A majestic, Tudor-style structure stands tall at the heart of Bangalore, amid the chaos and traffic snarls that the city has become infamous for these days. The architectural splendour hits you each time you visit the magnificent Bangalore Palace. Built by the then Maharaja of Mysore, Chamarajendra Wodeyar, in 1887, on the model of the Windsor Castle in the UK, it is spread over an area of about 430 acres. The palace, largely constructed of wood, has fortified towers, complete with Gothic windows, parapets, battlements, arches and turrets. An exquisite door panel opens on to equally grand interiors, with breathtaking floral motifs, cornices, mouldings and relief paintings on the ceiling. The sprawling grounds surrounding the palace have become a venue for many of the city’s cultural programmes, concerts and exhibitions. The palace is owned and maintained by the scions of the Mysore royal family, the Wodeyars.
Royal tag: (clockwise from top left) The Indian Institute of Science; Queen Vani Vilasa with her two sons; C. Rajagopalachari with the last ruler, Jayachamaraja Wodeyar.
Today, when we look around Bangalore for visible manifestations of the Wodeyar era, it appears all-pervasive to a perceptive and historically-sensitive eye. The other obvious sights would, surely, be the remnants of Tipu Sultan’s crumbling fort and summer palace in the crowded old market areas of the city; the Kote Venkataramanaswamy temple beside the fort; the Seshadri Iyer Memorial Hall; the Attara Kacheri building, housing the high court, and so on.
But this is not where the legacy of the Wodeyars begins and ends. Unlike many other royal dynasties whose legacies live on in decrepit monuments, most often crying for help from an insensitive public or government, Bangalore and Karnataka are still reaping the benefits of the gifts of the Wodeyars. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that the foundations of the phenomenal success that is today’s Bangalore were laid during the Wodeyar period.
In retrospect, 1901 proved to be a decisive year in the history of Bangalore. Sir William Ramsay, Nobel Prize winner for chemistry in 1904, was requested by the Royal Society of London to choose an appropriate site for the establishment of an institute of excellence in higher education in India. Ramsay toured the entire country, and recommended Bangalore. Around the same time, a fact-finding committee of Roorkee College also made a competitive bid for their town as a possible location.
But what clinched the deal in favour of Bangalore was the vision of a lady who herself was not too highly educated. The city would have lost the prestigious Indian Institute of Science (IISc), which was established there in 1909, but for the timely initiative of the Regent Queen of Mysore, Vani Vilasa Sannidhana.