Health
In most parts of Rajasthan, the biggest risk to most travellers is from the heat – dehydration, sunstroke and sunburn are common ailments, especially for those who come from more temperate climes. But fortunately, ensuring a regular intake of fluids, using strong sunscreens and wearing a shady hat and sunglasses easily minimise the risks from the hot desert sun. A sunscreen with minimum SPF 20 to escape sunburn is essential.

The major risks to your health from the armies of mosquitoes are malaria, encephalitis, kala azar and dengue. Cover your arms and legs; be liberal with the repellent and in problem areas sleep under a mosquito net. Traveller’s diarrhoea is another running problem and year after year traveller after traveller gets the ‘loosies’. Ensure it’s nothing nastier by avoiding green salads, uncooked food, and water that you haven’t sanitised by dropping an iodine pill into. Slightly more serious is the risk of contacting AIDS, Hepatitis B and other sexually transmitted diseases. For your sake and the sake of the people you’re visiting always use a condom. Have safe responsible sex.

The quality of health services is more than adequate in major urban centres like Jaipur, Jodhpur and Ajmer with their medical schools, hospitals and nursing homes, well-qualified private practioners and late night chemists shops. Medicines are fairly cheap and though chemist shops in the cities are well stocked, it is always a good idea to take along prescription drugs. Travellers from yellow fever areas are required to have an inoculation certificate. Prior inoculation for poliomyelitis is recommended.

Safety
Rajasthan is a safe destination for travellers who follow the rules and play safe. While the people are hospitable and sincere, travellers are advised to practise a fair degree of caution and not trust blindly. Try to deal with accredited or licensed travel agents, guides and tour operators only. Be extremely alert after sunset and try your best to be in a familiar area when it gets dark. One of the things that protect travellers here is the vast crowd in most places. The multitudes however, disappear into their homes at night, and you go from having a huge thick safety quilt to a flimsy sheet! Political disturbances and riots are usually localised and everyone’s aware well in advance of potentially troubled days ahead. Cases of mugging, theft and pick pocketing often happen and tourists are the favourite target of touts and scamsters though by and large serious crimes against travellers are rare. Women travelling alone, particularly need to be over cautious, as the state is notoriously chauvinistic in its attitude to women, and lone women are often considered fair game.

Basic precautions:

Keep your money and travel documents close to your body (perhaps in a pouch slung around your neck, tucked out of sight under your shirt),

Keep several photocopies of your passport, insurance, travellers’ cheques etc. scattered through your luggage,

Do not use a waist pouch, it may as well be a transparent plastic bag: it’s that fragile and that obvious!

Do not put all your money in one place,

Many women travellers wear the long tunic and loose pyjama dress of Indian women called the salwar-kameez and find that it substantially dissuades unwanted male attention.

If you are travelling alone, do not advertise it.

If you lose your passport lodge a First Information Report at the local police station and contact your embassy.