VIRATNAGAR

About Viratnagar ( Bairat )

Bairat is a town in northern Jaipur district of Rajasthan, India. It is located 52km north of Jaipur, and 66km west of Alwar. Bairat's history goes back to the time of the Mahabharata, when it was known as "Viratnagar". Viratnagar was the capital of the ancient Mahajanapada (kingdom) of Machcha or Matsya. The kingdom came under the control of the neighboring Chedi Kingdom in the 5th century and was later part of the Mauryan Empire. The ruins of the Bijak-ki-pahadi, a Buddhist Chaitya (chapel) from the 3rd century BCE located in Bairat, are the oldest free-standing Buddhist structures in India. The town is also home to ruins of a Buddhist monastery, a wood and timber shrine, and rock-cut edict from Emperor Ashoka; these date from the Mauryan period. The town has a number of Mughal structures, including a Chhatri (cenotaph) with some of the earliest surviving murals in Rajasthan, and a lodge where the Mughal emperor Akbar hunted and stayed overnight on his yearly pilgrimage to Ajmer....