The trip to Agra

Apologies that 'tomorrow' has turned into five days.

I am busy planning the logistics of a three-week road-trip, starting this Sunday. The project aims to understand how roads are shaping India and will involve a team of journalists travelling from Varanasi to Kolkata and Chennai to Mumbai by road.

Indian highway network has changed dramatically over the last 10 years. During the last six months, I have had an opportunity to travel on some of these roads in both south and north of India and have been suitably impressed.

The most recent excursion was last weekend, on a sight-seeing trip to Agra with a friend visiting from the UK. Agra is home to the famous Taj Mahal and situated about 210 kilometres from Delhi. It is located on the same National Highway 2 (NH2) that we will be taking for the first leg of our journey.

The journey to Agra began at 5.30 in the morning. Delhi is nice and cool at that time of the day and, thankfully, most of its car-loving people are still asleep. An early start would help avoid potential gridlocks along the Ring Road (read, Delhi's M25), Badarpur and Faridabad (located in neighbouring Haryana, but part of Delhi National Capital Region). The journey is hardly 30 or so kilometres but can easily take a couple of hours.

As we zipped through these areas, I was reminded of my childhood. Cars were rare in those days and if you were lucky enough to be in one (in our case, it would mostly be Dad's office car), negotiating Delhi's roads would be smooth and quick.

Once we crossed Faridabad, we had left the last bit of Delhi NCR's commuter-belt behind. The taxi suddenly picked up pace, with the speedometer touching 100-plus kilometres an hour - something that would have been a dream only a decade ago.

Unfortunately, NH2 - like many other national highways - passes through densely populated areas. And those living in these areas suddenly find themselves separated from their family or land by these fast lanes.

The taxi driver had to brake frequently to avoid hitting those crossing the road. Unfortunately, not everyone was lucky. Along the way, we saw the small Maruti Suzuki 800 that had run into a big truck. The stationary ambulance indicated that the driver of the car hadn't survived, but our driver thought otherwise - Generally the steering wheel caves in towards the driver's seat, which causes serious injuries. The steering on this car seemed fine, even though the accident looks bad.

Not exactly reassuring, but the man seem to know the route. I come to Agra between three-five times a month. Trucks are fine as they'll move slowly on the fastest lane, but it is the animals, pedestrians, tractors and cars you need to avoid. It is always better to overtake from the left.

We were in Agra just before 9 in the morning. The car had covered 210 kilometres in just under 3.5 hours, an average of 60 kilometres an hour.

So, Google was right all along. While planning our India Highways project, Google Maps kept calculating journey times at 60 kilometres an hour and I kept disregarding it - choosing to calculate 30 kilometres an hour instead!!

But then again, Agra is no Aurangabad - a district in my home-state Bihar, which is affected by Maoist problem. Agra sees hundreds and thousands of visitors every day and the authorities are even building a super-fast Yamuna Expressway Corridor, which will cut the journey time to about two hours.

Anyway, I digress. The taxi had to stop a kilometre away from Taj Mahal, and the tourist trade converged on us straightaway. Sir, there is a two-hour long queue outside the ticket window. Hop on to my electric rickshaw and I'll take you there in minutes. Sir, you don't want to spend two hours walking up to the monuments and various queues. Hop on to this camel cart and you'll be there quickly. Sir, I am a recognised Tourist Guide. You need my services to understand what the monument is about.........

My guest was fine with walking, so we made our way to the Taj Mahal. Some salesman pursued us but gave up after a few minutes. We were at the ticket-window in just 15 minutes, and there were hardly three people in front of us.

Foreign visitors are expected to pay 750 INR (about £11) and get a free 500 ml of packaged drinking water and disposable shoe-covers. Indians pay 20 INR (20 p) and have to carry their own water.

Getting through the security was a breeze but I got stopped at the entrance to Taj Mahal. Can we see your identification? Sure, I said, pulling out my driving licence. This is a driving licence. Where is your Tourist Guide Licence? I asked them to clarify their question. You are with a foreign tourist. Where is your Tourist Guide Licence?

I was allowed to enter once it was established that the white guy with me was a friend.

Taj Mahal is awesome. This was only my second trip to the monument, but the moment you enter through the main - you are captivated by the magnificence of this structure.

The friend and I spent a couple of hours walking around and marvelling the monument. It looks different from different angles, and the friend's favourite was Taj Mahal through the branches of a tree in the compound.

Lunch was a rushed affair. The driver took us to a "good restaurant" where the only other customers were eating a slightly burnt dosa. We ordered the bare minimum - paneer, daal and rotis - and bottles of pesticides (sorry, Coke, Pepsi and 7Up) to wash that down.

Agra Fort was our next stop. It was my first visit there and I found it more amazing than the Taj Mahal. As our guide said, you only ever get to see 25% of the area covered, as the other 75% has been an army cantonment for hundreds of years.

The fort was a seat of power much before the Mughals came to India. The first mention of it comes in the year 1080 AD, and the third Mughal emperor - Jalaluddin Mohammmad Akbar - turned this brick fort into a fort made of red sandstone.

The first five generations of Mughals - Babur, Humayun, Akbar, Jehangir, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb - all lived and ruled from here.

Shah Jahan, who built Taj Mahal in memory of his wife, Mumtaz Mahal, is credited with how the Agra Fort looks now. Unlike grand-father Akbar, who loved red sandstone, Shah Jahan preferred white marble.

As a result some parts of this fort are constructed in white marble. Some other parts have been covered in plaster of paris, to give them a white facade. Shah Jahan did live a privileged life, with a huge aquarium in the newer part of the fort to play games with his beloved wife and another area to play a version of Chinese checkers with his mistresses.

Apart from three wives, Shah Jahan had more than 300 mistresses in his harem. If one of them misbehaved or fought with another mistress, there was a prison beneath the harem. There was even a sheesh-mahal (a hall of thousands of mirrors) for dancers to showcase their skill.

Two of the marble structures were meant to house his two daughters, Jahan Ara and Alam Ara, and have a stunning view of the Taj Mahal. If the cost of modification to the Agra Fort and construction of Taj Mahal are included, it would run into billions of rupees in today's money.

Legend has it that Shah Jahan wanted to build a black Taj Mahal, before he was put under house arrest by his son, Aurangzeb.

One the first things Aurangzeb did was fill up the aquarium with soil and turn it into a lawn. He also created an additional moat around the fort, with crocodiles and other deadly reptiles in it. That is assuming someone was not using the main gate. If they were, the main access has a ramp through which big boulders could be rolled down. And if that wasn't discouraging enough, hot oil could be poured down specially-designed crevices in the wall.