Fateh Prakash Mahal, Chittorgarh; a double storeyed building, east of Kumbha's Palace. Built by Maharana FATEH SINGH (1884-1930), it now houses the STATE ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM. Its graceful architecture features a tower surmounted by a domed chhatri on each of its four corners. Originally, it was a huge palace of modern style, featuring a large idol of GANESH (the elephant god), a fountain, and different delightful frescoes.

Fateh Prakash Palace, Udaipur; at the southern end of the CITY PALACE, between the ZANANA MAHAL and SHAMBHU NIWAS PALACE. It is the youngest of a family of grand palaces, built at the turn of the 20^th century by Maharana FATEH SINGH (1884-1930). It has an impressively large and airy Durbar Hall, with magnificent chandeliers, portraits of Maharanas around the walls, a first floor balcony of arched windows, and an adjoining area, the Gallery Restaurant with a breath-taking overview of Pichola Lake and the Lake Palace, and the breath-taking Crystal Collection. British Viceroy Lord Minto laid the palace's foundation stone on November 3, 1909. It is the only palace to have steel girders; all others are built with stone arches, lintels and pillars and stone slabs for ceilings, but there are a few wooden beams, extremely well preserved. It was in this hall that the great durbars (royal audiences) of the past took place. Behind it, on the shore of PICHOLA LAKE is the Sunset View Terrace and the jetty for launches to the Lake Palace (JAG NIWAS), and the superb forty-five-room annex, The Dovecote. Today, it is an HRH Group heritage hotel. For reservations see HRH GROUP RESERVATIONS. See also CRYSTAL COLLECTION, CRYSTAL GALLERY, DOVECOTE, DURBAR HALL, GALLERY RESTAURANT, and SUNSET VIEW TERRACE.

Fateh Sagar, the second of Udaipur's four man-made lakes. In 1678, Maharana JAI SINGH (1680-1698), who had already constructed the famous JAISAMAND LAKE southeast of Udaipur, excavated this new but small lake. It lies immediately to the north of, and connected by a canal to PICHOLA LAKE, which had been established by Maharana UDAI SINGH II a century earlier. Fateh Sagar is 2.4 km. long, 1.6 km. wide and 11.5 m. at its deepest point; when full, it covers an area of about 1 sq. km., being fed by the Ahar (Berach) river. It is possible to drive around the complete circumference of the lake via Moti Magri Road, Fateh Sagar Drive, and Rani Road, a serpentine route that provides beautiful views of the lake as well as the encircling Aravalli Hills. The main causeways to the lake are from Pichola Lake, Madar Lake, and Badi Lake. It has three intake channels and an overflow channel for the rainy season. Two centuries after its construction, a severe storm and heavy rainfall collapsed the old eastern embankment causing loss of life and considerable damage, especially to the nearby, lower-level SAHELION-KI-BARI gardens. In 1889, to prevent further such flooding, Maharana FATEH SINGH reconstructed the embankment at a cost of Rs. 6 lakhs (600,000 rupees). Later that same year, the Duke of Connaught, third son of Queen Victoria laid the new embankment's foundation stone, and the lake was renamed Fateh Sagar. This reconstructed northeastern embankment has three names, the Pal, the Drive, or Connaught Bund (embankment or breakwater). Along it is the entrance to MOTI MAGRI hill, on the summit of which is a landscaped park with the Maharana PRATAP MEMORIAL. Three small islands grace Fateh Sagar, the largest being NEHRU PARK, a popular garden island with a restaurant and zoo, which is reached by inboard motor boats from the bottom of Moti Magri Hill. The Government of Rajasthan made the second island into a public park with a spectacular water-jet fountain, and the third houses the UDAIPUR SOLAR OBSERVATORY, the largest in Asia. A peaceful spot not far from the city centre, the lake is a popular leisure area for picnics and water recreation in hired pedal boats. Because of Fateh Sagar's blue waters and its backdrop of green hills, it is often referred to as the second Kashmir, an epithet often given to all of Udaipur.

Fateh Secondary School, Udaipur; in the central eastern sector of the city on Guru Nanak Road.

Fateh Singh. Apart from Maharana Fateh Singh, there were several leading members of clans who had this name. They came from Amet (Choondawat); Barlias (Sisodia); Boheda (Saktawat); Delwara (Jhala Rajput); Jamoli (Baba); Kaladwas (Chavda); Karoi (Ranawat); Kerya (Poorawat); Kotharia (Chauhan), and Taloli (Choondawat). There was also Kunwar Fateh Singh, brother of Maharaja Zorawar Singh of Bhindar, and Fateh Singh, elder son of Raja Dhiraj SUJAN SINGH of Shahpura. He was killed, along with his brother Veeramdeo, at the battle of Dharmat, assisting Maharana Jaswant Singh against Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. Fateh's minor son, Himmat Singh succeeded as the new chieftain of Shahpura. Six years later Sujan Singh's fourth son, Daulat Singh usurped Shahpura and became its ruler. Fateh Singh's descendants were forced to relocate to Gangwas and Barliawas.

Fateh Singh, Maharana (b. December 16, 1849 at Shivrati-d. May 24, 1929 at Udaipur), seventy-third ruler of the Mewar Dynasty (r. 1884-1930); adopted son and successor of Maharana SAJJAN SINGH; ruled from Udaipur. Dal Singh of Shivrati was his biological father. Fateh's elder brother, Gaj Singh who had no heir, adopted him first. Then Maharana Sajjan Singh, who also had no heir, adopted him. At the time of his adoption by Sajjan Singh, Fateh Singh was a cousin from a minor clan of good peasant stock, who was actually six years older than Sajjan. Coming as he did from a rustic background, Fateh was uneducated and essentially illiterate. But there was a quiet religious strength, a noble bearing, and an aura of austere self-assurance in this humble young man, characteristics that were to earn him the reputation of being the head of the Hindu nation, and the last true monarch of India. His full title was 'H.H. Sri Sri 108 Sri Maharaj Adhiraj Raj Rajeshwar Ravi Kula Bushana-Mahi Mahindra Yavadarya Kula Kamaldhivakara Chattis Rajkul Singar Maharana Sir Fateh Singhji Bahadur, G.C.S.I., Hindua Suraj, Hindupati of Udaipur'. A loyal contemporary chronicler, Chandradoji Sisodia, extolled the Maharana's virtues as such:

He is one of the most courteous of courtly Rajputs, an unfailing product of high culture and refinement, intensely conservative, jealous upholder of the Sisodia dignity, a typical Rajput of the old school, a keen sportsman, taking delight in all manly sports of the Rajputs, a daring huntsman ever in the track of big game, courageous and brave, generous of nature, a father to the people, an example in his domestic life to the future generation of Rajput princes. He spends his days usefully in the task of governing his people on old traditional lines of personal rule, takes a personal interest in the details of administration in the welfare of his people. He is liked by his own subjects, respected by other Rajput princes and their subjects and is second to none in his dignified loyalty to the Imperial Throne of Britain. He would not hesitate to assume the 'Saffron Robe' (Emblem of Victory and Death) if needed, and glory in making His Imperial Majesty's enemies his own, die fighting under the banner of that chivalry of which His Imperial Majesty King George V is the head.

Maharana Fateh Singh was aged 32 when he began his memorable reign of forty-six years. In the tenacious tradition of his ancestors, he steadfastly held out against accepting a subservient status to the British. A noble Rajput through and through, he reluctantly treated the British presence in his kingdom with deference (after all, he could not get rid of them) but maintained a superior reserve in all dealings with them.

Twice a situation arose when he was expected to present himself but refrained from physical attendance (he rarely wavered from his convictions). The first was in 1903, at the Delhi Durbar of the then Viceroy, Lord Curzon, to celebrate the accession of King Edward VII. The Maharana travelled as far as Delhi in two trains, accompanied by one thousand retainers, to attend the Imperial Durbar. When he discovered that he had not been accorded his rightful place in the procession (he had been placed after Hyderabad, Mysore, Kashmir and Baroda), he returned to Udaipur without getting off his train. The second was a similar incident, in 1911, at another Durbar in Delhi for the visit of England's King George V. His condescension continually frustrated and aggravated the British; in turn, there was nothing they could do about that. Fateh Singh was his own man, the faithful servant and trustee of Eklingji: the welfare of his people came first. Any decisions proposed by the British were made when Fateh Singh felt the time was appropriate for them to be made. What exasperated the British even more than the Maharana's procrastination was that he ensured all members of his Court emulated his aloof attitude. In short, he put the outsiders in what he considered was their rightful place: he was the paramount power in Mewar; the British were, if not his subjects, then certainly his servants. It seemed to work, although the British were obviously being more prudent than potently persuasive, as in the past. Publicly, they treated him almost as a demi-god and showed him more respect than any of the other Indian Princes.

During his reign, they showered him with honours: a 21-gun salute on all official occasions and visits from English royalty including the Duke and Duchess of Kent whom Fateh Singh treated with dignified respect, but as equals. England awarded the Maharana its highest military decoration for his help in World War I, which was more a gratuitous act as he had supplied only two hundred camels. He refused to wear it, telling the bearer to put it on the horse, adding, "It looks better on a horse than on a king." A handsome man, tall and straight, with a magnificent white beard and moustache in later years, he lived an austere private life, rising at 5 a.m. every morning, and spending an hour at prayers. He never touched alcohol and was emphatically pious, never missing a Monday visit to worship Eklingji. He married twice, taking a second wife only after the death of his first, although, by tradition, Rajputs were allowed several wives and a rawala (or zanana, ladies' apartments) of concubines. His entertainment was simple, hunting being his only form of leisure.

Breaking the run of the inability of recent rulers to produce an heir, Fateh Singh sired a son, Bhupal Singh, and two daughters, one who married Maharaja Sardar Singh of Jodhpur, and the other married Maharaja Maddan Singh of Kishengarh. He adored his son and heir who was born one year before his accession. Therefore, it came as a severe blow to Fateh when Bhupal, at the age of 16, was diagnosed as having contracted tuberculosis and severe curvature of the spine (see BHUPAL SINGH, MAHARANA). Life was never really the same again for Fateh Singh. However, despite his apparent detachment, the Maharana was responsible for some wonderful gifts that now adorn Udaipur. He built the elegant, crescent-shaped SHIV NIWAS PALACE (directly behind Shambu Niwas), then only single-storeyed. He occupied one of the palace's more modest suites, now Room 5. The other rooms were for his guests. Fateh Singh took delivery of a collection of crystal furniture and objets d'art from England, which had been ordered by his father Sajjan Singh in 1877 but arrived after that Maharana's death. Fateh Singh deigned not to use it, keeping the collection in its original crates. (Maharana Bhagwat Singh put it on public display in 1944.) Fateh Singh also funded district schools, a college, dispensaries and public hospitals; and repaired Chittorgarh's Tower of Fame and the fort's second gate, Bhairon Pol. He enlarged Fateh Sagar (1889), and reconstructed Sahelion-ki-Bari Gardens that had been flooded when an embankment of the nearby lake collapsed. At Kumbhalgarh, he built Badal Mahal, and Victoria Hall in Sajjan Niwas Garden to mark the English Queen's Jubilee. Here, he installed a most comprehensive library. Between Shambhu Niwas and the City Palace he built a huge Durbar Hall with many rooms and galleries, naming it after the British governor-general Lord Minto (now called FATEH PRAKASH PALACE, 'prakash' meaning 'light'). In his continual efforts to modernise the State, he introduced the railway and telegraph, linking Mewar to the rest of India.

In 1921, the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII then the Duke of Windsor after his abdication) made a special trip to Udaipur to see Fateh Singh. Claiming illness, the Maharana refused to meet him at the railway station, and deputised his son, Baoji Raj Bhupal, to do the honours. Annoyed and suspicious, the Agent to the Rajputana (Rajasthan) Governor-General wrote a secret letter to the British Government condemning Fateh Singh for his insult, retracting a former statement he had made about the Maharana being a gentleman. This was the final straw for the British. They considered Fateh Singh had become too inflexible in his demeanour and was ignorant of the social unrest in Mewar that was being stirred up mainly by members of the new communist movement. Thus, in July 1921, the British curtailed the Maharana's power. He was formally deposed, making their emasculation of the State complete. Fateh was allowed to retain his titular right to the throne, but effective power was handed to his son and heir, Bhupal Singh. Despite his fall from grace, Bapuji (honoured father) as his subjects called him, was greatly mourned when he died in 1930. It is written that Fateh Singh was "a great leader and a man of consummate nobility-it was if a divinity had perished." Fateh Singh's natural born son, Bhupal Singh, succeeded him.

Fatehpura, a northern suburb of Udaipur.

Fatehsagar Lake: see FATEH SAGAR.