Fort Placid

UNBELIEVABLY CLOSE TO THE CLAMOUR OF DELHI, AN ABODE OF ART AND PEACE IS GRADUALLY TAKING SHAPE. IT’S ALSO A REMARKABLE RESTORATION DRAMA, SAYS AMIT DIXIT

- Amit Dixit

Rarely have we followed the resurgence of a fort with such interest. Some years ago, when we learnt that the Neemrana Group of Hotels was developing a hitherto abandoned fort in Rajasthan into—for want of a better word—a hotel, we decided we had to observe the process at close quarters, to sit humbly at the feet of this restoration work in progress. We first visited when the bulldozers were still vrooming. We returned a few times as construction proceeded, documenting the transformation. Later, we came to stay at the newly opened property. It was lovely but the mules were still delicately hauling supplies up the hill (actually, they still are).

Last month, I returned to Tijara and found much had changed since our second visit. For one, this is a project way more ambitious than Neemrana; after all it’s a grander canvas. For another, ideas emerge fast and furious from the fecund imagination of Aman Nath, Chairman, Neemrana Hotels. No one else could have pulled it off, because Tijara Fort-Palace, above all, is an act of the imagination.