Although portraits of maharajas were an important genre in hill-state painting, this image of a blind raja stands apart. Most depict rulers in formal poses with servants proffering intoxicants: either pan (betel nut, lime, and spices) or tobacco smoked in a hookah. Here, the raja is shown unattended and saying his beads, a private devotional act. There is a rare poignancy in the artist's subtle characterization of pose and features.

Given the immediacy of the image, it is startling to learn that Sital Dev ruled from about 1630 to 1660, long before this portrait could possibly have been completed. Its style relates to the second phase of late-seventeenth-century Basohli painting, when earlier coloristic and decorative exuberance gave way to a more subdued palette and less dramatic juxtapositions of pattern. A Mankot provenance has been posited for the portrait, but its more refined drawing and its palette, particularly the soft buttery yellow of the background, are closer to works from the nearby principality of Basohli.