Horses feature heavily in the ancient murals and paintings of the Rajasthan warlords, bearing the region’s kings in processions, battles and hunting expeditions. But walk the streets today and the horse has largely been usurped by the humble donkey.
But donk doesn’t shout about it. He is too busy hauling improbably heavy loads and getting whipped for his trouble. Ponies do remain but it is a harder life now, although for the majority, not accustomed to the luxury of the royal stables, it probably always was. Their lives were never committed to canvas and so we know little of the social history of our four legged friend.
Many have have adapted to the new reality and the wisest now devote their efforts to the tourist trade, leaving the triumphant donk to reap the whirlwind of massive population growth and painfully slow mechanisation.
With some trepidation we visited the pampered few and put ourselves in the capable hands of Dinesh at the Krishna riding school. Krishna, of course, has eight arms and carries an array of weapons; a perfect combination with which to confront the undoubtedly wild Marwari horses that once rode the maharajas unflinchingly into all sorts of gold plated scrapes.
The 4x4 picked us up from the Mewargarh Palace after breakfast, where posh Louise was waiting in the back seat. Clara from Manhattan climbed in next to her and off we trundled, never making it out of 2nd gear of below 4,500 revs. Out of town and into the preserve of rural farmsteads we motored until we were deposited at a pleasantly leafy compound where five good looking horses were tethered, a little unnecessarily by bit and hind leg.
Dinesh, it gradually became apparent was something different. Eloquent, landed, married to a Dutch woman, well-travelled and an excellent horseman, these were just a few of the characteristics that we learned of during our 3 hour ride around the fields of sugar cane and alfalfa. It turns out he is a nephew of the recently abdicated Mewar dynasty maharaja. If he was a trifle rankled at his uncle’s unilateral decision to cash in the family's 1,350 year old chips and hand the fruits of the dynasty over the state, he didn’t reveal a flicker. Besides, he seemed to being doing OK for himself without too much help from old Uncle Mewar.
Clare rode a bay mare called Sapna and I braved the stallion, Mansa. A tad concerned was I that they don’t routinely geld their stallions and lively is the word for these nags. School ponies generally proceed at a pace somewhere between Go Slow and Stop. Marwari have been genetically engineered, through generations of careful breeding, to interpret the slightest gesture as an invitation to hit the gas. The merest touch of the heel on the flank and you can feel the coiled spring just waiting to unwind. On the plus side, there are no histrionics either. Plastic bags are just plastic bags, rather than an excuse to buck or shy. A rustling in the hedgerow does not induce equine panic and an odd shaped cloud is not cause for a nervous breakdown.
We stopped for chai and again for a walk around a village, narrowly avoiding an invitation to a boisterous wake. Posh Louise escaped lightly with a tumble onto a rocky path and wisely spent the remainder of the hack on the back of No. 2’s motorbike. A final stop at the pavilions above Tiger Lake, where surprisingly crocodiles still roam and Indian’s still swim, was the turning point for home.
Sapna was pregnant and ready for some shade. Louise’s pony had a 4 month old foal and whinnied to it for the last mile. Mansa finally got the message that today was not a day for tearing about and following a long drink at a roadside trough, settled down when home was in sight.
Dinesh was delightful and despite the mishaps, so were his ponies.
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