India Travel

Along the Hooghly to the sea In Coastal Bengal

Related Properties from Gurgaon

Coastal Bengal

The coast of West Bengal consists of two very distinct sections, on either side of the River Hooghly. To the east are the Sunderbans, one of the largest estuarine deltas in the world covering an area of 2500 square kilometres. Here you'll find the Sunderbans Tiger Reserve and the seaside resort of Bakkhali. On the west side of the Hooghly, an unbroken line of beaches goes all the way to Digha, the last resort before the coastline of Orissa begins.

Chandernagore, Hooghly and Bandel in Calcutta

Around 35km north of Howrah, the former French outpost of CHANDERNAGORE still bears traces of its colonial masters, who left in 1949 and office dally ceded the town to India in 1952. Crumbling buildings along its grand riverside promenade, formerly the Quai Dupleix and now the Strand, include what was once the Hotel de Paris, while the Eglise du Sacre Coeur, set back from the river, houses an image of Joan of Arc. Nearby, the eighteenth-century mansion of the French administrator serves as the Institut de Chandernagore. with a library, a French-language school and an interesting museum of documents, antiques,

Calcutta The City

Calcutta's crumbling weather beaten buildings and anarchic streets can create an intimidating first impression. Given a little time and patience, however, the huge metropolis starts to resolve itself into a fascinating conglomerate of styles and influences with a variety of impressive skylines to match. The River Hooghly, which was until recently only spanned by the remarkable cantilever Howrah Bridge, is not all that prominent in me life of the city. Instead its heart is the green expanse of the Maidan, which attracts Calcuttans from all walks of life for recreation, sports, exhibitions and political rallies. At its southern end stands die

Around Calcutta in Calcutta

The River Hooghly served for centuries as a lifeline for foreign traders; north of Calcutta, its banks are dotted with the remains of tiny European settlements such as Serampore and Chandernagore. All these sites, together with the Hindu temples of Dakshineshwar. Belur Math and Kalna, and even the great Vaishnavite centres of Nabadip and Mayapur further north, can be taken in as day-trips on local trains from Calcutta's Sealdah and Howrah stations. Simple hotels are always available should you want to stay.

Howrah and the River Hooghly

Although Howrah is technically a separate town, as the home of much of Calcutta's industry, as well as Howrah Station, it forms an integral part of the city. Until recently, antiquated Howrah Bridge was the only road link across the River Hooghly; since the opening of the tall and elegant Vidyasagar Setu, the second Hooghly bridge, a few years ago, the west bank of the river is changing rapidly. Vidyasagar Setu (also referred to as the New or Natun Bridge) provides easy access to Shibpur and the beautiful Botanical Gardens, and onwards southwest to the open highways towards Orissa. Across the

The beach resorts in Coastal Bengal

The popular seaside resort of DIGHA. 175km southwest of Calcutta and almost halfway to Pun in Orissa, with its immense silted hard beach, was originally conceived as a health sanatorium. Direct buses run from the Esplanade terminus in Calcutta; trains from Howrah station run to Kharagpur from where you can take a bus. Alternatively you can get here on a WB tourist bureau bus. If anything, the casuarina-lined beach at BAKKHALI, 80km south of Diamond Harbour on the east side of the Hooghly, is even harder than the one at Digha. However, it's much less developed and far more attractive, and

Naming of Calcutta

While Calcutta struggles to maintain its position as a world city, a strong parochial trend in recent years has been to replace all English eventually with Bengali - the most obvious result has been the renaming of the city as Kolkata. The shedding of the city's colonial past began decades ago in the Sixties and Seventies when many of the old British street names were officially changed, but Calcutta is slow to change and, three decades or so later, some of the original names continue to be widely used in tandem. The most important of these is Chowhnghee or Jawaharlal

What’s in a name? Calcutta

While Calcutta struggles to maintain its position as a world city, a strong parochial trend in recent years has been to replace all English eventually with Bengali - the most obvious result has been the renaming of the city asKolkata. The shedding of the city's colonial past began decades ago in the Sixties and Seventies when many of the old British street names were officially changed, but Calcutta is slow to change and, three decades or so later, some of the original names continue to be widely used in tandem. The most important of these is Chowhnghee or Jawaharlal Nehru

Botanical Gardens at Calcutta

The Botanical Gardens at Shibpur lie 10km south of Howrah Station on the west bank of the Hooghly. Although they were created in 1786 to develop strains of Indian tea, Calcuttans have only started to appreciate these 109 hectares once again since the opening of the second bridge. Populated by countless bird species, such as waders, cranes, and storks, the huge gardens are best seen in winter and spring and early in the mornings, when they're free from the grime of the metropolis. Their single most famous feature is the world's largest banyan tree, 24.5m high and an astonishing 420m

About Calcutta and West Bengal

Unique among Indian stares in stretching all the way from the Himalayas to the sea, WEST BENGAL is nonetheless explored in depth by few travellers. That may have something to do with the exaggerated reputation of its capital, CALCUTTA, which is actually a sophisticated and friendly city that belies its popular image as poverty-stricken and chaotic. Certainly the rest of Bengal holds an extraordinary assortment of landscapes and cultures, ranging from the dramatic hill station of Darjeeling, within sight of some of the highest mountains in the world, to the vast mangrove swamps of the Sunderbans, prowled by man-eating Royal

Dakshineshwar and Belur in Calcutta

At the outermost edge of Calcutta, 20km north of Esplanade on the east bank of the river, the popular temple of DAKSHINESHWAR stands in the shadow of Bally Bridge. Built in 1855 by Rani Rashmoni, a wealthy widow, it was a product of the Bengali Renaissance, consecrated at a time when growing numbers of middle-class Hindus were rejecting their faith. As the rani was not a brahmin, she found it hard to employ a priest, but one of those she eventually contracted became renowned as the sainr Ramakrishna who, despite his simplicity, went on to become a powerful influence on

History of Calcutta (Kolkata)

Although Bengal was part of the Mauryan empire during the third century BC. it first came to prominence in its own right under the Guptas, in the fourth century AD. So dependent was it on trade with the Mediterranean that the fall of Rome caused a sharp decline, only reversed with the rise of the Pala dynasty in the eighth century. After a short-lived period of rule by the highly cultured Senas, based at Gaur, Bengal was brought under Muslim rule at the end of the twelfth century by the first Sultan of Delhi, Qutb-ud-din-Aibak. Sher Shah Suri, who usurped power

Calcutta The City

Calcutta's crumbling weather eaten buildings and anarchic streets can create an intimidating first impression. Given a little time and patience, however, the huge metropolis starts to resolve itself into a fascinating conglomerate of styles and influences with a variety of impressive skylines to match. The River Hooghly, which was until recently only spanned by the remarkable cantilever Howrah Bridge, is not all that prominent in me life of the city. Instead its heart is the green expanse of the Maidan, which attracts Calcuttans from all walks of life for recreation, sports, exhibitions and political rallies. At its southern end stands die

Sajnekhali and the Sunderbans Tiger Reserve in Coastal Bangal

The cluster of mangrove-covered islands known as the Sunderbans, or"beautiful forest", lie in the Ganges Delta, stretching east from the mouth of the Hooghly to Bangladesh. They are home to the legendary Royal Bengal tiger, a ferocious man-eater which has adapted remarkably well to this watery environment, and swims from island to island - covering distances of as much as 401cm in one day. Other wildlife includes wild boar, spotted deer, Olive Ridley sea turtles, sharks, dolphins and large estuarine crocodiles. Among the people who find them selves sharing this delicate ecosystem with the mighty cats are honey collectors, woodcutters

Nabadip and Mayapur in Calcutta

Pilgrims come in their thousands to the pleasant little town of NABADIP (or Nawadip), on the west bank of the Hooghly, around 100km north of Howra. Although it was the eleventh-century capital of Bengal under the Sen dynasty, and the home of Sri Chaitanya, a Hindu sage, few of the many temples clustered around its Mayapur Ghat are of any great antiquity. The most important are Gauranga Mahapur and Sonar Gauranga, but the courtyards of virtually all are alive with devotees singing kirtan (devotional song). A fifty-kilometre padakrama, or foot pilgrimage, links Chaitanya with various sites spread across nine islands.

The Grand Trunk Road in Haryana and Punjab

Crossing Haryana and Punjab en route to, or from, Delhi, you're bound to travel at some stage, along part of the longest, oldest and most famous highway in India Stretching 2000km from Peshawar near the rugged Afghan-Pakistan frontier to Calcutta on the River Hooghly, NH-1. alias the Grand Trunk Road, was described by Kipling in his novel Kim, whose hero and his Tibetan lam i companion set off along it in search up' The River of Arrows", ;is "the Big Road", and "the Backbone of all Hind". The first recorded mention of this trade corridor dates from the fourth century BC,

Murshidabad in Central Bengal

Set in the brilliant green landscape of rural Bengal, historic MURSHIDABAD lies close to the bustling commercial town of Behrampur, 200km north of Calcutta. Several eighteenth-century monuments along the banks of the Hooghly stand as reminders of its days as the last independent capital of Bengal. Established early in the eighteenth century by the Nawab Murshid Quli Khan, Murshidabad was soon eclipsed when the forces of Siraj-ud-Uaula were defeated by Robert Clive at the Battle of Plassey in 1757, as a result of which the British came to dominate Bengal from the new city of Calcutta. Clive described Murshidabad as

The festivals of Calcutta

Most of Calcutta's Hindu festivals are devoted to forms of the mother goddess, Shakti. As one of the last centres of north Indian Buddhism, Bengal reflects a unique blend of traditions; Tantric Hinduism, closely related to Vajrayana Buddhism, continues to be evident in the devotion to mysterious deities such as Tara (see p.822). Calcutta's own deity, the black goddess Kali, is an emanation of Durga, the consort of Shiva. Kali is depicted with four arms, standing on the prostrate Shiva after killing the demon Raktviya. The two-week Durga Puja (Sept/Oct) is the most lavish festival of all. A symbol of victory,

The festivals of Calcutta

Most of Calcutta's Hindu festivals are devoted to forms of the mother goddess, Shakti. As one of the last centers of north Indian Buddhism, Bengal reflects a unique blend of traditions; Tantric Hinduism, closely related to Vajrayana Buddhism, continues to be evident in the devotion to mysterious deities such as Tara (see p.822). Calcutta's own deity, the black goddess Kali, is an emanation of Durga, the consort of Shiva. Kali is depicted with four arms, standing on the prostrate Shiva after killing the demon Raktviya. The two-week Durga Puja (Sept/Oct) is the most lavish festival of all. A symbol of victory,

Calcutta tour and transport

Virtually all the different modes of transport that clog the streets of Calcutta -trams, buses, rickshaws, metered taxis, and minibuses - add to the problem of congestion. However, the Metro, India's first and Calcutta's pride and joy, provides a fast, clean and efficient way to get around. It's also very easy to use, as it consists of just the one line running on a north—south axis. The river is also used for transport, with the ghats near Eden Gardens at the hub of a ferry system. The most pleasant way to beat the traffic is to take one of the very