Lucknow: The book ‘Gumnaam Hindu Raja Tikait Rai’ was discussed on the platform ‘Lekhakganj’ of the Gomti book fair organized by the National Book Trust. Mukesh Bahadur Singh, who has a special identity in Lucknow, and social worker Varsha Verma took charge of the question-answer session with the author Naval Kant Sinha. Many questions were also asked by the readers. On this occasion, many journalists, writers and intellectuals of the city participated. Publisher Neeraj Arora welcomed the guests who came here.
Varsha Verma started the discussion and Mukesh Bahadur Singh asked a flurry of questions. The readers present not only increased their knowledge of Lucknow from this question-answer session but also enjoyed it. Naval Kant Sinha said that many characters of the city could not come in front of the stories of the Nawabs. There is no doubt that the Nawabs have a big contribution in taking Lucknow forward. But it is not that there were only Nawabs in this city. In that era, many heroes took the city forward. Many people did remarkable work in Lucknow but the mention of their names got suppressed in front of the stories of the Nawabs. Raja Tikait Rai was such a hero, without whom the history of Lucknow and Awadh is incomplete.
In an interesting question-answer session, Mukesh Bahadur Singh asked that there is a lot of talk about ‘Nawabi Shauk’ in Lucknow, what is the matter? On this Naval Kant Sinha told that in his book, there is a mention of the love between Nawab Asif-ud-Daula and Raja Jhau Lal. It is said that Nawab Asif-ud-Daula loved Jhau Lal with all his heart. This was a common topic of discussion. Nawabi Shauk became famous in the discussion of this love of the Nawab. Then such love came to be called Nawabi Shauk.
On the same question of Mukesh, the author mentioned the influence of Nawab Begum Sadarunnisa and daughter-in-law Begum Ummat-ul-Zahra. He also told that Alia Begum, whose real name was Chhatar Kunwari, was a great devotee of Hanuman. On the question of rain, Naval Kant Sinha mentioned that the pond of Tikaitganj in Lucknow, Ram Janaki temple, Sheetla Mata temple, bridge and ghat on Behta river in Kakori, temple and mosque there, Imambara of Tikaitganj, mosque, Haiderganj mosque, Raja Bazaar, Sunday market of Nakkhas, all these are the gifts of Tikait Rai. He had built Patthar Ghat, Baradari and temple in Bithoor, Pakka Ghat of Dalmau, Hanuman Garhi temple in Ayodhya. Damgarha Dargah in Handia of Prayagraj was built by Tikait Rai. The author resolved all the queries of the readers.
