Write Circle with Natwar Singh

With Natwar Singh

I arrived from Jaipur yesterday morning. There was another edition of the Write Circle in Jaipur on March 31, 2013. This time the author was Natwar Singh, the first IFS officer from Rajasthan and a veteran politician. He spoke about his new book first before opening up the session to the audience. He spoke about his insights and stories and incidences from his life as a career diplomat and politician. After he spoke, there were a series of questions from the select band of audience.

This time the event was held at the Ramgarh Lodge which is about 35 kilometers from Jaipur and comes under the Gateway Hotel division of Taj Group of Hotels. This Lodge, over looking the dam on one side and with a mountain on the other, is very famous. There isn't a single drop of water left in the dam at present and neither did I see any water during my last visit here few years ago when Devendra Singh used to be the resident manager of the Lodge.

I heard that the Ramgarh Lake, which used to feed water to the dam used, was full of water once and had hosted the rowing event for the 1982 Asiad. The Lake itself is now dry. I came to know that the Rajasthan Government has made a provision in the budget for bringing water back into the dam.

Not so far away, there is another property managed by the Rajasthan Tourism Development Corporation (RTDC). That too is languishing as there is no water in the dam which was the main attraction for the property.

Although for weekend getaways citizens of Jaipur used to come here. I have also noticed that the hotel has undergone a spate of renovation. But I think the old look was much better.

I will fly out to Singapore late night today.

ess bee