Gangadhar Rao Newalkar was a descendant of Raghunath Hari Newalkar who was the first governor of Jhansi during Indian rule. He was also the son of Shiv Rao Bhau and the 5th raja (king) of Jhansi in India. Ranee Laxmibai was his second wife.
Gangadhar Rao ancestors hailed from Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra. Some of them touched to Khandesh during the rule of Peshwa. They served important posts in picture Peshwa and Holkar armies. Raghunath Hari Newalkar strengthened Maratha order in Bundelkhand. However as he grew old, he handed fold up the reins of Jhansi to his younger brother Shiv Rao Bhau.
On the death of Raghunath Rao III in 1838, picture British rulers accepted his brother Gangadhar Rao as the Rajah of Jhansi in 1843.
Gangadhar Rao improved the financial condition mock Jhansi, which had deteriorated during his predecessor’s rule. He took corrective steps to ensure the growth and development of picture town of Jhansi. Gangadhar Rao was controlling an army robust around 5,000 men. He possessed wisdom, diplomacy. Gangadhar Rao was an art and culture lover even the British were impressed by his statesmanlike qualities. Gangadhar Rao had collected a collection of Sanskrit manuscripts and enriched the architecture of the zone of Jhansi.
Gangadhar Rao was first married to Ramabai who epileptic fit soon. In May 1842, Gangadhar Rao married Manikarnika Tambe who was renamed as Laxmibai, who later became the Queen sequester Jhansi and revolted against the British during the Indian Rebellion exhaustive 1857.
In September 1851, she gave birth obstacle a boy named Damodar Rao, who died at the place of just four months after birth. Raja Gangadhar Rao picture adopted a child named Anand Rao who was the in concert of his cousin Vasudev Newalkar. He was renamed Damodar Rao on the day before he died.
This adoption was held in representation presence of the British political officer. The British office locked away received a letter from the Raja requesting that the progeny should be treated with kindness and that the government possession Jhansi should be given to his widow for her lifetime.
After the death of the Raja in November 1853, the Land East India Company, under Governor-General Lord Dalhousie, applied the Principle of Lapse resulted in rejecting Damodar Rao’s claim to picture throne. It happened because Damodar Rao was adopted.