The British Raj Walk
Calcutta became the capital city of the British Raj and on this walk we look at where it all began.
By the village of Kalicutta and the waters of Lal Dighi, on the banks of the Hooghly river a city grew. On these walks we roam around the origins of Calcutta and explore the essential buildings that went into the running of the colony, plus meet the people who now live and work in this now untypical corner of greater Kolkata.
The British Raj Walk is a little history lesson on how to invade a subcontinent and rule it. It explores the colonial beginnings of the city and is a template of all that is necessary for a colony to function, from the Governor General’s residence (a replica of Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire) and the neo-Gothic High Court building, the design, loosely modelled on the 13th-century Cloth Hall at Ypres, Belgium. It covers places of worship like St John’s (which has a memorial to the victims of the notorious ‘black hole of Calcutta’) and is based on St Martins in the Fields Church in London to the massive Writers Building where young clerks were trained in the business of running the colony and to various other financial and government institutions including the massive taxation offices, control central or much of the wealth extracted from India.
It is a walk back to a more spacious and grander time but with reminders of a violent past, when Calcutta was the capital of British India and one of the great and richest cities in the world.
The city started from from the banks of the Ganga but moved west as it grew and its centre had moved to Chowringhee by the time the British departed. We start here and if time permits end the walk in the area around Esplanade.
Meeting Point: In front of main gate Oberoi Grand hotel, Chowringhee
By the village of Kalicutta and the waters of Lal Dighi, on the banks of the Hooghly river a city grew. On these walks we roam around the origins of Calcutta and explore the essential buildings that went into the running of the colony, plus meet the people who now live and work in this now untypical corner of greater Kolkata.
The British Raj Walk is a little history lesson on how to invade a subcontinent and rule it. It explores the colonial beginnings of the city and is a template of all that is necessary for a colony to function, from the Governor General’s residence (a replica of Kedleston Hall in Derbyshire) and the neo-Gothic High Court building, the design, loosely modelled on the 13th-century Cloth Hall at Ypres, Belgium. It covers places of worship like St John’s (which has a memorial to the victims of the notorious ‘black hole of Calcutta’) and is based on St Martins in the Fields Church in London to the massive Writers Building where young clerks were trained in the business of running the colony and to various other financial and government institutions including the massive taxation offices, control central or much of the wealth extracted from India.
It is a walk back to a more spacious and grander time but with reminders of a violent past, when Calcutta was the capital of British India and one of the great and richest cities in the world.
The city started from from the banks of the Ganga but moved west as it grew and its centre had moved to Chowringhee by the time the British departed. We start here and if time permits end the walk in the area around Esplanade.
Meeting Point: In front of main gate Oberoi Grand hotel, Chowringhee
