Jnaneshwar Udyan, Paithan

Jnaneshwar Udyan, also spelled Dnyaneshwar Udyan, is a garden in Paithan, 40 km south of Aurangabad, which resembles the Brindavan Gardens near Mysore. The state government built it in the 1970s beside Nathsagar, the reservoir of the Jayakwadi Dam, and named it for the saint Jnaneshwar, who came from a village close to Paithan.

It spreads over 125 hectares, with 28 hectares laid out as parks. Visitors come for flowerbeds, wide lawns and musical fountains, with ten plazas and twenty-two fountains in all, and more than a hundred thousand trees besides forty thousand fruit trees. Saplings and spices are on sale at a nursery, and there is a children's play area, a swimming pool and boat rides. Nathsagar itself, spread over 350 sq km, is a sanctuary for flamingoes and other migratory birds. The Male Masjid nearby is where Emperor Akbar's son Danial married the princess of Bijapur.