Landmark · Jodhpur

Jaswant Thada

In 60 seconds

Jaswant Thada is a marble cenotaph in Jodhpur, Rajasthan, India, ten minutes' walk from Mehrangarh's gate — commissioned in 1899 by Maharaja Sardar Singh for his father Jaswant Singh II and completed in 1906. The Mehrangarh Museum Trust charges ₹100 for international visitors and ₹50 for domestic ones, 09:00 to 17:00, and lists no camera fee. Its Makrana marble is cut so thin that direct sun passes through it, which is why the walls glow amber from the inside at midday — the one monument in Rajasthan that is better at noon than at either end of the day.

Fees & timings

CHECKED AGAINST OFFICIAL SOURCES · AUGUST 2026

Entry	₹100 international · ₹50 domestic
Camera	No camera fee — the Trust lists none, so do not let anyone sell you one
Hours	09:00 – 17:00 daily
Built	Commissioned 1899 by Sardar Singh; completed 1906
Best hour	High sun — this is the rare monument that wants midday
Allow	40 minutes, plus the approach road for the fort view

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Marble thin enough to see through

The sheets are Makrana — the Taj's quarry — dressed and polished until light passes through them. Stand inside with the sun high and the walls turn the colour of weak tea, veined and lit from behind. Nobody tells you to go at midday, because midday is wrong everywhere else.

The India Unfolded edit

Three things to look at, that nobody points out

The portraits along the wall

Rathore rulers in sequence, back to the founding — a family tree hung as paintings. Find Jaswant Singh II, whose cenotaph this is, and then find the gap where a ruler died young.

The tank below

The cenotaph sits above a small reservoir, which is the reason for its siting: the rock catches water, and the water is why anything was built up here at all.

The later cenotaphs

Jaswant Thada is the big one, but the enclosure holds the memorials of the rulers who followed — smaller, plainer, and mostly walked past.

What isn’t true

“Jaswant Thada was built in 1899.”

Half right — that is when it was commissioned.

The Mehrangarh Museum Trust's own page gives 1899 for the commission and 1906 for completion. Seven years of marble-cutting sit between the two dates, and most guides print only the first.

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