History and Culture of Jaipur
The city of Jaipur was built by Maharaja Jai singh in the eighteenth century. This was India's first planned city and the king sought the help of the brilliant architecht Vidyadhar from Bengal to design the city in accordance with the ancient treatise on architechture (vaastu). Jaipur is built on the pattern of a grid with straight avenues and roads with uniform rows of shops on either side of the road, all arranged in nine rectangular city sectors. An interesting anecdote about the pink color of buildings in Jaipur is that the king wanted the city painted in honour of the visit of the Prince of Wales in 1905. The contractor was unable to supply any other color in the required quantity which resulted in Jaipur becoming the Pink City.
Jaipur is famous for its rich heritage and culture which are associated with a lot of local festivals, the most important being the Elephant festival which starts on the eve of Holi, the festival of colors. Though elephants are the center of attraction, one can also see camels and horses beautifully decked up for the occasion. Another festival is the Gangaur festival which is celebrated a fortnight after Holi in honour of Goddess Parvati (Gauri). This festival is considered an auspicious occasion for young people to choose their life partners. Teej is another important festival which welcomes the monsoon showers in Rajasthan in July- August and women pray to Goddess Parvati. The whole city is decorated and it is wonderful to explore the markets during the festive season.
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