Diya Kumari
Jaipur
Ancestor to reckon with: Man Singh I (commander-in-chief of the Mughal army during Akbar's reign).
The City Palace, Jaipur. We are whisked past the public museum area of the Indo-Sarcenic monument and into the highly restricted Chandra Mahal, the family residence. We traverse the courtyard where Eklavya and Umrao Jaan were shot and where Aamir Khan pranced for an ad, just the day before. This is also where corporates like Mercedes Benz and Renault as well as private NRIs celebrate, sometimes with an appearance thrown in by Maharaja Sawai Bhawani Singh II, himself. Durga Diya Enterprises, the in-house event management company is run by Diya Kumari, the soft-spoken princess of Jaipur whose flashing eyes contradict her still bearing. She is gently in command, refusing to sit back on her royal heritage, even as 300 staff members and retainers remain in abeyance and adabs and prostrations are a fact of royal contemporary living, here.

The fabulous Sukh Niwas, was named by Maharaja Savai Jaisingh II in 1727 after his favourite wife, Sukh Kanwar. This former royal bedroom and dining hall is today the palace showpiece, its gold frescos intact; its walls hung with priceless miniatures by the late 16th century artist, Mansoor; enormous crystal chandeliers that clink tales of another era, in the warm desert breeze; a show-stopper Lalique dining table, intricately etched. "I live in a palace but it is a normal lifestyle. It looks very glamorous but it is not glamorous anymore. It is hard work," says Diya, whose day starts early taking her children to the palace Montessori school that she founded because there were no appropriate schools in Jaipur. Today, she is involved in the creation of a high school, over 13 acres near the airport, the Sawai Bhawani Singh School. Heir to a dynasty that has always promoted education, this is a normal extension of regal living.

Siddhi Kumari
Bikaner
Ancestor to reckon with: Raja Rai Singhji (6th ruler of Bikaner - built the Junagarh Fort).
When in Mumbai, Siddhi Kumari, granddaughter of Sushila Kumari and the late Maharaja, Arjuna awardee and clay pigeon trap and skeet shooting champion, Karni Singh, seemingly casts off her lineage like a heavily embellished dupatta. Monsoon months are normally spent in a city that continues to frighten her with heavy downpours, indifferent cab drivers and crowded roads. But, the young princess is never alone; even taxi rides, when deemed necessary, are chaperoned and bodyguards, however inconspicuous, an essential way of life. They blend seamlessly into the bustle around South Mumbai's club life, for partying 'over the weekends only' becomes part of the Rajkumari's city statement. That most of her friends have no clue of her mighty ancestry bothers her not the slightest even as she hunts eagerly for Cavalli jeans, D & G separates and visits her favourite boutique, Melange, with obsessive frequency. "In Bikaner, I have no social life," she says with her twittering, musical laugh. "Maybe I should live in a metro city…but, no, I like to have both options."

We meet quite a different Siddhi at Bikaner's Prachina Cultural Centre and Museum, a project initiated and owned by her and targetting a predominantly European clientele. We are in the environs of the mighty Junagarh Fort, owned by the family, which houses a larger museum starring armaments and even an antiquated plane, probably a royal plaything. Prachina boasts a more delicate collection inherited by Siddhi from her grandmother and mother. The textile section which highlights the poshaks worn on special occasions, is very close to her heart. Restored to perfection with special gold thread and individually mounted, "These are very girl-like designs…very peppy, very tempting, very fun...." Reminiscent of an era that seems somehow hopelessly lost.

Kavita Rathore
Jodhpur
Ancestor to reckon with: Maharaja Rao Jodha (founder of jodhpur (1459), built the Mehrangarh fort).
As we descend onto Jodhpur's newly-painted airport, our turboprop plane throws up sliding vistas of desert scrub, flat as a model's ironed tresses. We wend our way through the city, its skyline dominated by the plush and overpowering Umaid Bhawan Palace, to the smaller Ajit Bhawan, India's first heritage hotel. A side entrance, cordoned off from public trespassing, leads to the home of Kavita and Raghavendra Rathore whose cavernous rooms laden with priceless relics and polo and hunting pictures of yore, have been variously visited by international designers like Diane Von Furstenberg and Calvin Klein. Not surprising, given that Jodhpur has made famous that stylish item of clothing - the hip-flaring jodhpurs, reinvented as a style statement by the city's young prince, Yuvraj Shivraj Singh, in Europe's trendiest nightclubs before his tragic polo accident. And of course, the fact that Raghavendra Rathore, in breakaway mode for a royal, is today one of India's leading designers, drawing heavily from his majestic heritage.

"It is like any other house…after all it is home," says Kavita, of her palace domain. She is elegantly 7-months pregnant and mother to Amar (2-and-a-half). "I am doing everything like any other working mother. Just because you have the privilege of many helping hands, it is not fair to suppose that things are different." Kavita, native to Jodhpur, grew up in Papua New Guinea in the South pacific, completed her higher education in the US, obtained a bachelors degree in hotel administration and an MS in Information Systems. Armed with these impressive qualifications and a regular on the Jodhpur social scene on her family's visits home, ("When you are brought up abroad, you are in touch with your roots more intensely") she encountered her prince however at an airport, while in transit. Today, she finds no dichotomy living in a palace and working with her husband's label, 'Rathore Jodhpur'. He is the creative person while she takes care of the administration. A rather modern division of roles, almost too modern for this style of living. A far cry from the traditions of purdah and immolation....

And yet, there is the polo season that is celebrated in right royal fashion since the present Maharaja, Gaj Singh II 'Bapji' to all and his son revived the pomp and splendour of this sport of rulers. Kavita would play out the season as an insider in jeans and a smart T-shirt. And there is holi played en masse with all the royal family in traditional garb. And the grand annual procession of the goddess Parvati and Shivji that starts at the Umaid Bhawan and winds its way to the formidable Mehrangarh Fort, in colourful array and then on to the zenana where the women wait in traditional ensembles and fabulous jewellery. "The zenana is still in existence," Kavita says, "though the connotations have changed. Purdah is no longer in continuance, though the code of conduct is still there…the symbolism is still there."

Divya Kumari
Bharatpur
Ancestor to reckon with: Maharaja Jawahar Singh (bought a fleet of Rolls Royces and converted them into Bharatpur's garbage collecting vehicles after being snubbed by an insolent Rolls Royce salesman).

To one side of the unassuming, dry, baked city of Bharatpur, renowned through the ages for its famous bird sanctuary and celebrity-and-caviar-soaked duck shoots, with nothing much in sight besides mud walls, a sudden wide road leads to a palace of beautiful proportions. We bypass this, the Moti Mahal, boarded up and destined for conversion into a heritage hotel by the Taj group, and stop at an outhouse, formerly a royal guest house for trigger-happy dignitaries. Amongst paintings of local ducks, taxidermy deer, portraits of a young prince and silver birds crafted aerodynamically in flight, we meet with Divya Kumari of Bharatpur and her upright, moustachioed, four-term MP husband, Vishvendra Singh, who would have, had the twists of Indian royal history been different, commanded a 19-gun salute. "These days, the only way to maintain a palace is to lease it to the Taj," Divya says, regretful of having to leave the carpets (one that has been fashioned from 32 tiger skins), full taxidermy bison and tigers, chandeliers, trophies and the virtues of high ceilings. Thirty old-timers and retainers, however, continue to serve their royal masters.

"We are the only family in Rajasthan that is not into hotel running and tourism but both of us are full-fledgedly into politics," says Divya, who gave up her seat in Parliament, 10 years ago, to care for her young son, Anirudh (16). "And this, after fighting an election in 45 degrees heat, her skin burnt brown," maintains her husband, who, for the last 17 years has been responsible for continuously defeating political stalwart, Natwar Singh. "It took a lot of strength but I cannot be like other royal women who have dumped their children for a seat in parliament," she counters. Today, back in the Rajasthan assembly, her mornings are spent as an ordinary modern housewife while in the afternoons and evenings, she is free to meet her caring goals of educating the girl child and empowerment of Rajasthan's women.