The Marwaris trace their descent to a small pocket of Rajasthan, a state with an opulent tradition of art and architecture
The Marwaris have little to do with Marwar (or Jodhpur, as most people know the capital) in spite of the moniker they bear with such pride; they were originally from the Shekhawati region: Small towns in a triangle that lay between Delhi, Jaipur and Bikaner. (Ironically, there they weren’t known as Shekhawats, that nomenclature being claimed by the Rajputs.) They flourished as businessmen with an acute sense of enterprise, making money from the satta markets and stock exchanges of cities and countries far from their own.
The name was earned because a few ingenious grandees from the business families of Shekhawati marched with the army of the maharaja of Jodhpur (or Marwar, as it was known) to Calcutta. These innovative businessmen, who kept the infantry supplied with uniforms, boots, rations and horses, soon earned the sobriquet ‘Marwaris’, a term the British used when looking to appoint business suppliers who kept them fed and watered, and managed the local trade that the East India Company needed to flourish in what would become the outpost of the Empire. It was in Calcutta that the Marwaris made their biggest fortunes—RK Dalmia becoming the ‘silver king’ for hoarding the metal at the height of the war years in Europe.
The Marwaris spotted the opportunity that was offered to them on the silver salver emblazoned with the emblem of the Windsor crown: There was business to be done, money to be made, and they made it, sending the wealth back to the dusty desert, to build homes to rival the mansions of the elite in the cities.
Forts and temples, palaces and mansions, murals and frescos, inlay and pietra-dura. Architecture that is Rajput, Mughal, British, Indo-Saracenic, Art-Deco, Gothic, Elizabethan, Edwardian, with interiors enhanced with gold, painted, chandeliered, carpeted, styled into Indian zenanas and European salons, with private lakes (Udaipur) and railways (most kingdoms had their own), aircraft (Jodhpur’s maharaja died in an air crash the day he won independent India’s first elections; Bikaner’s Karni Singh piloted his own aeroplane, and rare bombers are part of its museum; Udaipur’s Arvind Singh still flies his own aircraft) and polo teams (Jaipur demanding and getting what was considered the world’s finest team, the Jodhpurs, in dowry). It was an exciting, eclectic, creative hothouse and, amazingly, much of that heritage is still thriving.
Once they started travelling overseas, there was no holding back the potentates. They brought back European treasures. The maharana of Udaipur ordered a palace full of Osler crystal furniture, now on view in a gallery of the City Palace. The Jodhpurs ordered all the furniture for Umaid Bhawan from London. (As ill-luck would have it, the manufacturer’s factory burned down, then a second order shipped by sea was bombed—these were the War years. So, finally, local carpenters recreated the Art-Deco furniture. Today, Jodhpur is a major centre for the manufacture of colonial and made-as-old furniture.) They also ordered Wedgwood, Bohemian crystal, Rosenthal tableware and dinner services. The maharanis wore Mughal jewellery created by artisans in Bikaner and Jaipur—24k gold and uncut diamonds, with enamel work on the reverse—and also ordered from Cartier and Van, Cleef & Arpels.
Both Marwaris and Rajputs commissioned sculptors and painters to create relief panels to embellish temples. In Nathdwara, the pichwais (curtains) that concealed a jhanki of Krishna became celebrated for the quality of their paintings, turning into religious souvenirs before becoming collectibles. In Pushkar’s fair, even the camels’ coats were cut into patterns of almost abstract design.
(This story appears in the 21 March, 2014 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)