Raj Sagar Dam, Chopra

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Raj Sagar Dam is located in the Nayagaon village of the Pali district in Rajasthan. This village is part of the Chopra Panchayat which has three more villages namely Chopra, Chandasani and Abhi ki Dhani. The catchment area of the dam falls in the Pali as well as Jodhpur district of which the major part of the catchment lies in Pali. As per distance wise the dam is located 30 kilometers from Sojat, Panchayat Samiti of the village and 40 kilometers from district headquarters. Other major nearest city from the Raj Sagar Dam is Jodhpur which is 60 kilometers away. At present 3 villages of Chopra Panchayat namely village Chopra, Nayagaon and Chandasani and two villages of Jhupelao Panchayat namely Panchwa Kala and Panchwa Khurd are not only dependent on this dam for irrigation but also for day to day domestic purposes mounting enormous pressure on the dam.
The Raj Sagar Dam is one of the unique example of proper management and distribution of water resources which was introduced effectively during the feudal system and made way for more scientific methods of water extraction, storage and conveyance. But unfortunately there are not many authentic or noted records in the books of history either in the government or in State Gazette record of the Marwar State. Therefore, whatever information is available regarding the history of the dam is all based on the knowledge and information which passed on from one generation to another among the village community living around the dam area.

Thus, according to the village elderly and historians living around the dam area, in the period preceding independence, the Raj Sagar Dam was built by Maharaja Jaswant Singh II the erstwhile Maharaja of Marwar. To combat scarcity of water during the famine and drought situation Maharaja Jaswant Singh II ordered construction of this dam to one of his nobles named Shri Jhunjar Singh who was at that time know for his specialization in constructing such water reservoirs and handled irrigation department in the state time. As per the local historians the construction of this dam was completed somewhere between year 1800 to 1910, almost 20 to 23 year before construction of Sardar Samand Lake Palace, which was again a fine example of Rajputana style of architecture built with traditional water reservoir, situated around 12-15 km away from the Raj Sagar Dam. It was a chain of construction of reservoirs as the overflow of the Raj Sagar Dam went into the Sardar Samand Lake.