At 10:51  11/03/04 -0800, you wrote: >                  In my previous post on jaipur >succession i had written about how maharaja of jaipur >defied every convention and adopted his grandson. Well >he was not alone. >              A new incident has come to light which I >was unaware of in 1960's(I was not born then) . >Maharaja of kolhapur who himself had been adopted from >dewas gaddi decided to adopt his grandson from >shaliniraje. the dewas adoption was itself very >unpopular. Now there were massive street protests. >Most marathas favoured the claim of son of princess >padmaraje kadam bande of torkhed . He had stronger >claim to the gaddi . But kolhapur raja ignored it and >adopted his grandson. Today as a result there is not >respect left for house of kolhapur .Most marathas >including myself have disowned the royal family. And >raja has no legitimacy only palaces. > >*/Princess padmaraje died in 1999. She was daughter of >Chhatrapati rajaram of kolhapur./* > >            I appears to me jaipur is moving in same >direction. I dont think anyone respects jaipur gaddi >anymore. Thanks to antics of the maharaja and his son >in law. > While I was aware of the change of succession, I didn't know that it was so disliked. Can you tell us why the son of Padmaraje was favoured over the Dewas heir? As for Jaipur, I shudder when I think of what may happen when the Maharaja is succeeded by his underage grandson. His daughter will be de facto ruler for sure. Cheers, Henry