India Guide
Mumbai
Chhatrapati Shivaji Museum (Prince of Wales Museum)
Address: K Dubash Marg
Website: www.bombaymuseum.org
Price: Rs300, camera Rs30 – no tripods or flash
Opening time: Daily except Tues 10.15am–6pm
The Prince of Wales Museum of Western India, or Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya as it was renamed by the Shiv Sena, ranks among Mumbai's most distinctive Raj-era constructions. It stands rather grandly in its own gardens, crowned by a massive white Mughal-style dome, under which a fine collection of paintings and sculpture is arrayed on three floors. The building was designed by George Wittet, of Gateway of India fame, and stands as the epitome of the hybrid Indo-Saracenic style – regarded in its day as an "educated" interpretation of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Gujarati architecture, mixing Islamic touches with typically English municipal brickwork.
The Key Gallery in the ground floor's central hall includes fifth-century AD stucco Buddhist figures unearthed by archeologist Henry Cousens in 1909. The main sculpture room displays other fourth- and fifth-century Buddhist artefacts, mostly from the former Greek colony of Gandhara. Hindu sculptures include a seventh-century Chalukyan bas-relief depicting Brahma seated on a lotus, and a sensuously carved torso of Mahisasuramardini, the goddess Durga, with tripod raised ready to skewer the demon buffalo.
The first floor holds the museum's famous collection of Indian painting. More fine medieval miniatures are housed in the recently inaugurated Karl & Meherbai Khandalavala Gallery, on the east wing, along with priceless Ghandaran sculpture, Chola bronzes and some of the country's finest surviving examples of medieval Gujarati woodcarving.
Indian coins are the subject of the House of Laxmi Gallery, also in the east wing, while the second floor showcases Oriental ceramics and glassware. Finally, among the grisly weapons and pieces of armour stored in a small side-gallery at the top of the building, look out for the cuirass, helmet and jade dagger which the museum only recently discovered belonged to no less than the Mughal emperor Akbar.
The heat and humidity inside the building can also be a trial. For a break, the institutional tea-coffee kiosk in the ground-floor garden is a much less congenial option than the Café Samovar outside; to exit the museum and re-enter, get your ticket stamped in the admissions lobby.