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India.com
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- India.com
Discover Kolkata's Hidden Legends: A Journey Through Local Myths
Kolkata is the cultural capital of India and has a rich abundance of history, tradition and folklore. Beside its colonial architecture and busy roads, and the intellectual past, Kolkata is also home to several local legends that have been etched in time. It is like a mythical mosaic that encompasses the very own Kalakatanan's life. Come along as we share some unique stories of the local folk that have kept Kolkatan's mesmerized till this date. Haunted House of Rabindra Sarobar Legends buzzing tales in Kolkata talks about a haunted house around Rabindra Sarobar. This is a calm lake located in south Kolkata. Locals say that there lies a deserted mansion buried in overgrown foliage, which is said to be home for a restless spirit. According to the rumors, this house was formerly owned by a rich family who had an unknown tragic end. Whispers talk that anyone who dares to enter the house after sunset can hear their eerie whispers, watch ghostly apparitions, and feel an unbearable sense of panic. Although this house is referred to as paranormal, the enthusiast nature followers along with thrill seekers admire the sorroundings of the house. Curse of the Zamindar: The Essence of Fear In North Kolkata, USA, one can find the Zamindar Putty which is a place full of ugly, dead sights. Locals say that Putty is cursed by the ghost of the zamindar, the owner of the mansion and estate. People claim that he was very cruel and transacted in the exploitation of the lowly classes, often abusing servants. It is said that he was cursed by a random sage during his wandering, who because of his wrongdoings was fated to be tortured within the haunted mansion for the rest of his life. At night, the people can still hear the sound of chains as well as weeping. These are thought to be the remorseful screams of the zamindar. In addition to being a into a folklore tales, his life serves the purpose of describing what we are willing to do in the pursuit of materialistic achievements. tale of the lost treasure of Bow Barracks Bow Barracks is renowned for its vibrant Anglo-Indian community that captures the essence of Central Kolkata with colorful buildings. As charming as the neighborhood may be, it is also famous for its enthralling tales. Legend has it during World War 2, British soldiers posted in Kolkata managed to conceal a stash of gold and jewelry underneath the barracks, as an attempt to save it from the enemy forces. While many searched for the treasure, it has never been located. Some say that a powerful curse protects the treasure, others say that it will only be uncovered by someone with benevolent intentions. No matter where the truth lies, one thing for sure is that these tales beautify the already rustic and historical neighborhood. Goddess of the Hooghly River Kolkata's lifeline, the Hooghly River, is more than a mere physical feature; it is a spiritual hub. As per local tales, there lives a kind goddess who helps in safeguarding the city and watches over the river's waters. Fishermen and boathmen offer prayers and flowers to the goddess before starting their voyage hoping that the gentle goddess will help them in safely crossing the river. It is believed that those who disrepect the river by polluting its water suffer the misfwrtune of the goddess's anger. This myth highlights the profoind relationship the goddess has with the people of Kolkata and the rich history and culture it possesses. Phantom Tram of Kolkata Like most metropolitan cities, Kolkata is known for its unique legend which is terrifying in nature. Tram system, one of the most used public transport in Kolkata, is a creepy urban legend. It is said that an old tram devoid of any features appears out of nowhere at night and takes ghost like people to some mysterious location. Those who have seen it speak of the tram's interior as junk. It is mostly dark with shady pieces being positioned in such a way that it looks like some shadow is observing passerby through a window. Without a second the tram changes its position and becomes memorabilia which the passenger has said in shock. While the story is nothing but a well concocted tale of someone's hyperactive brain, it nevertheless adds to the enduring mystery surrounding Kolkata. story about the secret tunnel of Thakur Dalan In Kolkata's older areas, one can find Thakur Dalan-style Bengali mansions. One such mansion situated in North Kolkata is said to have an unused secret tunnel that used to be escape routes for the family in times of danger. According to local lore, the passage was supposed to end in an ancient treasure room, however, the tunnel is also said to be warded by spirits. The mystery of the tunnel is a testament to the blend of history and folklore, both of which capture the imagination of the people. Final Words Kolkata urban folklore is more than legends; it replenishes the identity of the city. These stories, whether histrionically inspired or created out of thin air, Kolkata is sculpted with magic like none. As imposing as the modern city looks, there rests an eerie calmness that holds together a multitude of legends. While wandering around the robust areas of Kolkata, let these folklore guide you through the heart of the city and witness the stories that have shaped this magical place.
Time of India
5 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Set up in 18th century, bazaar now deals in milk products and spices
1 2 Kolkata: The Orphanganj Market in Kidderpore, with its origin dating back to the early 18th century, stands as a significant reminder of colonial Calcutta's social welfare initiatives, particularly concerning the Anglo-Indian community. The present form of the market, however, took shape over the past 150-odd years. The market's establishment, with its architecture following the open-brick style and spread over 36 bighas, is closely tied to the Bengal Civil and Military Orphan Society. The society was formed after British officials discovered disturbing conditions affecting orphaned or abandoned children, particularly those of mixed Anglo-Indian heritage. This society subsequently established two schools, including the Free School in Kidderpore, to support these 'Eurasian' orphaned or abandoned children, said retired bureaucrat and former Rajya Sabha MP Jawhar Sircar. Several years ago, Sircar served as the collector of the market, thanks to his role as the South 24 Parganas ADM. Plots in Kidderpore were granted to the society by the British govt to generate revenue for their welfare activities. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Install the Perfect Pool at Home – Start Here Backyard Pool | Search Ads Learn More Undo The market's proceeds were directly used in supporting the society's charitable work. It was found that earlier, the market was owned by one Collier. Later, the erstwhile British govt bought this market and started the work of expanding it in 1780. The responsibility was given to Captain Becker. The market formation began around 1820, but it slowly achieved its form over a span of the last 150 years. This market is mainly divided into three parts: Government Orphanganj Bazar, Kali Bazar, and Chamaria Building. It controls almost all the markets of South 24 Parganas. At present, the market is mainly known for its milk-based products, with the butter and ghee mandis and spices being the main ones. On the periphery, multiple consumer item trading, including perfumes, is also carried out. The market's informal economy, where unaccounted stalls were set up, has operated without formal accounting systems for the past four decades. An effort was made in 2007 by the Left Front govt to develop it into a mall, and multiple plans were mooted where around 400 traders were summoned. However, it did not materialise. At present, the administration wants a full survey of the ownership and the losses suffered by the traders. This will also establish the exact number of owners of the market, said sources. Sudipto Das)
Hindustan Times
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Hindustan Times
Review: Daisy & Woolf by Michelle Cahill
Dalloway Day, an annual event, was celebrated on June 11, marking the 100th anniversary, this year, of Virginia Woolf's novel, Mrs Dalloway. Published by Hogarth Press, that the author set up with her husband Leonard in their basement at Hogarth House in Richmond, London, the novel challenged the Victorian idea of a plot. A luminary text, that has been adapted to films and plays, it is set to soon have its own biography published by Manchester University Press. But as everyone holds forth about the centenary – the book was published on May 14, 1925 though Dalloway Day celebrations are held in mid-June, when the central event of the novel, Mrs Dalloway's party, takes place – few question Woolf's colonial gaze. Indeed, the Eurasian character left in the margins has rarely been addressed. Far away from the colonial metropole, Daisy, Peter Walsh's Anglo-Indian lover awaits news from him in India. When Woolf mentions her in passing, it is with an air of racial superiority even as her protagonist, Clarissa, suffers from low self esteem. 'Oh if she [Mrs. Dalloway] could have had her life over again!...She would have been, in the first place, dark like Lady Bexborough, with a skin like crumpled leather and beautiful eyes… slow and stately; rather large; interested in politics like a man; with a country house; very dignified, very sincere… She [Mrs Dalloway] had the oddest sense of being herself invisible; unseen; unknown; there being no more marrying, no more having children now, but only this astonishing and rather solemn progress with the rest of them… this being Mrs Dalloway; not even Clarissa anymore; this being Mrs Richard Dalloway.' The passage establishes Woolf's protagonist as someone without an inherent sense of self. In her fifties, when she is no longer pressed by the duties of being a wife and a mother, Clarissa Dalloway finds herself wanting to be more than her social identity as wife of a conservative MP with her silks and scissors preparing to throw a party on a fine evening in 1923. As she walks across London, she has opinions on everyone but it's not the same as participating in luncheons hosted by Mrs Bruton where they discuss politics. From Hugh Whitbread and Peter Walsh to Sally Seton and Miss Killman, everyone is scrutinised, even Septimus Smith's wife, Lucrezia, 'a little woman, with large eyes in sallow pointed face; an Italian girl.' Everyone, but not 53-year-old Peter Walsh's 24-year-old Anglo-Indian lover, Daisy, wife of a major, mother of two in India. She describes Indian women at large as 'silly, pretty, flimsy, nincompoops.' The stream of consciousness narrative, whose film parallel would ideally comprise one long single shot somehow narrated from the perspective of different characters, makes the reader wonder: Was Daisy merely a tool to explore the complex relationship that Peter and Clarissa shared in their youth? For Peter looks at Daisy as someone who'd boost his ego, '…of course, she would give him everything…everything he wanted!' which Clarissa had bruised. He describes, in his insecurity, the women he loved over the years as 'vulgar, trivial, commonplace' and has thought before that 'Daisy would look ordinary beside Clarissa.' Clarissa's presence in his life is further underlined by the impactful lines at the end of the text: 'It is Clarissa, he said. For there she was.' The contemporary reader is bound to ask: With Clarissa's overbearing presence, what was Daisy doing in Peter's life? Compensating for the void left behind by Clarissa? When Woolf dug her characters from within, showcasing their perception of each other, why was Daisy left voiceless far away in India? Her mixed race mentioned but not explored. A century later, enter Michelle Cahill with Daisy & Woolf. An Australian of Anglo-Indian heritage, the author provides a glimpse of Daisy's life along with the difficulties and blockages that come with it by introducing a mixed-race immigrant protagonist, Mina, who is writing Daisy's story. Woolf is evoked in the novel's epigraph with a quote from A Room of One's Own: 'A woman writing thinks back through her mothers.' While the book revolves around motherhood quite a bit, the epigraph works like a double-edged sword: it showcases gratitude for the feminist writers who have paved the way for the telling of Daisy's story while also challenging their silence that has rendered voiceless this character at the margins. In this metafiction set in 2017, Cahill presents the dilemmas of race and migration through Mina's reimagination, in the novel that she is writing, of Daisy journeying to London to meet Peter Walsh. Mina writes, 'Muslims and refugees were being restricted by Trump's immigration ban; Theresa May was advocating an early Brexit deal, with Scotland calling for talks on a second referendum. All over the world people of colour felt vulnerable while crossing borders.' As the storyteller of Daisy's life, she narrates harrowing experiences of being Anglo-Indians from East Africa and of her brother's mental illness, a result of being bullied at school for being brown skinned. It's as if Mina, and Cahill herself, is attempting to fill an intersectional gap in the canon. Instead of writing a straight postcolonial response like Jean Rhys does for Bertha Mason in Wide Sargasso Sea, Cahill makes her work partly epistolary. Between Mina's meditation on racism and writing and her travels across India, China, London, and New York to find the nuances of Woolf's life, Daisy tells her story through letters and diary entries. Alongside, Mina writes, 'Mrs Woolf had kept Daisy stunted, and on purpose it seems. Her intent was always to centre Clarissa Dalloway, setting her in flight. Drifting and timeless, she is a hallmark achievement: Clarissa, the stream of Virginia Woolf's consciousness.' Daisy too addresses the absorbing nature of Clarissa's presence, which makes you wonder if she will ever see herself as Clarissa's equal or if she will succumb to class and racial hierarchies. She writes, '…although you [Walsh] hint at… an air of disappointment about Clarissa, it is impossible for me to imagine a woman more absorbing?' Cahill's Daisy has the decisive power to leave her husband and son behind to board a ship for London with her daughter and Radhika, a servant girl from Bihar. She reflects on her experiences as an Anglo-Indian in India by chronicling her life story and through the course of a journey lasting months from Calcutta to London, she comes face-to-face with the plague, loses her child to death, which changes her romantic obsession into something much stronger, a determination to chart out her life irrespective of Peter Walsh. She engages with the suffragettes, befriends Lucrezia — the other peripheral character in Mrs Dalloway — and makes a living in Italy, which can be interpreted as tragic for the former wife of an officer in the Indian army or as empowering for an immigrant woman in an alien land. Interestingly, Cahill leaves Daisy's servant girl behind. Radhika disappears, quite literally, from Daisy's life implying that not all stories can be accommodated when the writer chooses to focus on one character. However, this absence is observed and mourned by Daisy, who was held together by her support in the lowest times — a treatment that's better than Woolf's treatment of Daisy. Throughout the novel, Cahill keeps fictional characters and real-life figures in conversation with each other. Daisy & Woolf is meta not only for its story-within-a-story structure but also for the many references to Woolf's diaries and letters to interpret her psychology at the time. Daisy is also travelling to London at a time when Woolf is writing Mrs Dalloway. Characters from Woolf's story and suffragette figures such as Sylvia Pankhurst are masterfully incorporated into Daisy's narrative. All of it creates a dialogue between the worlds of Mina, Virginia and Daisy while also exploring grief, death, motherhood, alienation, sexuality and mental illness. The prose of both these novels is distinctive. But while Mrs Dalloway glides, Daisy & Woolf startles by intentionally hitting the brakes on multiple occasions. In the end, this novel, that breathes life into an incidental character, encourages readers to examine the colonial gaze of a celebrated 20th century high Modernist, while also realising that race, identity and migration are as fraught today as they ever were. Akankshya Abismruta is an independent writer.
France 24
11-06-2025
- Entertainment
- France 24
Film show: Tom Hiddleston brings a gentle touch to 'The Life of Chuck'
Culture 12:31 From the show After adapting three of Stephen King's horror stories, director Mike Flanagan opted for the author's sweet and life-affirming novella "The Life of Chuck" for his latest film. Film critic Emma Jones tells us why Tom Hiddleston brings a sweet levity to this uncynical life story, told in reverse. We also discuss the latest big budget live action remake as the "How to Train Your Dragon" series gets a 2025 version, and we find out more about the quirky arranged marriage at the centre of "Sister Midnight", an Anglo-Indian production that amused critics at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. Plus we get a preview of some of the highlights at this year's animation festival in the French town of Annecy.
The Hindu
10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Hindu
Ruskin Bond turns 91, and releases his latest book
'I am a very lazy writer,' declares Ruskin Bond, with a Duchenne smile that extends to his eyes, twinkling behind thick, black-framed spectacles. A couple of pages a day is all that he is committed to writing because 'I think if I worked too hard, I wouldn't write well. I've got to enjoy it'. Bond's daily routine certainly sounds rather idyllic. 'I like to write for an hour or two, usually before breakfast, because there is not much disturbance,' says Bond, whose reputation as a highly accessible writer often leads to random strangers ringing his doorbell at frequent intervals. 'Young people sleep very late now and are not getting up till noon, so I am safe till then,' he laughs. 'I give up some time every day to writing and a lot of time to reading, apart from sleeping and eating.' Writing leisurely also seems to have been the secret to his long career — the prolific author has written over 500 short stories and more than 70 books for children, besides several essays, and novellas since he began his writing journey in 1956, with The Room on the Roof, penned when he was all of 17. 'Writing has got to be a pleasant job. That is how I have managed to keep going for so long,' he insists. Even when he had his doubts, it was 'sheer stubbornness' that kept him going, choosing the writerly life over and over again, remarks Bond. 'You know, in those early years, paying the bills could be a problem. I could send an article or a story, but it took time, sometimes, to get paid.' But he took it in his stride, approaching it like an adventure, he says. 'When you are young and single and healthy, you can do these things. You can take this risk and put up with certain hardships or difficulties or shortage of funds.' Ultimately, of course, his persistence, coupled with his confidence in the ability to write, paid off. 'It is a matter of establishing one's name,' he says, referring to it as an ongoing process. 'I've never stopped writing… sitting back and saying that I've done enough and that I've got nothing more to say,' says Bond, whose latest book, Life's Magic Moments (Penguin India, ₹ 399), was launched on May 19, coinciding with his 91st birthday. It also helps that he keeps a journal, 'not very regularly, but I've had many periods where I've put down my feelings, thoughts and observations,' he says, adding, 'There is always something to say if you are observant. A writer shouldn't run out of materials or ideas.' Real life clearly inspires Bond, the creator of some of literature's most memorable characters, including Rusty, a young Anglo-Indian boy, clearly based on Bond himself, eccentric relatives like Uncle Ken and Aunt Mabel and a vast menagerie of animals, like Toto the monkey, Harold the hornbill and Timothy the tiger. 'I'm not very good at making up characters who are purely fictional,' confesses Bond, who relies on his excellent memory, instead, basing his stories on people he has actually encountered. 'Basically, they start off as real people. While putting them in a story, they might acquire different characteristics and change into different people,' he says. 'By and large, I change characters a bit so they don't always recognise themselves.' Exploring life's magic moments Life's Magic Moments, too, is culled from his own life, an amalgamation of observations, reflections, musings, and memories about it. 'I send you these little confidences — quiet thoughts of a quiet fellow — telling you something about my life, my writing, the world around me and the passage of time,' he writes in the book's foreword. 'Allow me to share some of my golden days with you.' From the sudden blooming of a tiny yellow flower in an abandoned flowerpot to the joy of knowing that he can still read, despite his fading eyesight, and the delight of discovering a mountain spring on a hot day, the book is chock-full of what the world of trauma therapy would likely describe as 'glimmers', those tiny moments of positivity, gratitude and beauty that help us feel calm and connected to the world we live in. 'There is joy in small things, too,' he further states in the foreword. 'Look for the ladybird, the firefly in the night.' There is more to the book, including the secret pleasures offered by tin roofs and windows, Bond's deep, if somewhat perilous, affinity towards pickles, the close relationship between cheerfulness and corpulence and, my personal favourite — the appearance of a rather ornery three-legged, semi-Persian cat named Mimi, who constantly tussles with Bond 'for the occupancy of the easy chair,' he writes, pointing out that if she loses, she takes her revenge by sitting down on the leafiest geranium. 'She is very arrogant and aristocratic, not the type of cat who'll sit on your lap,' he says, with a guffaw. 'She is the boss here… rules the roost… is the managing director of the household.' Long before Indian ecofiction became mainstream, Bond has been writing about animals and trees and revelling in Nature, gently hinting at larger themes like climate crisis, human-animal conflict, and shrinking wild spaces, without ever sounding pedantic, preachy or grimly prophetic. This deep, abiding love for the natural world finds its way into every page of the book, which is packed with ruminations about flowers, trees, earthworms, butterflies, birds and more. 'My relationship with Nature is deep, but it has grown over the years,' he agrees, adding that it was not so deep or so passionate when he was younger. 'When we are young, we take everything for granted: the trees, the forests, the animals,' he explains. Only later does worry set in as one begins to wonder what is going wrong with the planet since these wonderful creations are not there anymore, he says. 'I am in my dressing gown and sweater, and having to use a heater in the middle of summer. It is pretty obvious that it is climate change, and I don't know how some world leaders can deny it.' Despite his vast body of work and the many accolades he has received for it over the years, including a John Llewellyn Rhys Prize in 1957, the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1992, the Padma Shri in 1999, and the Padma Bhushan in 2014, Bond insists that reading has always been his first love. 'Even though I have got a couple of hundred titles in print, I am a reader first and a writer second,' he says. So much so that if he is halfway through writing a story and a book he has been wanting to read arrives in the mail, 'I'll immediately put my work aside and start reading, which means that I am really a reader,' he says. 'I often feel that people who don't read are missing out on something in life.' So, does it bother Bond that, in an age with so many distractions, the world has fewer readers? 'No, not really,' he responds. 'There never were many readers. It has always been a minority pastime.' According to him, in the 1940s and 50s, before television, laptops, mobiles and apps, there were only two boys in his class of 35 at school who read books for pleasure. 'We had a good library, and everyone had to take a book out of the library every week, but most people did not read them. They put them back unread,' he says. 'Actual book lovers have always been few, the exception rather than the rule.' He believes that, in fact, thanks to better access to education and with more people simply being able to read, there are actually more readers today. 'Today, I make a living out of my books, which I could not have done in the 1950s and 60s,' feels Bond, who says that he has already written two successors to Life's Magic Moments as well as some children's stories, 'enough to keep my publishers busy for the next year or so,' he says. He is also 5,000-odd words into his next project, a short book on the small towns of India, and is also working on a few stories for children. 'I've quite a busy work schedule. But, who knows, it is not in my hands,' he says, with a laugh. 'The great librarian above decides these things.'
