Jaipal Singh Hall of Fame

7.08.09 at Spaghetti,Kharghar, Navi-Mumbai.

Need to raise a memorial hall in the memory of the great martyr of 1857 war of independence,in my life time,which may be only a short distance away or even forty years away,who knows?
I propose building it on the exclusive property in my name,adjacent to the Sees Chand Mansion,in which both myself and Jaipal Singh had the privilege of being born,a hundred and forty years apart.
This could be of the same width as of the Sees Chand Mansion,which could be called it’s length and it’s width could be adjusted in the Bailva of yester-years,with three feet corridor left on the south and north sides ,surrounded by a thin wall supported in-between by piling driven pillars seven feet apart,the over-head space to be covered by some ingenius device,so as to allow the air to pass but thieves and intruders to hold.
All along the southern boundary of neighbors,our own piled supported srut should have a 3inches wall(owing to steep rise in the brick-prices,and there after a wind tunnel three feet wide all along,turning left at the juncture of Babu Baldeo Singh’s bakhari,till in line with the southern wall of Sees Chand Mansion,unless hard –pressed for a few more feet in Rishabh Deo Singh’s bada,adjacent to the hata(compound )of Babu Baldeo Singh,now in possession of Munna and Laddoo.A room and a kitchen would be built for the purpose of catering to the demands of the tourists visiting to see the Jaipal Singh memorial Hall of the 1st house of the Raghuvanshies of Katehar dedicated to Baba Pukar Rai and his eldest son Rai Khemraj singh’s foray in Kaithi in order to install his eldest son Rai Chan Singhjudeo,as a five year old youngster in Kaithi,on the spot where his grandson built a permanent abode,while his father Madan Chand and Grand-fatherstarted living in his newly acquired jagirdari of Pargana Bayaleesi in distt. Jaunpur.Madan Chand may have traveled to Kaithi,once in a while,however the credit for the present house goes to Sees Chand,built at the turn of the fourteenth century into fifteenth.It seems I was born to tell the Raghuvanshies all about it,through the charts and genealogy tales of Banshi Kavi,our bard’s descendant since we left Ayodhya around 1194AD. In a way it is a great historical monument,but as these are not the days to talk about all that ,so we will stick to 1857-martyr Jaipal Singh and the memorial hall built in the commemoration of his martyrdom.
I dare say I have failed in my latest bid to emulate my world conquering ancestor Raghu Maharaj,in going around the world like him when the ex-chequer is devoid of requisite wealth.Hence my programme shall be executed with limited means and most simply devoid of ostentation of any sort except for the future’s security arrangements and security of future. I shall certainly abhor any help from any corner except from my own son,which may be done by pledging my Mumbai flatm,in lieu of his donation to my project dealing in the past,which is wont to my family,specially my own spouse,who is sitting pretty lording over the investment of my maximum collection of wealth from around the world,which has been desired by me to be converted into a memorial trust in the name of Rai Chan Singhjudeo to Babu Rishabh deo singhji,celeberating their uninturpted stay in the Sees Chand Mansion between 1465 and 28thof june 1952.Any one desireous of future use(after my wife and myself are no more) shall be made fully and sincerely responsible towards the up-keep of the so called R.M.House(short for RaiChan Singh to Rishabh deo Singh Memorial Houise),simply by paying in the Trust created already or to be created by the descendants of myself and my wife Savitri Devi Singh Raghuvanshi,for making certain that the edifice shall not fall apart for next 300 years in it’s originality and if necessary for building another memorial in the same names in the same place.Much will power will be required to wish to go and stay in that House built by me by my own earnings around the world and building operations supervised wholly by my good wife abovenamed.The working of the above trust is not a matter tom be discussed here.
So in case the good old Sees Chand Mansion becomes a heritage property,we shall be ready to move-on,while maintaining the old Mansion for the Archeological Survey of India.
It can be foreseen that with a flat in Mumbai and a Mansion in the Town ,hardly anyone would venture out like me in 1971 against the wishes of all in the family,again to stay put,despite my call in my Blog to all to return to Kaithi,even if waiting for the great holocaust.But I shall make arrangements,in the infra-structure like in Mumbai for thr future generations to invest and adopt beautifications and decorations in the interior and even the exterior.It will be my utter desire with the Architect to build and design to save from the excited and unruly youngsters of the locality to damage the window-panes,like they have been doing on the first floor rooms of the old Mansion,while enjoying our hospitality of playing cricket and volleyball in my back-yard.A wire –mesh to all glasses is a must as our stayis occasional and minimal of a day or two and we are not able to maintain a guard,over already a property which is costing us moolah.
In the western end a place to sit for visitors ought to be created since Thakur Ram Rup Singhji had allowed Kaka to convert Bharat Baba’s Baithaka into his temporary living quarters,we are devoid of a baithaka ourselves and I received visitors in my late father’s day room and even Thakur Ram Rup Singhji had wished for a Men’s baithaka whenever he visited Kaithi in the eighties,during the alluvial problems created by the river Gomti.So it can be created,by and by where our Anjahia bakhari used to be,facing north and another aisle facing east to gather sunlight earliest in the mornings as in my lifetime I do not wish to disturb the settings as created by the permission of my late uncle,although better alternatives can be worked-out.After all there are family members with erroneous notions that it was only his property.We are no trespassers we have come as legal heirs of my grand-father and I am beneficiary in sale-deeds also,which came to light in some legal wranglings for ten years over erroneous assumptions.I have entered the house of my birth after the expiry of three months notice to all the co-parceners,in 1971,after I returned from sea for the first time in fourteen years.Yet I have invited in some blog of mine for all coparceners to come and take charge of the Mansion and save it from falling-over,I have done it off and on,whenever any murmur has risen.But no body is interested in the upkeep,but only in the booty.While on the contrary,my devotion is satiated when some kith and kin visit their ancestral house,the ancestry of which they are not aware of.So I thought before I leave this world I shall endeavour to leave no bone of contention for the kith and kin to claim that it is only theirs and anyone else is an intruder.But for God’s sake let them be willing to undertake some burden of maintenance as well.One might argue,that as I live in it I shall maintain it.Good enough reason.But then since 1989,we are not living in it and we come here off and on and spend big some on redoing the faulty and leaky ceilings and mud-hatched brick walls with in-roads of water all round.This house belongs to the descendants of late Thakur Ram Rup Singhji and his own younger brother late Babu Rishabh Deo Singhji and all are wecome to come and stay but after my demise anyone before claiming it his own shall also come forward and do the necessary repairs at that time and undertake maintenance through-out with the guidance of an engineer and an architect (like I have been doing ) and be prepred to employ a watchman to ward-off many more claimants,like the after death period of my father,between 1952 and 1971.
Suresh Pratap Singh(Kaithi)