The ground on which the Jai Mahal Palace stands has always been referred to as Natani-ka-Bagh or the garden of Natani. Sawai Ishwari Singh’s (1743-50) military commander and Prime Minister, Hargovind Natani, developed it around 1745. Natani was a prominent military figure but is also known to be something of a traitor. Unlike Rajput warriors he did not belong to the Kshatriya caste but came from the lower trading castes.

After Natani’s death, his property was reverted to the state as according to the state laws he had committed an act of disgrace. Thus Natani-ka-Bagh became a princely property since then. In the 1860's it was allotted as the residency surgeon’s house. In 1881, under Dr.Thomas Holbein Hendley’s tenancy, a meteorological observatory was built beside the garden.  It was later joined into the gardens of the palace of which only a dilapidated tower remains. When Sawai Man Singh II (1922-1947) took over Jaipur State, Natani ka Bagh became the official residence of the Prime Ministers of Jaipur and continued to be so till 1948. Sometime during his reign Man Singh II changed the name of the garden to Jai Mahal in honour either of his second son, Jai or his great ancestor, Sawai Jai Singh II or simply after the city itself. Jai Mahal Palace remained unoccupied from 1948 till 1955 when it was converted into one of India’s earliest palace hotels.