India, Nov. 23 -- Whenever 'Moti Mahal' comes up in a conversation among the residents of Lucknow, the usual response often centres around it being just a lawn for hosting banquets. Many overlook its rich history and the marvel it once was. Let's take a moment to piece together the fragments of this grand palace complex, to rediscover its origins, architectural splendor, and the role it played during the illustrious Nawabi era and beyond. Moti Mahal was built by Sa'adat Ali Khan, the sixth Nawab of Awadh, on the banks of river Gomti. It evolved into a magnificent palace complex during the rule of his son, Ghazi-ud-Din Haider, who enriched it by adding the Shah Manzil and the Mubaraq Manzil palaces. Over the years, Moti Mahal transformed into a substantial assemblage of palatial buildings, courtyards, pavilions and a baradari under successive rulers. The complex had a massive entrance gateway, which resembled a Scottish castle, complete with turrets and towers. Moti Mahal itself has been described as 'a two storeyed building painted pale turquoise, and crowned by a dome or a projection topped with a golden finial, which gave the impression of a pearl.' In 'General Views and Special Points of Interest of the City of Lucknow' by Lt Col David Scott Dodgson (1860), the 'Motee Mahal' (Plate 14) is depicted with its prominent, peculiar gateway and a building without any central dome, but four small domes at its four corners. This tends to throw the researcher off track, so let us delve a little more into this jig-saw puzzle. Among its various buildings, the Moti Mahal complex had a structure called 'Chauburji Kothi'; it is obvious that the Colonel had erred in his descriptions while naming various structures in his book. For example, he had labelled Badshah Bagh as Budshur Bagh and the Shah Najaf as Shah Nujeef. It seems probable that the Colonel had actually sketched the Chauburji Kothi and labelled it as Motee Mahal. In this context, a scroll painting (watercolour and gouache, with gold) by an unknown artist (1826) currently with the Yale Centre for British Art, Connecticut, USA, titled 'Lucknow from The Gomti' or 'Lucknow Panorama' is much more informative, i.e. it clearly shows the Moti Mahal along the banks of the Gomti (see inset) with its dome and gold finial, together with other adjoining structures as also a royal barge moving down the river. That the Moti Mahal was somehow connected with animal fights, so popular during Nawabi rule, is well known. However, an enigmatic situation exists even for this. Some writers are of the view that the Shah Manzil was the venue for the animal fights, while others state that the ruler and his guests would be seated at a vantage point and the animal fights took place across the river, in a 'ramna' or park, called Hazari Bagh, which stretched for miles. To come down to brass tacks, it would be impossible for anyone to witness an animal fight taking place across the river, unless the viewer, seated on his balcony, was equipped with a high-powered telescope. It is much more probable that the fights took place in an enclosure, in one of the courtyards of the Moti Mahal complex itself; this premise is supported by the numerous sketches and descriptions of the animal fights which successive European guests like Viscount Valentia and Bishop Heber had witnessed during their visit to Lucknow. Other than animal fights, the Moti Mahal complex seems to have been used as a venue for leisure and even for marriage festivities, as Wajid Ali Shah had stated in his semi-biographical 'Ishqnama'. Aloys Sprenger, who had been deputed by the East India Company to catalogue the Royal Library during Wajid Ali Shah's reign, wrote that the library had been split into different sections. The 'valuable literary works' more than three thousand in numbers, were preserved in a garden house of Moti Mahal palace and the 'elegant books' were stored in the Farhat Baksh palace. During the events of 1857-58, the Moti Mahal palace complex was the scene of heavy fighting and was captured by the British on November 17, 1857. After the British abandoned the city, the palace complex was fortified by the freedom fighters, but the British recaptured it on March 14, 1858. The turreted gateway of Moti Mahal was the location where the British Generals: Colin Campbell, Henry Havelock and James Outram had met, which was immortalised in a painting called 'Meeting of The Generals' by Thomas Barker Jones. A commemorative plaque was later erected on the spot by the colonial administration, which exists till today. Alexius Abbot Saunders, formerly a Major General in the Bengal Army was Commissioner of Lucknow during 1858-1863. His wife established the Lucknow Girls' School on the premises of Moti Mahal, which was later shifted to the Khurshid Manzil palace and renamed as La Martiniere Girls' High School. The palace complex seemed to have lost its architectural features with the passage of time. A photograph of the building dated 1900 shows a European-style two-storeyed building with arched verandah on the ground floor and windows on the first. The turreted gateway collapsed during the floods in Lucknow during September, 1923, and was subsequently demolished. Nothing remains of the original Moti Mahal today other than its name. PC Sarkar, a former scientist, has authored several books on the forgotten heritage of Lucknow...