Ajmer revisited

A trip to Ajmer is, for me, a journey straight down memory lane. Going back in the winter of 2009-10, I found the place had changed little in the nearly twenty years since I was here last. The bazaars were as congested, as noisy as ever before. Cattle continued to make off with vegetables hanging from the edge of a hawker's cart, beggars continue to throng the approach lanes to the Dargah and people still treat red-beaconed government vehicles with a degree of awe now absent in much of India.

Having said that Ajmer's heart is essentially the same, I would like to add that its peripheral parts have been dynamic over time. There are more vehicles on the road, many driven by women - something that would have been regarded as unusual in the late 1980s. Road connectivity is impressive - the National Highway from Jaipur gets you to the city in under three hours. Industry has arrived in the town and employment is being generated locally.

Education, though seems to have declined. The city used to have a reputation of being an education hub - this is something that has not kept up with the times and is in decline. The mantle of being Rajasthan's educational hub seems to have firmly shifted to Kota, albeit as a coaching centre. Institutions like St. Anslems - my old school - seem like stragglers from a different era.

The buildings remain as marvellous as ever. The church in my old school has had a fresh coat of paint on its Gothic exterior and is better for it. The Dargah - whose spaces have become more commercialized than ever before - looks fairly chaotic, though the upkeep of the buildings within is excellent. The Adhai-din-ka-jhopra is in great shape, its arches still glowing when the rays of the rising sun fall on them. It is interesting that while most 'modern' things in Ajmer have changed, the charm of the old buildings is still intact.