On August 16, 1897, Hridaynath Ghosh, manager of Kathalguri Tea Estate in what is now Jalpaiguri district in West Bengal, was found brutally murdered in his bungalow, his throat slit wide open. Topping the list of suspects was his former domestic help Ranjan Singh alias
In an age when misinformation and fake news have become part of everyday life, this story would be commonplace. Nearly a century ago, however, news was not taken as casually as it is now, and certainly not when it involved a personage of the stature
It was French journalist and novelist Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr who in 1849 first coined the saying, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” (the more things change, the more they remain the same). He could easily have been talking about what is said to
COVID-19 has not only snatched many of our near and dear ones but has had an impact on some iconic landmarks of Kolkata from book shops to restaurants, to cinema halls that marked Kolkata’s heritage for ages. They are shutting down. One to join the
Did ever 92-year-old Mohan Tiwari dream in his wildest dreams that he has to pull down the curtains of his heritage book shop on the same year when we celebrate Satyajit Ray’s borth centenary? Mohan’s Books & Magazines, opposite Lighthouse Cinema, used to be a
Even if you don’t know it by name, the nearly 100-foot tall, graceful white tower is instantly recognisable to any Kolkatan as a BBD Bag landmark, next to Writers’ Building, and looking straight down Old Court House Street. Visible from a long distance even today,
Babul mora naihar chhooto hi jaye… the poet, the singer, the musician and the Shatranjke Khiladi. He was dethroned and uprooted from the place he loved – Lucknow and was sent by the British to Kolkata on exile. Jab chhorchale Lucknow Nagri, kahehalke hum por kya
The Chinese community was among the first group of migrants to settle in Kolkata way back in 1780. Calcutta Chinese has a bit of mainland, a touch of the original Cantonese, the subtlety and strength of original flavours married to Bengali ingredients and cooking styles.Kolkata’s
• You are an electrical engineer, but you run a paan shop that is a name by itself, a shop as old and prestigious as Kolkata’s history. Why did you choose to make paans instead of taking up engineering? There are too many engineers these days,
Imagine elephants walking down Chowringhee! Street scenes of erstwhile Calcutta, under the British Raj, captured in water-colour canvases of William Daniell, the English landscape and marine painter, are still something to linger over. One of them shows elephants moving with leisurely grace, followed by many