Divine Horses of - Friends of Marwari / Kathiawari Horse UK

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The Marwari Horse regal meeting rooms and disused watchtowers, allowing arrow-slit views towards the shimmering desert, transport the imagination back to more uncertain times. I had been fortunate enough to coincide my week’s riding at Dundlod with the Gangaur festival, the main event in the Rajasthani calendar. At the Sheikhawati Horse Show I would have a chance to see the Marwaris in action. Horses play a major part in the Gangaur processions and have always held a special place in the hearts of Rajasthani men. A local folksong has a wife lamenting: “How can I compare as a lover to the mare when she is close to thee? “I’m sure that when she’s between your thighs you lose all thought for me.” Gangaur is essentially the Hindu celebration of the marriage of Gan (Lord Shiva) and Gauri (the goddess Parvati). Bejewelled effigies of the divine couple are put on display in the great diwan-khana reception rooms of the castles, and the shrouded women of the Dholak caste gather to chant their endless litanies. The villagers dress in their finest clothes and the bright saris gleam like neon against the sunbleached Rajasthani stonework and the desiccated landscape. Young women beg the goddess Gauri to find them a good and loving husband…while The Gangaur procession trooping out of Fort Dundlod married women content themselves with asking The women of Rajasthan make offerings to effigies of Lord Shiva and his wife Parvati www.nagmagmedia.com email: info@nagmagmedia.com June 2009 NagMag ❘ 29
The Marwari Horse ❝ To know and love the Marwari is to re-enter a magical realm of our childhood ❞ for a general improvement in the behaviour of the current one. The horse show has become a marketplace for the nomadic horse-traders of the Marasi tribe, and the Raika communities whose great camel-drawn wagon trains are still a fixture of Rajasthani highways. Though far smaller than the world famous Pushkar Camel Fair, Sheikhawati is yet to be overrun by tour groups. The afternoon was filled with show jumping, tent-pegging and ‘hanky-picking’ – where the rider swings down below his galloping A Marwari displays its unique lyre-shaped ears, during guard duty at Fort Dundlod horse to grab a shred of cloth from the ground – tournaments between the Indian Police and the (victorious) Dundlod team. As the sun began to set into the dust of the polo field, richly decorated dancing camels and horses were led out to display talents that still survive from the Natchni – a now extinct dancing strain of the Marwari. Just as tent-pegging dates back to dawn attacks by lancers who flicked the pegs from enemy tents, dancing to wild drum beats was a way of teaching these agile horses evasive footwork and of habituating them to the clamour of battle. “If horses don’t run during Gangaur,” say the Rajasthanis, “when will they run?” Over the course of a week Raat ki Rani took me on many long runs through the Sheikhawati countryside. We trotted through villages where young men paused in their endless games of cricket to wave. Kohl-eyed girls looked up from their laundry to smile bashfully. We cantered through flocks of posturing peacocks and herds of haughty camels and, one unforgettable morning, we galloped with a herd of wild nilgai antelope. Despite my soldierly delusions I never did get to ride into battle with the Dundlod Cavalry or get to prove my worth as a mounted striker for the Rajasthani Wanderers (or even the Sheikhawati bicycle polo team). I still look back with a feeling of gratitude, however, that throughout all those breathtaking morning gallops Queen of the Night had the simple decency and noble-breeding to allow me to retain my rather insecure seat on her back. NM 30 ❘ NagMag June 2009 Tel: 01273 491 550 www.nagmagmedia.com
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Divine Horses of - Friends of Marwari / Kathiawari Horse UK

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