Ajmer-Pushkar (Dec 27, 2008)

Travel:
We left for Ajmer from Gwalior on Dec. 26th in the evening. The train was delayed by few hours. The train was not full. Some of the best tea I had after coming to India is not in Hyderabad by in North India and in particular in the train station of Gwalior. This morning, we discovered 'Matka tea', tea in mud cups in this train station. I don't know if the clay cups imparted any special taste but the fact that you can drink from one of those environmentally friendly cups was thrilling for me. Using my old mud cup we had couple of cups of masala chai. The train travelled through Agra, Jaipur before it reaches Ajmer in the middle of the night. We met a friendly couple in the train. They gave us some useful tips.

It was freezing night when we reached Ajmer in the middle of the night. We reached the hotel and grabbed few hours of sleep before we are ready to visit Hazrat Moinuddin Chisty Dargah. This is the tomb of the a famous sufi saint in the eastern part of Rajasthan. Ajmer is very arid like rest of Rajasthan. The road leading to the Dargah is filled with shops selling many interesting stuff. My attention was on sweet stalls. My son, Bunti, bought a cap as men/boys have to have their heads covered before entering muslim tombs or mosques. I used one that I purchased during our visit to Egypt in 2005.

History:
Moinuddin Chisty was born in east Persia in 1100s AD. Around that time Persia was fighting against the Tartars who ransacked the country repeatedly killing many and destroying cities. Khawaja Moinuddin's family was in middle of this turmoil. He lost his parents in the process. He is said to be descendant of Hazrat Ali, son-in-law of Prophet Mohammed and due to whom the Shia division of Islam came into existence. So he is a Shia Sufi saint.

Khawaja Moninuddin had a spiritual experience at an early age and left to study at Bokhara and Samarkand. Baghdad and Nashapur (where he lived) had well known universitities too but were destroyed in Mongols invasions. He apparently traveled through much of what is middle-east including Mecca, Madina, modern day Iraq. While at Medina he had vision asking him to proceed to Ajmer in India. He travelled through Afghanistan, modern-day Pakistan, Delhi before reaching Ajmer in 1191 AD.

Interestingly he entered India around the time the Ghauris of Ghazni were waging wars with Prithviraj Chauhan the ruler of Delhi and Ajmer too. This was the same year that Prithviraj Chauhan defeated the Ghauris in the first battle (he eventually lost to them starting the spread of Islam in India). The legend goes that Prithviraj's mother prophesized about a fakir coming into the kingdom of her son and if he is attacked, his son would lose his kingdom. It is also said that Prithviraj went to confront Khawaja Moninuddin and his assistant tried to attack the sufi saint with his black magic but failed and in turn became diciple of the saint. He married twice and passed away at 92.

Khawaja Moninuddin may be one of the first islamic evangelist in India even before the Muslim invaders came into India. His tomb is visited by both Muslim and Hindu devotees. I have heard people say that that his dargah (tomb) is a very powerful place (powerful in the sense that whatever the devotee wishes will hapen).

Travel:
The visit to the dargah was uneventful. I didn't feel anything much inside the dargah. It was crowded, unorganized, many ecstatic devotees and zealous priest looking to make money. After returning to hotel for lunch, we left for Pushkar which is few kilometers from Ajmer. We reached Pushkar in late afternoon. This place was teaming with foreign tourists and hindu piligrims. There is a lake where devotees take bath but I found none doing as it was very cold. But the sernenity of the lake ringed with many temples was spiritually touching. I visited the famed one and only one Brahma temple. Did not find it least bit appealing.

This is first of my experiences with North Indian hindu temples. While south India temples are very eloborate, with the priest dressed in certain way and the idols are large and life-like, north Indian temples have small idols usually dressed in daily wear like kurta and Pajama. The purohit looks just like anybody else. But the temples are usually beautiful and the temples are not crowded like those in south.

After Pushkar we headed for Fort Khajerla not knowing what it is and where we will be staying for the night. In between we stopped for a tea break but found a Rajasthani sweet shop with a friendly owner. Tasted some good sweets.

Follow the link to see a map of our travel through Rajasthan.