The train manufactured by CNR Dalian Locomotive & Rolling Stock Co. is the first of 14 rakes to be shipped to Calcutta
The China-made coaches being loaded on a vessel at the Dalian port / Sourced by the Correspondent
Consignment: Calcutta Metro’s first foreign-made rake
Origin: Dalian, China
Status: In transit
Calcutta Metro’s first foreign-made rake is sailing towards Chittagong on its way to the city from China.
The rake is scheduled to arrive at the Calcutta port on March 1. From there, it will be taken to Metro Railway’s Noapara maintenance base for trial runs, Metro officials said on Thursday.
The train manufactured by CNR Dalian Locomotive & Rolling Stock Co. of China is the first of 14 rakes to be shipped to Calcutta.
The prototype rake was loaded onto cargo vessel Han Zhang at Dalian port.
The vessel, which had set sail from Dalian on February 1, is now sailing towards Chittagong in Bangladesh after touching Singapore. It is scheduled to reach the Sandheads on February 28 and wait for the high tides.
At noon on March 1, when the high tide sets in and the water level rises, the vessel will enter Netaji Subhas Dock at Garden Reach.
The rake, like the existing Metro rail fleet, will have eight coaches.
“The train is being carried in two tiers of the vessel’s deck. Each tier has four coaches,” Metro spokesperson Indrani Banerjee said.
Once the cargo ship anchors at Calcutta port, special cranes will be used to lift the coaches and load them on to a container. “The coaches will be assembled in the port area to form the rake before a diesel engine pulls it to Noapara,” Banerjee said.
Metro will use Eastern Railway’s tracks to roll the new rake into its Noapara facility. The rake will be taken to Majerhat and from there to Chitpore, Belghoria and Dum Dum, before entering Noapara.
Calcutta Metro’s rakes, unlike other Metro trains, run on broad gauge tracks used by passenger and long-distance trains. “So, it’s easier to bring the rake into Noapara from the port using Eastern Railway’s tracks,” a Metro official said.
Engineers from China and Japan would be present when the coaches are unpacked and assembled into a train. Although CNS Dalian has manufactured the train, the components have been made by Toshiba of Japan.
“Once inside the maintenance base, the trials will begin,” Banerjee said.
Metro officials could not say when the first train would start commercial runs.
The 14 Chinese rakes will replace the snag-prone old non-AC Metro rakes and reduce the burden on the existing AC rakes.
The new rakes will also be used in the expanded network of Metro. The Noapara-Airport and Noapara-Baranagar-Dakshineswar lines are scheduled to be commissioned by next year.
The Chinese company is manufacturing 14 low-maintenance rakes for Calcutta Metro, breaking the monopoly of the Integral Coach Factory in Perambur, near Chennai, where the current snag-prone AC trains were built.
The trains will run at an average speed of 65kmph, 10kmph faster than the rakes in use. The aerodynamic design of the rakes will help them hit peak speed faster than the existing ones and reduce energy consumption too, the Metro spokesperson said. The doors will be 20cm wider than that of the existing AC rakes.
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, online edition / Home> West Bengal / by Sanjay Mandal in Calcutta / February 22nd, 2019
The year 1942 was a landmark year in terms of political and military changes, especially in East Asia.
Calcutta in post-World War II days
Calcutta Under Fire: The Second World War Years By: David Lockwood Publisher: Rupa Pages: 294 Price: `295
The year 1942 was a landmark year in terms of political and military changes, especially in East Asia. Japan, which had entered World War II spectacularly by bombing Pearl Harbour in December 1941, had—within less than a year—successfully invaded Malaya, Hong Kong, Singapore and Burma. In each of these territories, the defending (and now defeated) forces had been the British.
With the Japanese occupying Burma, sitting literally on the doorstep of India, it was unsurprising that by late 1942, fears of a Japanese invasion of India, or at least of its eastern and coastal stretches, should be widespread.
Yet, there were other factors to be considered. Political, social, and military factors, and factors regarding less tangible ideas, such as the need to save face, or to put up a brave front. There was the Indian national movement, there was the growing doubt among many Britishers themselves regarding the future of India as part of the Empire. There was the (natural, given what had happened in Burma and elsewhere) fear among Indians that the British would be incapable of defending India against the Japanese.
David Lockwood examines all of these and more in an attempt to explain the circumstances and events that shaped India during World War II, especially around the tumultuous year of 1942, when the Japanese bombed Calcutta and sent thousands fleeing the city in panic.
But merely looking at the Japanese bombing of Calcutta in isolation would not make a complete book, so Lockwood instead spreads his net wide to encompass events, ideologies, movements, policies and more. He examines the theory of hegemony as an intrinsic part of British imperialism, and from there goes on to discuss how the Congress’s policies were tailored towards a counter-hegemony.
There is a detailed discussion of how the Congress’s policies underwent changes; of the work the Congress did to mobilise the general populace in what was essentially a counter-hegemonistic movement; of the role played by radio (including the Congress’s illegal, underground radio broadcasts as well as Subhas Chandra Bose’s broadcasts from Berlin); and of rising discontent and nationalism among the Indians in the British Indian military and civil services.
The final picture is a complex but intriguing one of the different forces that not only shaped India in 1942, but which eventually led to independence. Lockwood manages to present interesting insights into the considerations that made the British, the Congress, and the general Indian public (both urban as well as rural) act as they did.
Lockwood’s research is extensive (he even manages to present the Japanese side of it: did they really intend to invade India and make it part of a Japanese Empire?). There are some delightful bits of trivia, too (the thought of an impending Japanese invasion seems to have encouraged some Indians, who looked on the approaching Japanese armies more as liberators than conquerors, to take some very surprising steps, such as learning Japanese). While Lockwood’s style of writing may at times seem more geared towards an academic audience than a layperson, the book is an invaluable resource for understanding India during World War II.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Lifestyle> Books / by Madhulika Liddle / Express News Service / February 24th, 2019
The highlight of a railway heritage walk was the residence of the GM of South Eastern Railway that was once occupied by Wajid Ali Shah, the last ruler of Awadh
The headquarters of South Eastern Railway.
A white edifice overlooking the Hooghly in Garden Reach was built by the British in 1846, the architecture inspired by the Tower of the Winds in Athens.
The building, the highlight of a heritage walk on Saturday morning, was for a few years the home of Wajid Ali Shah, the last ruler of Awadh who was exiled to Calcutta.
But the first occupant of the home was Lawrence Peel, the chief justice of British India. He was the cousin of Robert Peel, two-time Prime Minister of England and one of the founding fathers of the Conservative Party.
The walk began at the South Eastern Railway headquarters in Garden Reach and culminated at the BNR (Bengal Nagpur Railway) House, the official name of the white bungalow that now serves as the residence of the general manager of South Eastern Railway.
“Fascinating titbits of colonial history is nested in every corner of the buildings in this area,” said Samrat Chowdhury, chief mentor of BAUL (Bespoken Architectural and Unique Legacies of Bengal), which organised the walk in association with the external affairs ministry and the railways.
The inside of the building. The dome on top conceals water tanks A clock made in London in 1888 inside the general manager’s office
The headquarters of South Eastern Railway (erstwhile Bengal Nagpur Railway) is a majestic red brick building with domes.
“The architecture is Indo Saracenic, also found in Madras High Court and Lucknow railway station. The red brick structure is occasionally relieved by stone terracotta. The western design is embedded with Indian features such as domes,” said J.K. Saha, chief heritage officer of South Eastern Railway, who guided the participants in the walk.
The construction of the building — spanning over 53,000sq ft — started in April 1906 and was completed in May 1907, a pointer to British engineering efficiency.
Several things have been left unchanged for over a 100 years, including the cast iron-Burma teak staircase to the glass door that leads to the general manager’s cabin. “The building has not needed any structural alterations,” said Saha.
Apart from railway officials and heritage enthusiasts, people from various walks of life took part in the walk on Saturday. Janavi Sanon, a 24-year-old architect, was one of them.
“This is my second railway heritage walk. As a student of design, this is an exciting journey. The history behind all these buildings makes it doubly interesting,” she said.
The deputy high commissioner of Bangladesh, Toufique Hasan, was a participant.
One of the main attractions was a newly opened heritage gallery at the railway office. A 119-year-old Schiedmayer piano was a key draw in the gallery.
Made in Stuttgart, the instrument was shipped to India in 1900. “It is difficult to say who brought it and who played it in Calcutta but it is vintage stuff and would fetch at least a crore in the antique market,” said Saibal Bose, senior railway engineer who has done extensive research on railway history.
The BNR House that was home to Wajid Ali Shah for a few years / Pictures by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya
A feedback from Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in a complaint book of a railway refreshment stall at Muri station, now in Jharkhand, is there on one of the shelves.
A cabinet is dedicated to shells made by the Kharagpur railway workshop of BNR during World War I and II. Resting beside the shells is a large splinter that was inside a bomb dropped by the Japanese in Garden Reach during World War II.
“People of the country need to know about this heritage. I want more and more schoolchildren and youngsters visiting these areas,” said Kajari Biswas, head of the external affairs ministry’s branch secretariat in the city.
Saha also explained why the area was called Garden Reach.
A reach is a length of a stream or river, usually suggesting a level, uninterrupted stretch. There is one such reach in the backyard of the headquarters. The botanical garden sits on the opposite bank.
“The reach and the garden gave this name,” Saha said.
In December, BAUL had organised a similar heritage walk around Howrah station. “We want to bring the railway heritage sites within the ambit of tourism. Ideally, there should be a single-window system that takes care of a guided tour of all these places. There is tremendous tourism potential here,” said Chowdhury.
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, Online edition / Home> Heritage / by Debraj Mitra in Calcutta / February 03rd, 2019
Future Lifestyle Fashions CEO Vishnu Prasad (right) and Future Retail CEO-East Zone Manish Agarwal – Debasish Bhaduri
It was in 1934 that American film production company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer decided to set up a cinema hall in Calcutta to promote its films. The hall was inaugurated in 1935. Famous as an elite British city, the then Calcutta was a large market for Hollywood films.
Eighty-five years later, the iconic cinema hall on Chowringhee Road has made way for Future Group’s first ever movie themed ‘Central’ store.
The fashion and lifestyle retail store will play old Hollywood, Hindi and Bengali hits. These classics were big draws at the ‘Metro cinema’. The screenings are likely to start in April.
According to Vishnu Prasad, CEO, Future Lifestyle Fashions (which owns Central), the company is preparing a list of classics that have been screened. Plans are afoot to bring in the yesteryear stars who featured in these films. Over each week, a film will be played.
First thematic store
“This will be our first thematic store. In fact, Metro Central will be a filmi store. Going forward we may look to host theme-based movie screenings at the store. The idea is to bring alive a lost heritage of the city,” Prasad told BusinessLine.
Metro Central, as it is called, is expected to rake in ₹100 crore by FY20 with apparel sales accounting for nearly 70 per cent of it.
Down memory lane
Metro Cinema’s distinctive art deco structure has, over the years, defined the culture of the city. Initially, it screened only films produced by MGM. Gradually, Hollywood films made way for Hindi cinema and an occasional Bengali film.
The two-storied structure was designed by Thomas Lamb, a Scottish architect settled in the US who built several movie theatres around the world. MGM commissioned him to build two theatres in India. Metro Calcutta’s famous cousin in Mumbai was built in 1938.
Prasad points out that “special care” was taken at the time of renovation so that the art-deco façade, waterfall-style columns and grand staircase within were retained. The company has spent ₹22-25 crore on renovating the heritage structure that will have 55,000 sq ft of space.
Sources say the group had held talks for the renovation and reuse of Grace cinema, too, but issues such as structural stability of the building put things on the backburner.
source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com / Business Line / Home> Variety / by Abhishek Law / Kolkata / February 15th, 2019
Expert coming from Japan today to help with the gardens, one of which was set up by the poet’s son
The Japanese garden next to Udayan house at Visva-Bharati.Picture by Indrajit Roy Picture by Indrajit Roy
Visva-Bharati has decided to restore three Japanese gardens on the campus — one of them set up by Rabindranath Tagore’s son, Rathindranath — by an expert from Japan soon.
The Japanese department of Visva-Bharati has appealed to the consul general of Japan in Calcutta, Masayuki Taga, to arrange for an expert gardener who can help the university restore the gardens in keeping with Japanese culture.
Gita A Keeni, the head of Japanese department, told The Telegraph: “We wanted to restore our Japanese gardens but we had no expert gardener. So, we requested the consul general of Japan in Calcutta who has helped us get the expert. The expert in Japanese garden, Fumio Thukamoto, will visit the campus on February 11 for two days.”
Visva-Bharati sources said there were three Japanese gardens on the campus — one is beside Udayan house in Uttarayan complex, the second garden is at Nippon Bhavana and third near the Nandan gallery of Kala Bhavana.
The Japanese garden beside Udayan, where the poet stayed for a log period of time, was designed by Rathindranath Tagore in the 1930s. The gardens at Nippon Bhavana was designed by the then Japanese language professor Saini Makino and the garden near Nandan gallery was designed by a group of scholars from Japan.
Nilanjan Banerjee, the special officer of Rabindra Bhavana and a scholar in the Japanese department, said: “We did not get any expert on Japanese gardens earlier. As a result, the gardens were not being restored for a long time. The oldest Japanese garden is in the Uttarayan complex. We are happy as now the gardens will be restored properly under guidance of an expert gardener.”
Rabindranath went to Japan five times between 1916 and 1929 and saw the culture and rituals of Japan, including the concept of gardening in that country.
In his travelogue, Japan Jatri, Tagore wrote: “The Japanese know what a garden should be. Merely piling up earth and planting shrubs in geometrical patterns is not enough as you will know if you have ever been to a Japanese garden.”
Visva-Bharati sources said during his maiden visit to Japan, the poet had stayed at a beautiful garden-house, which was the residence of a Japanese silk merchant and art lover Tomitaro Hara.
“Tagore was so influenced by the culture and gardens, the Ikebana (Japanese art of flower arrangement) and the Chado (Japanese tea ceremony) that he had wished to bring an entire Japanese house to Santiniketan,” said Banerjee, the special officer of Rabindra Bhavana.
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, online editon / by Snehamoy Chakraborty in Shantiniketan / February 11th, 2019
A flesh-and-blood Minto and his wife were in Calcutta on Saturday, retracing the steps of his ancestors who lived here over a century ago
Gilbert Timothy George Lariston Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, the seventh Earl of Minto, with his wife Diana Barbara Trafford in front of the Old Government House in Barrackpore on Saturday. / Pradip Sanyal
Minto, to most Calcuttans, is a bus stop scrawled in black on an yellow band across the sides of ramshackle minibuses. For some, it is the patch of green in front of Belle Vue Clinic named after the governor general of India.
But a flesh-and-blood Minto and his wife were in Calcutta on Saturday, retracing the steps of his ancestors who lived here over a century ago.
Gilbert Timothy George Lariston Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, the seventh Earl of Minto, visited the summer residence of the governors general of India where the first Earl of Minto (governor general of India, 1807-1813) and the fourth Earl of Minto (governor general and viceroy of India, 1905-1910) are said to have spent many a happy weekend, “arriving on Fridays and leaving only on Monday mornings”.
“I can absolutely see why they built the summer residence right next to the river. It gives a real atmosphere of India, and I just spent a magical time there,” Minto told Metro after touring the Old Government House in Barrackpore.
“The entire purpose of this time was to visit Calcutta,” said Minto, on his second visit to India but “the very first to Calcutta”. He is scheduled to travel to Goa and Hyderabad before leaving for London.
Minto’s earlier stops in the city included Victoria Memorial Hall and the Raj Bhavan, where he saw a photograph of Lord Minto’s appointment as governor general in 1807.
“There was a lot of talk about India at home and the country was remembered with much affection,” said the current Lord Minto, pausing before his ancestor’s statue on horseback at Latbagan. “My great grandparents made many good friends in India and were in touch with them all their lives.”
With Minto on this trip are his wife Diana Barbara Trafford and author and family friend Anabel Loyd.
“The Government House designed by Captain Thomas Anbury in 1813 was used as a country residence for the British Governor-Generals,” according to the British Library online gallery.
Lord and Lady Minto at (in the background) Lady Canning’s tomb. / Pradip Sanyal
The present Lord Minto in the Westside Gallery where seized arms from the pre-and post-Independence era are displayed. / Pradip Sanyal
Lord Wellesley, who took over the commander-in-chief’s residence in 1801 in Barrackpore, commenced the building of a summer residence for the future governors general of India. He got the gardens landscaped in “English style” and added an aviary and a menagerie, both of which are in a shambles. However, only the first storey was built before Wellesley was recalled to England.
Wellesley’s dream house was added to and expanded in bits and parts by the governors general who lived there. Sir George Barlow, acting governor general, converted each corner of the verandah into a small room. In 1814-15, the building was expanded by the Marquis of Hastings who added a new storey, side wings, a portico and the Upper Entrance Hall. Lord Auckland (1835-1842) added the balcony on the western side, Lord Lytton (1876-1880) replaced the unseemly iron staircase on the southern front, Lord Ripon (1886-1884) installed a wooden porch in front while Lord Minto (1905-1910) electrified the building, laid the floor in the drawing room and redecorated the house.
The house was taken over by the Bengal government and turned into a police academy and police hospital in 1948. The hospital was later shifted out.
The current renovation and conservation of Old Government House, now Swami Vivekananda State Police Academy, has been undertaken at the initiative of Soumen Mitra, the additional director-general of police (training). “Work is on, it will take a long time to finish,” said Mitra, as he took the Mintos around.
Strolling through the lofty rooms, both the Lord and the Lady marvelled at the architecture and the ventilators that naturally cooled the rooms with the river breeze passing through the shafts and lofty windows. They were accompanied by G.M. Kapur of Intach.
Barrackpore, a cantonment area, was built at the bend of the Hooghly river, 20km north of Calcutta, and offered a splendid vista, making it the perfect “weekend retreat”.
The couple from Minto, Roxburghshire, also stopped by the Minto Fountain, a marble fountain added to the sprawling acres by Lord Minto. “The fountain was designed by Lady Minto who inaugurated it before leaving for England in 1910,” said Mitra, who found it dysfunctional and buried under a pile of rubbish.
The Mintos were taken to Flagstaff House, the current residence of the Governor. They strolled around the garden, peered at the old lighthouse, stood before Fourth Earl of Minto’s statue, inspected a series of Raj statues shifted from Calcutta to the statuary and stopped at the restored cenotaph built by the First Earl of Minto in commemoration of officers who fell in the battles of Java and Mauritius and Gwalior.
In front of Minto fountain, which was designed by Lady Minto and inaugurated by her before she left for England. / Pradip Sanyal
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, Online edition / Home> People / by Anasuya Basu in Calcutta / February 10th, 2019
This book offers insights into a chapter of Calcutta’s history that is frightening and inspiring at the same time. David Lockwood takes readers back to 1942 when the city was bombed by the Japanese air force. An excerpt:
December 20, 1942, was a Sunday. On that day, Calcutta’s ‘Oldest Nationalist Daily’ (according to the masthead), the Amrita Bazar Patrika, reported that in Burma there was a possibility of ‘the end of defensive warfare on this frontier [by the Allies] and the beginning of a war of attack.’ Meanwhile, in the Don-Volga area, ‘the Soviet ring is drawing tighter around the enemy.’ Despite this optimistic note, the paper reflected evidence of wartime stringencies. The Imperial Tobacco Company appealed to its customers to accept cigarettes without packets in order to alleviate the paper shortage. The Government denied a shortage of rice. Women were told that they were ‘the Inner Wall of Defence’ and as such they should join the Women’s Auxiliary Corps (India). Indian political problems were also evident in the shape of the continuing Quit India campaign. An attack on a police station, bombs in Baroda and acid attacks on the police were reported.
The Calcutta races, however, went ahead as normal and were graced by the presence of the Marchioness of Linlithgow, His Excellency the Governor of Bengal, and Lady Mary Herbert. There was cricket on Saturday and Sunday and a tennis carnival to look forward to on Thursday. Cinemas catering to English speakers were featuring Chaplin in Goldrush, Robert Taylor in Her Cardboard Lover, and Abbott and Costello in Pardon My Sarong. The paper reported an increase in the production of Indian films for ‘the surging crowds during yuletide hungry for entertainment.’
That night Calcutta was bombed by the Japanese air force. The structural damage was minimal, but the panic that ensued was widespread. Large numbers of Calcutta residents fled. Fear was exacerbated by indications that neither the Government of India nor the Government of Bengal nor the Calcutta municipality were prepared for the defence of the city.
The air raid took place in a context of overwhelming Japanese military success and territorial expansion. The British — the assumed defenders of India — had been pushed out of Malaya, Singapore, Hong Kong and Burma. In late 1942, it was widely expected, in India and beyond, that a Japanese move into northern India was inevitable, imminent—and perhaps unstoppable.
Calcutta served as an industrial centre, a port and a transit point for troops moving up to fight the Japanese in Malaya and then in Burma. It was a city of considerable strategic importance to the Allies. Once Burma fell, Calcutta was the mainstay of the Allies’ Asian front. Consequently, it was a Japanese target. As Prasad points out, ‘Their air force was also well poised…to inflict continuous and heavy raids on Calcutta and the industrial area in the eastern regions. The official reaction to these first raids on the city was very much along the ‘we can take it’ and ‘business as usual’ line, modelled no doubt on the (officially) stoic British reaction to the Blitz. The Governor of Bengal, Sir John Herbert, telegrammed the Viceroy after the first raid that despite two deaths and fourteen injuries, there had been ‘No noticeable effect on morale.’ Later the Chief Secretary related that ‘ARP Services are in general reported to have done excellent work,’ demonstrated by the fact that ‘defections were very few.’ The Viceroy was moved to tell Calcutta’s citizens:
Yours is the first capital city in India to suffer in this war a baptism of fire and her citizens have provided an admirable example of steadiness and fortitude. Well done Calcutta.
The English press was, if anything, even more relaxed. The European-owned Statesman declared that the first raid was ‘a small affair and, if the city has to be raided, it can be described as a very suitable introduction.’ Even the Amrita Bazar Patrika reported that ‘Little damage was done and no nervousness was shown by the townspeople.’
Down amongst the townspeople, however, things were not quite so sanguine. After the first raid, ‘nervousness’ broke out on a wide scale. According to Joydeep Sircar, the raid was a ‘devastating blow to the morale of the inhabitants.’ Sircar suggests that ‘one and-a-half million people’ fled, causing a breakdown in ‘the civil services.’ There was a widespread feeling that ‘The Government had not prepared for the eventuality and seemed overwhelmed by developments in Southeast Asia.’
In the ensuing days and weeks, some signs of defence began to appear: A number of Hurricane aircraft were moved to Calcutta; emergency airfields were constructed, including one in the centre of the city between Chowringhee and the Maidan; slit trenches were dug in the same area. But following the December 1942 raids, many of Calcutta’s citizens were not concerned with defence. They were more interested in flight.
On December 23, Governor Herbert reported to the Viceroy that there had been a ‘considerable exodus of people from Calcutta though not yet amounting to a panic rush.’ Workers had ‘wholly disappeared from the dock area’ and morale was deteriorating — though ‘nothing like a landslide’. The post-bombing exodus took up the full capacity of the railways. Special trains were laid on to cope with the numbers attempting to leave the city. On December 27, ‘measures were taken to clear crowds of refugees collected at railway stations along the evacuation routes.’ The British authorities estimated that some 2,50,000 people left the city by road and another 1,00,000 by rail. Katyun Randhawa, a Calcutta schoolgirl, remembered the exodus and the railway stations ‘packed with people trying to get out’—some permanently. ‘Some of our street hawkers also disappeared,’ she relates, ‘—we never saw our bread delivery man again.’
Not unnaturally, those who felt the most vulnerable —from working-class suburbs, industrial establishments and around the docks — were those most inclined to leave. The Bengal Government Labour Commissioner put a brave face on the situation on the Monday morning after the first raid: ‘There was full attendance this morning in mills and in engineering firms. In fact, some engineering firms reported better attendance than on normal Monday mornings.’ The docks presented a different picture. The Chief Secretary reported that boatmen, port employees and contract labour (including coal coolies) all evacuated. Workers from outside Calcutta ‘left in large numbers on foot both by way of the Grand Trunk Road and the Orissa Trunk Road.’ He estimated their number at 2–3,00,000. Severe labour shortages ensued. The workers that remained took the opportunity of pressing their demands on the employers. There was an increase in strikes in Calcutta after the raids. The Australian war correspondent, Wilfred Burchett, was present in the Calcutta Port Commissioner’s office after one of the December raids, when the latter was confronted by a deputation of wharf labourers. They told him:
We don’t mind staying and working, even if they do bomb us, but we want food in our bellies and decent shelters. At present we’ve got neither.
The Scavengers’ Union demanded wage increases and free accommodation as ‘a large number of sweepers had already left the city and many would go away in the near future.’ The wharf labourers’ demand for shelters reflected, again, the feeling in the city and in the province—and perhaps across India as a whole—that the Government had not prepared well enough for the possibility of war and was not doing enough about it now that it had arrived. In the aftermath of the raids, Sudata Debchaudhury argues, ‘[t]he Government had practically collapsed.’ This may be overstating the case, but at the time the Amrita Bazar Patrika was complaining that the Government of Bengal had done nothing to organise an orderly evacuation, or to provide the evacuees with alternative means of livelihood, shelter and conveyance. Confidence in the authorities could not have been strengthened by the fact that during the December raids about 10 per cent of ‘the lower ranks of the Calcutta Police’ themselves abandoned their posts and fled.
Widespread fear of air raids and even invasion had taken hold in India well before December 1942, and this laid the basis for the civilian exodus from Calcutta. In the early part of the year, the example of Burma was there for all to contemplate. The Government should have known what to expect. On the basis of Burma’s experience of attack from the air, the Government of India’s Civil Defence Department sent out a circular, Lessons learned during air raids, to all Provincial Governments in August 1942.
Excerpted with permission from David Lockwood’s Calcutta Under Fire, Rupa Publications India, Rs 295
The Registry Office, Chandernagore College and Sacred Heart Church are declared as heritage structures
(From left) French ambassador Alexandre Ziegler; consul general Virginie Corteval; Shuvaprasanna, chairman, West Bengal Heritage Commission; and Fabrice Plancon, director, Alliance Francaise du Bengale at Sacred Heart Church on WednesdayPicture by Sudeshna Banerjee
French ambassador Alexandre Ziegler unveiled plaques declaring three buildings in Chandernagore heritage structures on Wednesday.
He was accompanied by members of the West Bengal Heritage Commission.
“The French consulate in Calcutta had sent a proposal for enlistment of 14 buildings in Chandernagore as heritage structures in 2017. Acting on it, the commission has made the declaration for eight buildings. Plaques will be laid today on three of them,” commission chairman Shuvaprasanna said at a programme at the start of the tour at Institut de Chandernagore.
The blue enamel plaques reminded the ambassador of the street name signage in France. “They are very French,” he smiled, unveiling one at the first stop on the tour — the Registry Office and French Court.
The derelict structure rich in history at the starting point on the Strand, facing the river, has been saved from demolition after the petition from the French.
It was also the focal point of a workshop called House of the Moon during Bonjour India, the French festival in India, in 2017, for which students of design from India and France co-created and collaborated to develop an intervention in Chandernagore.
Once restored, Ziegler envisions it as a focal point of tourist interest, with a coffee house and an information centre.
Ziegler unveils the plaque declaring the Registry Office a heritage structure.
But he insisted that the day’s exercise was not just about restoring history. “It’s about what you can do with heritage while looking at the future. It is much more than architecture, for our vision involves economic revitalisation of the town. We will be working on giving ownership to the whole community by working with students and children, and making Chandernagore the focal point of our common history and bilateral relations.”
The heritage structure plaque at Chandernagore College.Pictures by Sudeshna Banerjee
The other two buildings where plaques were unveiled are Chandernagore College and Sacred Heart Church.
The college, originally established as St Mary’s Institution by the French Catholic Missionary, Rev. Magloire Barthet in 1862, had received an affiliation to Calcutta University as a First Arts Level College in 1891.
The principal, Debasish Sarkar, had a piece of good news to share with the ambassador — the college had just been granted Rs 1.68 crore for the upkeep of the building by the higher education department.
“This is a memorable day for Chandernagore. The laying of the plaques invests the buildings with importance and insures their future. It also gives the young generation something to take pride in,” said Basabi Pal, the head of the college’s French department, which is the oldest in Bengal. The department now grants even postgraduate degrees.
Father Orson Welles received the ambassador at Sacred Heart Church, which dates back to 1875.
The consul general of France in Calcutta, Virginie Corteval, and district magistrate J.P. Meena were present at the programme.
A team of technical experts will visit Chandernagore “by the summer” to help with the restoration, the ambassador said.
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, Online Edition / Home> Heritage / by The Telegraph – Special Correspondent in Chandernagore / February 07th, 2019
Sister Nectaria Paridisi of the Greek Orthodox Church is the only Greek left in the city
Ground reality: Sister Nectaria at the Greek Orthodox ChurchManasi Shah
Sister Nectaria Paridisi sips on her Darjeeling tea. She is sitting in the lounge on the ground floor of the Greek Orthodox Church in Kalighat in south Calcutta and talking animatedly about a whole lot of things — the church, the state government’s lack of interest in the heritage property and its history, the uncaring locals. The room is full of antique furniture, framed photographs of bishops and Greek inscriptions. Flags of Greece, India and the bygone Byzantine Empire stand in different corners of the room. Our host is Father Raphael, a priest at the church. And the nun, Sister Nectaria, is the only Greek resident left in Calcutta.
To trace the beginning of Calcutta’s Greek association, however, we have to trek to Phoolbagan in the eastern part of the city. It is not difficult to miss the plaque at the entrance to the Greek cemetery. For one, the compound itself is surrounded by a gaggle of residential buildings and then there is the flurry of activity from the ongoing expansion work of the Kolkata Metro. Unlike some of the other cemeteries of the city, such as South Park Cemetery or the Scottish Cemetery, this one is smaller and way less verdant.
The caretaker, Basanta Das, says there are more than 200 graves here. Das, whose father and grandfather have also been caretakers here, says, “Not all the graves have bodies. Some of them are just epitaphs and tombstones.” Most of the graves have inscriptions in Greek. One such reads: “In the memory of Mavrody Athanass Mitchoo who died on December 9, 1855.” But the oldest grave is of Alexander Argeery, who died on August 5, 1777.
“From the 17th century, Calcutta was home to a Greek community,” says Sister Nectaria. In his book, Calcutta Old And New, H.E.A. Cotton writes: “The Greeks, like the Armenians, owe their association with Calcutta to the allurements of commerce.” According to Cotton, the first Greek settler of note in Calcutta was Hadjee Alexias Argyree, a native of Philippopolis, who came to Bengal in 1750 and earned his living as an interpreter.
In fact, it was Argyree who founded the first Orthodox Church of Calcutta. The story goes that in 1770, he set sail from Calcutta for Mocha and Jeddah. But his vessel was hit by a severe storm and was close to sinking. A devout, Argyree promised the gods that if he survived the peril he would found a church in Calcutta for its Greek inhabitants. True to his word, upon return to the city, he obtained relevant permissions and started to move on the purchase of a property. But then, he died in 1777.
Three years later the church came up. Writes Cotton, “…his family contributed a considerable sum, the remainder being made up by voluntary contributions, Warren Hastings heading the subscription list with 2,000 rupees.” Sister Nectaria confirms that the first Greek church to be built in Calcutta was indeed at Amratollah Street (in central Calcutta) and it had a cemetery adjoining it.
The first minister of the church was Father Parthenio, a native of Corfu, who settled in Bengal in 1775 and who is said to have sat for the figure of Jesus in German neoclassical artist Johann Zoffany’s painting, Last Supper.
The Greeks of Calcutta were a wealthy and powerful community. This is borne out by some of the epitaphs. One of them reads: “In the memory of Sir Gregory Charles Paul, Advocate General of Bengal, died on January 1, 1900.” Another grave belongs to Mavrodi Athanass Mitchoo, a planter.
According to Sister Nectaria, in 1922 another wave of Greeks fled their homeland. “A major reason was the genocide that happened at that time. Calcutta was an important port those days and so many came to Calcutta,” she says. The long and short of it, the Greek community continued to flourish till 1947 and, thereafter, began its denouement. Says Sister Nectaria, “Greeks started to leave India and move to London, Johannesburg, some moved back to Greece even.”
In 1924, the Amratollah property on which the Greek church stood was sold. Says Sister Nectaria, “The church authorities bought the Kalighat property and decided to move the cemetery out of town.” [At that time, Phoolbagan was not part of the city.]
The entrance to the Kalighat church building has two plaques on either side. The inscriptions are in Greek. Sister Nectaria translates it: “It is in memory of the Greeks who donated generously to build the first church in Amratollah… Their bodies are buried but their names will remain alive for generations.”
A tombstone in the cemetery at Phoolbagan / Manasi Shah
With the Greeks moving out, the church became non-functional and was finally locked down in 1972. And then, in 1991, it was reopened on the initiative of the Greek embassy. At the time, Sister Nectaria, who was posted in South Korea, was asked to come and take care of the church. Father Ignatios was in charge of the church. He also established the Philanthropic Society of the Orthodox Church.
According to the nun, the years of neglect had literally eaten into the church building. The whole place had been taken over by termites. She says, “It was just black. And I started cleaning through the layers of dirt. The termites had eaten all the ornaments of the Lord, the clothes, the books and even the wall clock.”
Sitting in the church that afternoon, it was difficult to imagine that scene. The wooden altar is now beautifully polished and has intricate panels and paintings related to the life of Christ, Virgin Mary, archangels Gabriel and Michael with their swords drawn out.
Calcutta is now emptied of its Greek populace. The church is frequented by local Christians and Sunday services are held regularly in Bengali. “Many Hindus also just come to pray. Sometimes I see Krishna monks, who come, sit, pray and leave silently,” says Sister Nectaria.
If she resents anything it is the attitude of the people in the neighbourhood. Breaking his silence for a change, Father Raphael says, “This is a Grade 1 heritage building [as declared by the Kolkata Municipal Corporation] and still we have to struggle for its maintenance.”
Sister Nectaria elaborates, “The local people force the guard to open the gates and act like this is their property. During Durga Puja, they put lights around the church. It is not as if we are against Durga Puja, but it is about the whole attitude. Whenever there is a festival, they block the church entrance and dump chairs, lights and sound equipment in the church premises as if it were a store room. And when I oppose, they call me an outsider.”
These days, Sister Nectaria visits the church only every other week. She remains busy in Bakeswar on the southern reaches of the city, where she is in charge of two orphanages under the Greek Church. Then there is the St. Ignatius High School, which is also under her supervision. And does she feel like an outsider?
She smiles, “Now? I am now half Indian.”
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph, Online edition / Calcutta / Home> Heritage / by Manasi Shah / February 02nd, 2019
Despite being a pioneer in the study of cosmic rays in India, Bibha Chowdhuri remains practically unknown. Gifted physicist Bibha Chowdhuri / Illustration by Suman Choudhury
Judging by her publications in journals such as Nature and Proceedings of the Physical Society of London, and her doctoral research work at the laboratory of renowned physicist P.M.S. Blackett in the UK, Bibha Chowdhuri was a gifted physicist. No wonder she was one of the young scientists — the first woman researcher — selected by Homi J. Bhabha to join the newly established Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Bombay, in 1949. Chowdhuri (1913-1991) served in renowned institutions of the country and was a tireless researcher till she died, unsung and unheralded, in Calcutta. No national award or fellowship of any major scientific society came her way. She does not figure among the 98 scientists of uneven quality in the 2008 book Lilavati’s Daughters: The Women Scientists of India, edited by Rohini Godbole and Ram Ramaswamy and published by the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore.
Now, thanks to the painstaking efforts of two physicists, a book has been published from Germany that throws light on the life and work of this remarkable scientist who happened to be a woman. Rajinder Singh, a noted science historian at the University of Oldenburg in Germany and Suprakash C. Roy, former professor of Physics at the Bose Institute in Calcutta seek to unravel the “story of courage and determination of a lady born more than a hundred years ago …for our younger generations to emulate.”
While her research contributions are well recorded and have been critically examined by the authors, not much material could be unearthed on her life. Chowdhuri was wedded to physics and led a quiet, modest and dignified life largely within the confines of her laboratory. A quintessential researcher who never aspired for high office, she hailed from an educated zamindar family in the Hooghly district of undivided Bengal and her mother was related through marriage to the family of Sir J.C. Bose. Chowdhuri was one of six siblings — five sisters and a brother. All of them were well-educated, thanks to their Brahmo lineage, and none of them married.
Chowdhuri obtained her MSc in Physics from Calcutta University in 1936 — the only woman in that batch — and plunged headlong into research, mostly at the Bose Institute. Debendra Mohan (DM) Bose [nephew of Sir J.C. Bose] and Chowdhuri published three consecutive papers in Nature, but could not continue further investigation on account of “non-availability of more sensitive emulsion plates during the war years. Seven years after this discovery of mesons by DM Bose and Bibha Chowdhuri, C.F. Powell made the same discovery of pions and muons and further decay of muons to electrons… using the same technique” and won the Nobel Prize in 1950. Powell acknowledged Bose and Chowdhuri’s pioneering contribution in his work.
In 1945, Chowdhuri joined “the cosmic ray laboratory of would-be Nobel Laureate P.M.S. Blackett (he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1948) at a time when studies on extensive air showers in cosmic rays were one of the most important investigations in particle physics” for her PhD.
On her return, she joined TIFR. After eight years, she joined the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) at Ahmedabad. She was involved deeply with the Kolar Gold Mine experiment and discussed with Vikram Sarabhai, then director of PRL, about her future research plans. Unfortunately, after Sarabhai’s untimely death, she was not permitted to take up the planned work. It is unfortunate that at two critical junctures, once at the Bose Institute and later in PRL, she had to abandon the work she intended to pursue. She finally opted for voluntary retirement, moved to Calcutta to pursue her work on high energy Physics, continued as an active researcher with the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics and the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science and kept publishing her findings till almost the time of her death.
While Chowdhuri’s research in the fields of high energy and cosmic ray physics has been extensively reviewed and rated as “superb” by the authors, her life, devoid of any major recognition, raises many important questions, especially in the context of barriers women face even today, while pursuing science.
Just like C.V. Raman was reluctant to admit the first woman researcher to the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, DM Bose too was initially not enthusiastic but eventually accepted Chowdhuri as a research student. The situation was not much different in the West.
In her introduction to the book Women and Science in India: A Reader,a collection of interesting essays, Neelam Kumar states that “science continues to be characterised by low number of females, clustered in disciplines considered feminine and confined to the ranks of invisible, poorly paid assistants, and other lower positions.” In the same volume, Namrata Gupta and A.K. Sharma write about the “triple burden” —- In addition to the double burden of career and home, the long hours in the laboratory demanded by scientific study and research constitutes the third burden — faced by women in science. The issue of “passive discrimination” and of invisible barriers are also no less important.
The authors of the book on Chowdhuri cite Godbole and Ramaswamy that till a few years back only five per cent of the fellows of the Indian National Science Academy were women. Eileen Pollack, author of The Only Women in the Room: Why Science is still a Boys’ Club, argues that society encourages men to take up science and discourages women. In an interview to The Manchester Herald during her research days, Chowdhuri had said, “Women are terrified of Physics — that is the trouble. It is a tragedy that we have so few women physicists today… I can count the women physicists I know, both in India and England, on the fingers of one hand. At school, scientifically-inclined girls choose Chemistry; perhaps because a really sound grasp of Higher Mathematics is one essential of any physicist’s equipment.”
Singh and Roy deserve praise for having written a scholarly and dispassionate analysis of what Chowdhuri achieved. One hopes that the book would lead to more material on Chowdhuri emerging from her students who may still be alive. It may also prompt the government to take due cognisance of Chowdhuri’s life and honour her memory as a way of expiating our collective apathy towards her.
A Jewel Unearthed: Bibha Chowdhuri by Rajinder Singh and Suprakash C. Roy was released by German publishing house Shaker Verlag recently
source: http://www.telegraphindia.com / The Telegraph,Online edition / Home> Science / by Amitabha Bhattacharya / November 25th, 2018
