Jaipur City, Rajasthan

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A Glimpse into the Architectural Marvel of Jaipur City, Rajasthan

Jaipur City, nestled in the heart of Rajasthan, India's north-western state, stands as a testament to the harmonious blend of ancient and modern architectural influences. Inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2019, this vibrant city offers a unique fusion of traditional Hindu, Mughal, and Western design elements.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

The walled city of Jaipur, in India’s north-western state of Rajasthan was founded in 1727 by Sawai Jai Singh II. Unlike other cities in the region located in hilly terrain, Jaipur was established on the plain and built according to a grid plan interpreted in the light of Vedic architecture. The streets feature continuous colonnaded businesses that intersect in the centre, creating large public squares called chaupars. Markets, shops, residences and temples built along the main streets have uniform facades. The city's urban planning shows an exchange of ideas from ancient Hindu and early modern Mughal as well as Western cultures. The grid plan is a model that prevails in the West, while the organization of the different city sectors (chowkris) refers to traditional Hindu concepts. Designed to be a commercial capital, the city has maintained its local commercial, artisanal and cooperative traditions to this day.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (ii): Jaipur is an exemplary development in town planning and architecture that demonstrates an amalgamation and important interchange of several ideas over the late medieval period. It shows an interchange of ancient Hindu, Mughal and contemporary Western ideas that resulted in the customised layout of the city. It is believed that Raja Jai Singh arrived at the final layout after a thorough analysis of several town plans sourced from across the globe. Following the grid-iron plan prevalent in the west but with traditional zoning, superimposed by the desire to rival Mughal cities, Jaipur reflected new concepts for a thriving trade and commerce hub that became a model for the later towns in the adjoining Shekhawati region and others parts of Western India.

Criterion (iv): Jaipur represents a dramatic departure from extant medieval cities with its ordered, grid-like structure – broad streets, crisscrossing at right angles, earmarked sites for buildings, palaces, havelis, temples and gardens, neighbourhoods designated for particular castes and occupations. The main markets, shops, havelis and temples on the main streets were constructed by the state, thus ensuring that a uniform street facade was maintained in Jaipur. The city planning of Jaipur remains a unique response to the terrain that amalgamates ideas from an ancient Indian treatise to contemporary global town plans and Imperial Mughal architecture to finally produce a monumental urban form, unparalleled in its scale and magnificence for its times. While the grid iron pattern of planning has been used historically in city planning, its application at such a monumental scale for a planned trade city, along with its particular urban form, makes it an important example in the history of urban planning of the Indian subcontinent. The continuity of the architecture and urban form is enhanced by the functions of trade and craftsmanship that reflect the living heritage character of this innovative urban settlement.

Criterion (vi): Historically, the city is said to have housed “chattis karkhanas” (36 industries), the majority of which included crafts like gemstones, lac jewellery, stone idols, miniature paintings, each with a specified street and market some of which continue to exist. During 19th century, the local crafts received further momentum with British period influences in special exhibitions held in United Kingdom, establishment of institutions such as the Rajasthan School of Arts and Albert Hall Museum. While the local traditions of guilds continued, formal institutions for crafts, policies and programmes by Government and the private sector further contributed to national and international recognition of Jaipur crafts in the 20th and 21st centuries. There are 11 surviving crafts, and continuing building crafts of Jaipur contribute much to the conservation works of the city, and the renowned craftsmen from Jaipur continue to conserve and restore historic structures across many cities in India.

Encyclopedia Record: Jaipur

Jaipur is the capital and the largest city of the north-western Indian state of Rajasthan. As of 2011, the city had a population of 3.1 million, making it the tenth most populous city in the country. Located 268 km from the national capital New Delhi, Jaipur is also known as the Pink City due to the dominant color scheme of its buildings in the old city.

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