted to a deity in the form of a motorcycle.It is located 20 kilometres from Pali and 50 kilometres away from Jodphur on the Pali-Jodhpur highway. The motorcycle is a 350cc Royal Enfield Bullet.

Residents of Chotila village have built a small temple for the motorbike and his dead owner, Om Singh Rathore, also known as Om Banna or Bullet Baba, on National Highway 65 in Pali, Rajasthan.The shrine has a Royal Enfield 350cc bullet enclosed in a glass box with a photo of Om Banna, who died in a road accident around 24 years ago in that same spot.

Over two decades ago, 21-year-old Om Singh Rathore, the son of a local village leader, was on his way home when he met with a fatal accident on the highway. The police hauled away the motorcycle and that’s when the legend began.The bike was not in the police station the next day. It was found at the accident spot. The police took the bike back, this time securing it with chains and deflating its tyres. The story goes that the next morning the motorcycle was again found at the accident spot. Police tried everything possible to stop the bike from being moved. The bike somehow made it to the accident site in the dead of the night.

Thus began the legend of Om Banna, or Bullet Baba, the patron saint of all those who use the highway. Following the incident, villagers in the area build the temple to worship it.

The temple itself is an elevated concrete platform on which is a bust of Rathore. Behind it stands the Bullet, enclosed in a glass case.

Rajasthan has been blessed with varied flora and fauna even when majority of its area is desert. The forest cover is also quite limited, despite these adversities, some unique flora and fauna can be witnessed.

The flora and fauna of Rajasthan supports all kinds of animal species and forests.The flora and fauna of Rajasthan will completely spellbound the tourists.

Nilgai - Blue Bull of India:

Sometimes referred to as the "blue bull" (or horse), it is the largest of all Asian antelopes and is one of the most commonly seen wild animals in Rajasthan. The nilgai are very robust animals with bodies similar to horses, but have much smaller heads and small horns (only on the males), leading many to compare them to a cross between a horse and a goat. Females are a lighter brown color and slightly less robustly built. Both males and females have a short bristly mane.

Demoiselle crane:

The demoiselle crane is a species found in central Eurasia, ranging from the Black Sea to Mongolia and North Eastern China.These cranes are migratory birds. Birds from western Eurasia will spend the winter in Africa whilst the birds from Asia, Mongolia and China will spend the winter in the Indian subcontinent. The bird is symbolically significant in the culture of North India, where it is known as the koonj.

These cranes make one of the toughest migrations in the world by crossing the Himalayas and have literally changed the landscape of Khichan near Jodhpur in Rajasthan. The once obscure village has now become one of the most favoured bird-watching vacation hotspots in India.

The Chinkara:

The chinkara, also known as the Indian gazelle, is a gazelle species native to Iran, Pakistan and India. It has a reddish-buff summer coat with smooth, glossy fur. In winter, the white belly and throat fur is in greater contrast. The sides of the face have dark chestnut stripes from the corner of the eye to the muzzle, bordered by white stripes.