Showing posts with label South Park Street Cemetery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label South Park Street Cemetery. Show all posts

Saturday, November 21, 2015

'HINDOO' STUART's MAUSOLEUM ... Tomb or Temple ??!!

During the Bengal Renaissance of nineteenth century, many prominent names of the society chose to adopt Christianity and converted. Reverend Krishna Mohan Bandyopadhyay, Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Toru Dutt, Chandramukhi Basu are only to name a few. The scenario was similar in the remaining part of Colonial India too. With the increase in European settlements in India from 17th century onwards, conversion to Christianity from Hinduism was not a rare or surprising instance. But finding a British (technically Irish) dignitary, who inspite of adhering to his religion, embraced Hindu Culture, is a rare instance indeed !

In the 25th post, WANDERLUST explores an Irish Major-General who practiced idolatry, wore dhoti, used to bath in River Ganges, advised Memsahibs to wear Sari, built a temple, criticized European missionaries and has a Mausoleum in South Park Street Cemetery which looks like a temple !!

Presenting CHARLES 'HINDOO' STUART and his exceptional Mausoleum.




Saturday, June 20, 2015

4 OVERLOOKED MEMORIALS... Prince... Nawab... Maharaja... Artist !!


On the streets of Calcutta there are innumerable relics, monuments, memorials, plaques; reminding us of our Colonial past but these have sunk in oblivion of public memory, obliterated by parked vehicles or the tarpaulin sheets of roadside vendors or simply lying forgotten behind the weeds. There is hardly any signage to indicate either their background or historical value. 

If you take a tour across Dalhousie-Esplanade area, which was once called 'Town Calcutta' and was the first developed area in the city, you will spot many such architectural marvels. 

My today's article will indeed highlight four of them, generally overlooked by the daily commuters passing by.