Museums, we all know that museums play a vital role in understanding about our pasts. Objects and artifacts of artistic, scientific, historical or cultural importance are preserved in these museums. There are many museums in our country from where we could understand the culture and practices of our predecessors. Salar Jung is one such museum which contains information and details which is displayed for us to watch and understand.

Salar jung museum which is situated in Dharushifa, which is in the Hyderabad city. The museum is famous for the collections which are being preserved here. Around 1 million objects are preserved in the museum which includes Raja Ravi Varma’s painting, a tiffinbox which is made up of diamond and gold, Tipu Sultan’s wardrobe, daggers which were used by Jahangir, Shah Jehan and Noorjahan and painting of Aurangazeb. These collections were obtained from the Salar Jung family.

Salar Jung is one of the biggest museums in India which depicts only the collections of a single person. The collections include artifacts from various civilizations, even artifacts from the first century are displayed in the museum. This museum became true only because of the hard work of one man who had collected such a huge collection and he is Nawab Mir Yusuf Ali Khan Salar Jung III who was the prime minister of Hyderabad Nizam. It is believed that a large portion of his collections were stolen by his workers. Earlier these collections were displayed in ‘Diwan Deodi’, (Salar Jung’s predecessor’s palace) which was privately owned. The collections were taken to the present location that is Afzalgunj, in the year 1968.

Now let us have a close look at how the museum is designed. The museum is semi-circular in shape, with two floors displaying around 38 galleries. 18 galleries are displayed in the first floor and the remaining in the ground floor. The complete original collection is not displayed in this museum; only a part of Salar Jung’s Collection can be seen here. You could also enjoy reading, since there is a library and a reading room in the museum where reference books are available.

As said earlier the museum has a large collection which dates to the first century. The statue of Veiled Rebecca which was done by G B Benzoni is there in the collections which are displayed in the museum. A great collection of Quran is there in the museum which is from different parts of the world. There is a clock room in the museum displaying different kinds of clocks which includes the sundials to Modern clocks.

This museum was declared as institution of national importance by the Parliament of India. The museum will not be working on Friday and will be opened from 10:00 AM to 5 PM on the remaining days. The travelers have to pay an amount of INR 50 for using still cameras inside the museum. An amount of INR 10 is levied from the public and an amount of INR 5 from students as entry fees. But the foreigners have to pay around INR 150 as entry fee. Rest rooms, cafeterias and cloak rooms are available in the museum which will help the travelers to be comfort. You could reach this museum either by rail or by road. Kachiguda and Nampally railway stations are located very close to the Salar Jung Museum and buses are available to Afzalgunj from Hyderabad.  Everyone should try to make a visit to this place so that you could know about our past and also about the hard work done by Salar Jung to preserve such a magnificent collection.