Tilak Museum can be called the chief attraction in the famous Kesari Wada which is also called the Gaikwad Wada. The museum always attracts the tourists, students and researchers and unveils the legendary career of the Father of Indian Unrest Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Certainly Tilak Museum can be listed among the most important museums in the city of Pune.

Where is it located?

Kesari Wada, the famous historical monument houses the Tilak Museum on the second floor. Kesari Wada, also known as Gaikwad Wada stands in the Narayan Peth area of Pune. The site is just a couple of km away from the Deccan Bus Stop and 5 km from the Swargate Station. The nearby landmarks are the Omkareshwar Temple and the Modi Ganesh Temple.

Tilak Museum: Rich Heritage
If you are going to visit this museum, let me tell you, keep a couple hours free from your busy schedule. Because once you enter into this museum, you are just lost in an altogether different world. You see the entire journey of Lokmanya Tialk unfolded with the help of some exclusive photographs, his personal items, letters written by and addressed to Tilak and lot more. As you move on and go on reading the biographical facts in Tialk’s life, different traits of his manifold personality come to the forefront. You meet a great scholar, a great leader, a great pleader and a great mathematician in Tilak. You feel like bowing down before this great man.

Following are some of the things you see in the Museum.

1) Genealogical Table and Horoscope:
In the very beginning you see Tialk’s Genealogical Table and Horoscope. You feel excited to see Tilak’s handprints. On the wall in this section you see some rare photographs of Tilak’s ancestors; his grandfather, father, uncle and other family members. You can also find a black and white photograph of Gorewada in the village Chikhli in Ratnagiri District where Tilak was born.

2) Juvenile Efforts:
Right from the beginning Tilak was a voracious reader and prolific writer. You will be amazed to read here Tilak’s juvenile pieces of works that include some Sanskrit poems that he wrote when he was still a schoolboy.

3) Certificates:
Tilak’s laminated degree certificate of Bachelor of Law and the Sanad of practice as a lawyer introduce you with an efficient pleader in Tilak.

4) Tilak’s Study Room:
The replica of Tilak’s study room made by artist Suhas Bahulkar is an enlivening experience. Tilak’s statue showing him writing an editorial for his newspaper Kesari is an excellent work. You feel as if you see the real Tilak and not the statue.

In this study room, you see Tilak’s bed, his personal items like his clothes, his nut crackers, his footwear, the wall clock and his library. The table that was used by Tilak for writing Gita Rahasya while suffering imprisonment in Mandalay Jail is an item worth preserving.

5) Photographs Galore:
It’s always amazing to see the glorious events and happenings in the past through photographs. In the Tilak Museum, you see hundreds of black and white photographs all around. They display some of the important events in Tilak’s biography. As photography was not developed much at that time, the quality of these photos is not that good. But still they are enough to take us back to the busy days of Indian freedom struggle and accent the all encompassing political career of Tilak.

Here you find the photos of the institutes where Tilak studied as well as those founded by him and his colleagues. Some of the rare photos of the Fergusson College building, New English School and Deccan College bring back before you the Pune city in the nineteenth century.

Tilak’s photos here with many eminent personalities make us aware of his reach and following. A photograph snapped in Tilak’s bungalow on Sinhagad in 1915 shows Tilak and Gandhi together. You can see the end of one age and the imminent beginning of the other in this photo.

Photographs of Tilak’s funeral hurt you. Though dead, Tilak looks like a yogi in these photos.

6) Oil Paintings:
Some oil paintings here too are worth taking a note of. Especially the painting showing Tilak in the court putting his own side in a case of treason filed against him is just awesome.
A picture showing Tilak and Swami Vivekanand together fills you with great respect for both.
Another painting by Dinanath Dalal showing Mahatma Gandhi bowing down before Tilak’s dead body touches you deeply.

7) Replica of Mandalay Cell:
One more attraction here is the replica of the cell in which Tilak was kept in Mandalay Jail. You can see Tilak engrossed in writing Gita Rahasya in the light of a burning lamp and his small library in the cell.
Moreover, you can see here the first national flag of India unfurled by Madam Bhikaji Kama in Stuttgart, a table where Tilak and Dr. Anny Bezant used to have long discussions on Home Rule League and the palanquin in which Lord Ganesh was carried to the sanctum for the Ganesh festival.

Timings:
The museum is open on all seven days of the week from 10 A.M. to 01 P.M. and from 03 P.M. to 06 P.M.
No entry fee is charged.

How to reach:
Hiring an auto rickshaw from the Deccan Bus Stop is the best option.
You must visit the museum at once in your life. Please tell us more about it through comment.