I know very well the Library of the Maharaja Man Singh Museum in Jaipur, where I worked on manuscripts almost every year (excepted the COVID years) since 2012. For those interested, I attach the English version of a paper about Savai Jai Singh I published in the Journal des savants, 2013, after some complementary visits to archives in Lisbon and Goa.

It would be invaluable if someone thoroughly familiar with the European methods of requesting and obtaining (copies of) ancient manuscripts were assigned to this position. We, researchers in Indology, could then benefit from much easier access than I have had over these many years. Of course, there had been some exceptions, I fondly remember the help Mrs. Rima Hooja gave me just before COVID and also Giles Tillotson's unwavering support for my research. But I also remember hard times when I waited for days for the person (a sort of powerful figure in the Palace hierarchy, not really familiar with best practices for research support) who held the key to the library cabinets. Things have improved somewhat in recent years, but the new procedure, inspired by those used in England, is rather cumbersome, especially given the obvious disarray of the Jaipur collections. Here is an extract of an Email I sent last year, in which I expressed my reservations about the classification of the manuscripts :

"Thank you for your answer. I will try to fill this form, but the problem is that your Persian/Arabic manuscripts are not properly/not at all catalogued. And for the Sanskrit manuscripts, I would say : not unequivocally catalogued. For them, there are at least three different catalogues (Bahura 1971, Bahura 1976 and Pingree 2003). I will find the Sanskrit items I am looking for in one of these catalogues (Pingree, by instance, is quite complete for astronomy, but not so for mathematics) or the others, but I am not sure I will be able to find an accession number for the manuscripts I want to receive a copy. Perhaps, a real effort should be made in order to edit a complete catalogue of all the manuscripts in the MSM, on the model of the catalogues edited by the RORI, by instance, and to make it available on the internet.
Some years ago, I went to Jodhpur's RORI, searched the catalogue and saw the manuscripts. On the same day. I asked for complete copy of 12 manuscripts (including a very interesting rekhāgaṇita) and receive them three days later, digitalized."

As I have been informed that the Pothikhana manuscripts are going to be digitized (and I assume the above announcement is related to this project), I hope things will improve further. We'll see...

I must add that I visited Jodhpur's RORI again some weeks ago, and that, thanks to the help of Dr Kishore, I could have access to copies of manuscripts in Kota's, Jaipur's and Alwar's RORIs very easily. I was also most welcome in the IGNCA, Delhi, where I received copies of some Banaras' manuscripts, otherwise inaccessible. If anyone is interested in my contact information, feel free to ask.

Best regards,

Jean Michel Delire