Mewar: Guhils, Sisodias, Kumbha, Sanga and Pratap

Mewar is the dynasty every Rajasthan paper comes back to. Its rulers held the hill country of southern Rajasthan for more than eight centuries from Nagda, Chittorgarh and finally Udaipur, and their history gives examiners exactly what they want: a long line of named rulers, three famous sieges of one fort, a tower of victory, and a battle fought in a narrow pass. The rulers of Mewar carried the title Maharana and described themselves as the Diwan, that is the servant, of Eklingji, the form of Shiva worshipped at Kailashpuri near Nagda, a detail that itself appears in objective papers.

The Guhils: from Nagda to Chittor

The dynasty takes its name from Guhil or Guhadatta, placed in the sixth century, and its early capital was Nagda near modern Udaipur. The ruler who makes the dynasty famous is Bappa Rawal of the eighth century, who is credited with establishing Guhil power at Chittor and with the worship of Eklingji. In the thirteenth century Jaitra Singh held off an invasion by Iltutmish of Delhi, and Mewar emerged as the strongest of the Rajput states of the region.

In 1303 the fort fell for the first time: Alauddin Khalji besieged Chittor, defeated Rawal Ratan Singh, and gave the fort to his son Khizr Khan, after whom it was renamed Khizrabad. Rajasthani tradition attaches the story of Rani Padmini and the first jauhar to this siege. Chittor was recovered about 1326 by Rana Hammir, whose line is called the Sisodia branch after the village of Sisoda, and every later Maharana of Mewar, Udaipur included, belongs to it.

Rana Kumbha, the builder

Rana Kumbha, properly Kumbhakarna, ruled from 1433 to 1468 and is the builder of the dynasty. He raised Kumbhalgarh fort in the Aravalli range and is credited in tradition with thirty-two of the eighty-four forts of Mewar. After his victories over Mahmud Khalji of Malwa, beginning in 1440, he built the nine-storeyed Vijay Stambha, the Tower of Victory, inside Chittorgarh, which remains the single most asked monument of the state. He was a scholar as well, credited with the Sangeet Raj and a commentary on the Gita Govinda, and he was killed by his own son Uda.

Rana Sanga and the second fall of Chittor

Rana Sanga, or Sangram Singh, ruled from 1509 and built the widest Rajput confederacy of the age, defeating the Malwa sultan at Khatoli and Gagron. In 1527 he faced Babur at Khanwa, near Bharatpur, the battle in which Babur took the title Ghazi; Sanga was wounded and carried away, and died in 1528. His defeat is the turning point after which the Rajput states could not keep the Mughals out of the plains. In 1535 Bahadur Shah of Gujarat attacked Chittor during the regency of Rani Karnavati, and the second jauhar is placed in this siege. A generation later the nurse Panna Dhai saved the child Udai Singh from the usurper Banbir, and Udai Singh founded a new capital at Udaipur in 1559, away from the exposed fort. Akbar besieged Chittor in 1567 and took it in 1568; its defenders Jaimal of Badnor and Patta of Kelwa were honoured by Akbar himself with statues at Agra fort, and the third jauhar belongs to this siege.

Maharana Pratap and Haldighati

Maharana Pratap, born in 1540 and crowned at Gogunda in 1572, refused the Mughal alliance that most Rajput houses had accepted. On 18 June 1576 his army met the Mughal force at the pass of Haldighati near Khamnor. The imperial army was commanded by Man Singh I of Amer with Asaf Khan; Pratap's wing included the Afghan chief Hakim Khan Sur and the Bhil chief Rana Punja, and his horse Chetak carried him wounded out of the field. The battle was indecisive in the long run: Pratap withdrew to the hills, made Chavand his capital, and with the treasure offered by his minister Bhamashah recovered most of Mewar, winning the battle of Dewair in 1582. He never recovered Chittorgarh itself, and died at Chavand in 1597. His son Amar Singh I made peace with Jahangir in 1615.

What survives on the ground

Chittorgarh and Kumbhalgarh are both part of the Hill Forts of Rajasthan inscribed by UNESCO in 2013. Inside Chittorgarh stand Kumbha's Vijay Stambha and the earlier Jain Kirti Stambha, the Tower of Fame, along with the palaces associated with Rana Kumbha and with Padmini. Eklingji at Kailashpuri, Haldighati with Chetak's memorial, and Chavand with Pratap's cenotaph complete the list of places a question can name.