And if the Golgumbaz is Bijapur’s answer to the Taj Mahal (a scaled-down answer, for sure, because the Taj is beyond comparison), the city’s finely-sculpted Ibrahim Rouza is what the exquisite Itimad-ud-Daulah is to Agra. "Have you been to Agra? one proud Bijapur resident asked me. "Don’t you think the minarets of the Ibrahim Rouza are more beautiful than the Taj Mahal’s?"

I couldn’t answer that question but what I learnt subsequently was that the Ibrahim Rouza’s slender minarets actually inspired those of the Taj Mahal. Two delicately carved structures with cupolas and a profusion of minarets, one a mausoleum the other a mosque, the Ibrahim Rouza’s sheer beauty leaves you simply awestruck.

The ornamentation inside is fabulous: richly decorated walls, exquisite latticed windows of stone, superbly crafted wooden doors. Designed by a Persian architect, the twin structures along with a minareted gateway in the middle, lie above basement in an arcade, with secret passages. The entire complex stands in the middle of a vast, manicured lawn. The mausoleum contains the tombs of Ibrahim Adil Shah II, his queen Taj Sultana, his daughter, two sons and his mother.

Ibrahim Adil Shah II (1556-1627) was the fifth king of Bijapur’s Adil Shahi Dynasty. Its founder, Yusuf Adil Shah, was a Turkish prince who fled his homeland in the late 15th century to escape assassination and ended up in Bidar, northern Karnataka, then capital of the Bahmini kingdom. The Bahminis, who were Turks, had broken away from the Delhi Sultanate to establish an empire in the Deccan, and in Bidar, Yusuf Adil Shah found favour with the then Bahmini Sultan who appointed him governor of Bijapur.

Soon however, Yusuf Shah found himself crowned King of Bijapur thanks to the break-up (in 1482) of the Bahmini empire into five kingdoms, Bijapur (along with Golconda) being among them. The new kingdom rose to great heights by the middle of the 16th century when under Ali Adil Shah I, it played a key role in bringing down the mighty, fabulously rich Vijanagar empire in 1565. Ali Adil Shah, great grandson of Yusuf Shah, undertook ambitious building projects in his capital city soon after which were a public water supply system, the new Jami Masjid (Grand Mosque) and the Gagan Mahal among them.

While the Jami Masjid, a vast rectangular structure with graceful arches, is still in use, the Gagan Mahal, which house royal residences and the Durbar Hall, is today in ruins, its roof has collapsed and plaster is peeling off its high walls. A towering grand arch, flanked by two narrower arches, still stands. They flank the royal residence on the two sides and the Durbar Hall in the middle, proceedings where could be watched by the public through the grand arch.

The Gagan Mahal is among a complex of other royal buildings, including the ruined Sat Mahal (seven-storeyed palace), that were housed in the citadel, a walled enclosure surrounded by a moat. The architecture of all these structures is characterised by a marked simplicity, indeed a certain austerity. Most monuments of Bijapur and that includes the immense Golgumbaz, eschew excessive ornamentation, the only exception being of course the Ibrahim Rouza of Ibrahim Adil Shah II.

A great patron of art and music, Ibrahim Adil Shah II, Ali Adil Shah’s nephew and successor, was a visionary king who sought to bring Hindus and Muslims together. He spoke the local languages, had a Hindu temple built in his palace and composed verses dedicated to Saraswati and Ganpati. He was a disciple of a Sufi saint who lived in nearby Gulbarga and during his long reign of 46 years (1580-1626), Bijapur attracted musicians, dancers and poets from far off lands. It was at Bijapur that the concept of mushaira (gathering of poets) emerged did travelled subsequently to northern India.

But it was Ibrahim Adil Shah’s son and successor, Mohammad Adil Shah, who gave Bijapur its greatest marvel the Golgumbaz. It was to be his mausoleum, and it took 20 years to build. Completed in 1659, it houses the tombs of the king, his two wives and one mistress, a daughter and a grandson. Over 150 ft high, this immense square structure is capped by a vast dome that is the world’s second largest, its 38 metre (about 110 ft) diameter exceeded only by that of the Vatican’s St Peter’s Basilica. Octagonal seven-storey towers stand attached to the four corners of the building, and it’s through the steep spiralling staircase of one of these that you reach the terrace from which the famed Whispering Gallery inside the mausoleum can be accessed.

The Whispering Gallery, 90 ft above ground, runs around the base of the dome; it is so called because even a whisper murmured here can be picked up and echoed some ten times over by the hemispherical dome. But to test that, you need to be here by 6 a m when there is no one around. By mid-morning, the gallery turns into a Tower of Babel as scores of visiting children (and even adults) scream, squeal and shriek to revel in the cacophony of ricocheting reverberations.

Bijapur has several other attractions besides, most notably a huge bell-metal canon (one of the largest forged anywhere in medieval times), the ruined Asar Mahal and the unfinished mausoleum of its last king, Ali Adil Shah II. It takes an entire day to see all the sights, two if you want to do it leisurely and savour the quaint charm of the city. And it sure is well worth it.