Madhya Pradesh: The land where tales and folklore come alive

Madhya Pradesh: it's India's biggest secret. It lies there, hidden in plain sight, in the middle of the country. It's bigger than most Indian provinces, in fact until 2000, when Chhattisgarh seceded, Madhya Pradesh was by far the largest Indian state. It's still as big as a country. A little bigger than Britain, a little smaller than Poland. It has more forests and natural parks than any other Indian state. It doesn't have the snowy peaks of the Himalayas but it is chequered with the hills and plateaus of the Vindhyas, India's most ancient mountains. It still bristles with the palaces and forts of more kingdoms than 'princely' Rajasthan ever had.

I spent a week touring as much of the state as I could, from the northern fringes of the Bundelkhand region to the capital Bhopal in the Malwa plateau. By the end of the week, I was bursting with secrets of my own but perhaps I should keep them to myself. Would you really believe me if I said that in a few short days I had climbed India's oldest mountains, traversed several kingdoms, witnessed an orgy, stalked a tiger, eaten the world's best (and cheapest) gourmet burger, had tea with a pretender to the House of Bourbon, and a beautiful Bhopali Begum, stepped inside the perfectly preserved dwellings of India's and quite possibly the ancient world's earliest artists? I didn't think so. No wonder there's a conspiracy of silence about Madhya Pradesh.

It's quiet on the Ken river at dusk. Even the irrepressibly chatty Englishman sharing my boat seems to have run out of anecdotes. There's a fish owl, still as a statue, on the branch of a gnarled jamun tree, and a serpent eagle scanning the river marshes with stealthy patience. There's a brave fisherman perched on two sticks that span the hollow centre of an inflated tyre. A crocodile slides off a rock and disappears with a terse 'plop'. There are cormorants holding out their wings to dry and a flock of them flickering through the air in a V formation. A silent V, of course. We slide over the smooth water and snake through narrow overgrown channels. You can hear the marsh grasses susurrate against the hull. Even they seem to be saying 'Shh!' Delicate spider lilies crane their long stalks and peer into the boat inquisitively. As we turn back and the boatman eases us upstream again, the sun hovers just above and below the horizon, its guttering flame mirrored in the glassy river. And suddenly the sky and the water fuse into a single blue grey screen. The illusion is broken only when a pied kingfisher dives vertically through it leaving a brief splash at the bottom of the frame. I almost expect to see its reflection in the sky. When the boat finally scuds onto the sand we wobble off it and onto the soft shore, exchanging complicit, intoxicated smiles. It's a fact that we just got high together, and I feel like we now share an unspoken oath: We must never speak of this again!

In the evening, I warm myself around a crackling fire with my fellow conspirators at our stylish eco resort, the Sarai at Toria. The Englishman is back on form, a charming but

"Sex orgy!" the man says, and I nod dutifully. Shading my eyes with my palm, I stare up at the scene. Sure enough, a multitude of supple brown bodies are entwined in diverse acts of congress, both horizontal and vertical. It's 7 am: a bit early for orgies and to be honest I want to get back to Sarai at Toria for a late breakfast. But I need to be professional and so does the man. After all we've just met and struck a deal for Rs 600. "I will show you everything," he promised.Only 1.5 million of them live in Bhopal and they live in wildly diverse circumstances. Of all the sights I've seen in MP, this city is the most beguiling and challenging. I am installed in the whitewashed colonial splendour of the Jehan Numa Palace, a property owned by descendants of the royal family of nawabs (and more frequently begums Bhopal was famous for its queens) who ruled here until 1947. I wake up in the mornings to the rumble of racehorses galloping on along the track that circles the hotel and after a swim, propelled by a stab of luxury guilt I seek out a humble autorickshaw to begin my sightseeing. The driver is a bit of a character and apparently a frustrated comedian. "Myself Muzzafar Mian Tapori," he says, "Bhopal ka original third class rickshawalla." It's a clever opening gambit: he's made me laugh too much to haggle over the fare. It's also my first taste of the uniquely self deprecating braggadocio for which Bhopalis are famous. Soorma Bhopali, the much loved character from Sholay, is arguably an archetype of this local style. Having coffee with a local journalist who clearly loves his city, I hear that Bhopal is becoming very popular as a location for Bollywood movies. "Production costs come down a lot if you shoot in a B class town," he says with ironic pride.