The Place:
Rana Kumbha palace is located near the Vijaya Stamba of Chittorgarh Fort. It is built with plastered stone. The remarkable feature of the palace is its splendid series of canopied balconies.
The palace can be entered through the imposing Badipol and also through the modest Tripolia gate both being gateways to the east. Inside the palace complex is a Ganesh temple, a Zenana (living quater for women), a water reservoir, beautiful balconies, and stables of elephant and horses. Although in a dilapidated condition, the palace marks the prosperity of Rajput architecture.
Maharana Udai Singh, the founder of Udaipur, was born here; the popular folklore linked to his birth is that his maid Panna DaiPanna Dhai saved him by substituting her son in his place as a decoy, which resulted in her son getting killed by Banbir. The prince was spirited away in a fruit basket.
Rani Meera, the famous poetess saint, also lived in this palace. This is also the palace where Rani Padmini, consigned herself to the funeral pyre in one of the underground cellars, as an act of jauhar along with many other women.
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The Person:
Rana Kumbha was the ruler of Mewar, a state in western India, between 1433 and 1468 AD, and belonging to the Sisodia clan of Rajputs. Kumbha was a son of Rana Mokal of Mewar by his wife Sobhagya Devi, a daughter of Jaitmal Sankhla, the Parmara fief-holder of Runkot in the state of Marwar.
Rana Kumbha was the vanguard of the fifteenth century Hindu resurgence in northwestern India. A very tall and powerful man, he held the Mewar flag flying high in an age when several Indian kings like Kapilendradeva of east India, Deva Raya II of south India and Man Singh Tomar of central India defeated the Turkic invaders in different parts of India and expanded their kingdoms. Mewar was one of the major states ruled by an Indian ruler and owing sovereignty to no one but the Lord Eklingaji (Shiva).
Rana Kumbha was a versatile man, a brilliant poet, and a musician. He was a patron of the arts to rival Lorenzo de' Medici, and he made Chittorgarh a dazzling cultural centre whose fame spread across Hindustan. Maharana Kumbha is credited with writing the Samgita-raja, the Rasika-priya commentary on the Gitagovinda, the Sudaprabandha, and the Kamaraja-ratisara. No copies of the Sangita-ratnakara and Sangita-krama-dipaka (two books on music by Rana Kumbha) have survived.
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