The above image is from Satyajit Ray’s Aparajito, the second film in the Apu trilogy. Unlike Apu, I didn’t get to lounge beside the river today but I did visit it. After arriving in the city this morning, I took in the river from the Vidyasagar Setu. About twenty ferries lay on the river’s surface in a torpid haze. On the other side of the bridge, looking in the direction of Rabindra Setu (what used to be called Howrah Bridge), there were another twenty ferries lying seemingly immobile on the brown water. Long ago, the East India Company ships had sailed up this part of the river and established their trade settlement here. (It is difficult for me to make an imaginative link with the past; I need more historical learning. Yesterday, standing beside the Ganga at Krishna Ghat in Patna, I learned that the site had served as a battleground on May 3, 1764 between the British and the combined forces of Shuja-ud-Daulah, Mir Qasim and Shah Alam II. I couldn’t go back to that distant past; my mind stopped at the memory of those names that I had encountered maybe in my ninth or tenth standard History class. Oh, the fatal boredom of one particular teacher’s voice, his maddening lilt, my fellow students…) My second encounter with the river today was when I drove out to Balden to look at the Hooghly Imambara. There the river was in fierce flow. In the distance, loomed the Jubilee Bridge. A young man standing at the water’s edge warned me not to go too close. I asked why. He said “Jwaar bhata.” Did he mean that it was the tide from the sea? The young man said yes. Over the next few days, I want to learn more about what happened when the Farakka Barrage was built to divert the waters of the Ganga to reduce the silting of Kolkata port. Tomorrow, early morning, I start toward the Sundarbans. More later. Right now, I’m visiting with my former student, Anish, and his wonderful parents. The drink of the evening is Glenfiddich Project XX. Life is sweet.
Here’s a photograph I took this afternoon of the Hooghly Imambara.
P.S. Also, in Balden, after my visit to the local church, I saw this ad which had my own name on it. (Please call me “Amitava Sir” from now onwards. Thank you.)
In Class VI, we made a field trip from school to Hooghly Imambara and Bondel Church and had mutton curry and rice on that courtyard you have taken such a nice picture of. Post from Sundarbans, I have never been there.
Today’s piece is my favorite. And thanks for visiting my hometown, Hooghly. I went to primary school right opposite the Imambara, in Abbott Shishu Hall. As you are probably aware, the Imambara was built by Haji Mohammed Mohsin, a social benefactor, whose donations, among other things, led to the development of the district hospital (also known as Chinsurah Imambara Sadar Hospital) and Hooghly Mohsin College.