01The rajtilak of 1572
After Chittor fell to Akbar in 1568, Maharana Udai Singh II kept his court in the hills, building Udaipur and staying often at Gogunda, which could only be reached over a difficult pass. He died at Gogunda on Holi, 28 February 1572. He had named his younger son Jagmal as heir, but the Mewar chiefs, led by the Chundawats, set Jagmal aside and placed the eldest son, Pratap, on the gaddi at Gogunda the same season. Most Rajput houses had by then taken Mughal service. Pratap refused, and for the next twenty-five years Gogunda and the hills around it were the base of his war.
02After Haldighati
In June 1576 Pratap marched from Gogunda to meet Man Singh’s army at the pass of Haldighati, a few kilometres away. After the battle on 18 June the Mughal army entered Gogunda, but it found an empty town, and Badauni, who was with them, describes the troops short of grain and fearing night raids from the hills. Akbar came to Gogunda himself later that year and moved on to Udaipur, but Mewar’s hills did not give in. Pratap won back most of his country before his death at Chavand in 1597. Gogunda today is a small tehsil town on the road from Udaipur to Kumbhalgarh.
The life of this place
- 28 February 1572Maharana Udai Singh II dies at Gogunda; Pratap is placed on the gaddi.
- June 1576Pratap marches to Haldighati; after the battle the Mughal army occupies the empty town.
- late 1576Akbar comes to Gogunda in person.
