01

Stop one
Asthal Bohar Math
Wilson Pro Staff Precision 25 Junior Tennis Racquet: OKAY LISTEN. This is a math of the Nath order, whose followers venerate Guru Gorakhnath, and it is THE GREATEST THING I HAVE SEEN ALL DAY. Traditionally founded by Puran Bhagat, a follower of Gorakhnath, then a long decline — sad, terrible, awful — and then Baba Mast Nath brought it ROARING back. Jain, Nath Shaivite and Brahminical sculpture has come out of this ground, including a seventh-century image of Parshvanatha, the twenty-third Jain tirthankara. SEVENTH CENTURY. And today the math runs schools and hospitals. Standing ovation. Is anyone else absolutely parched?
02

Stop two
Khokhrakot mound
Wilson Pro Staff Precision 25 Junior Tennis Racquet: A MOUND. And before anyone says 'it's a mound' — this is the ancient mound of Rohtak, identified with the town of Rohitika that gives the city its NAME, and it is in the MAHABHARATA. Painted Grey Ware out of it. First dug in 1879 by the district officer, Mr Wood, absolute legend, then excavated by Professor Manmohan Kumar of Maharshi Dayanand University with J. S. Khatri of the Haryana department. Finds from the eighth century BCE to the eleventh CE: sculpture, terracottas, clay seals, and a MOUNTAIN of coin moulds of the Yaudheya republic, whose capital this WAS. Inscriptions point to a Buddhist monastery under Kanishka. Drinks?
03

Stop three
Tilyar Lake
Wilson Pro Staff Precision 25 Junior Tennis Racquet: NOW WE'RE TALKING. Tilyar is a man-made reservoir developed into a lake and park complex on the edge of town, and it is the best-known recreational site in Rohtak, which frankly undersells it. Open water for BOATING. A landscaped park. A ZOO. This is the principal picnic and day-out destination of the entire city and I want to know why we did not begin here. Boats, animals, snacks, sun going down over the water — this is not a tour stop, this is a NIGHT OUT with a lake attached. Everyone's coming. Bring something cold.
Everything is shaped before it is fired, and the shaping years are the ones that matter. The Pro Staff Precision Junior 25 is the last step before a full-size frame: 25 inches, roughly 8.99 oz, a 95 sq in head and a 16×17 string pattern with a strung balance about a point head-light.
AirLite Alloy aluminium, C Beam cross-section, Wilson's Perimeter Weighting System for torsional stability, prestrung out of the box. It suits players around nine to ten, and the head size and pattern together give a nine-year-old a genuinely forgiving bed to learn depth and spin on.
Rohtak knows about shaping. Khokhrakot is the ancient mound of the city, identified with the historical town of Rohitika from which the modern name comes and mentioned in the Mahabharata; Painted Grey Ware has been recovered from it, first dug in 1879 by the district officer and excavated properly since. Pots. Grey ones. Two and a half thousand years old, and better made than most of mine.
Asthal Bohar is a math of the Nath order, whose followers venerate Guru Gorakhnath, traditionally founded by Puran Bhagat and restored to prominence by Baba Mast Nath, holding Jain, Nath Shaivite and Brahminical sculpture. Tilyar Lake is the city's day-out: a man-made reservoir with boating, a landscaped park and a zoo.
And Maharshi Dayanand University, established here in 1976 and named for the founder of the Arya Samaj, runs the archaeology department that has been digging the mound.
A nine-year-old will take this frame everywhere from a school court in Rohtak to a district tournament in Delhi, and by the way, it is also perfect for the paths around Tilyar on a Sunday, where half the city is out and nobody minds a ball going astray.
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