CHAKRADHARPUR
If I want to reflect on my life, Chakradharpur or CKP invariably comes into the discussion. Chakradharpur is the place where I spent my childhood formative years from 1970 to 1983.
Chakradharpur was not a sub-divisional town then but only a South Eastern Railway division. We used to live in the Railway Colony. Initially in the East than in the West. CKP was popular for its vast Anglo Indian Community. I studied in the S.E.Railway English Medium School and many of our Teachers and school mates were Anglo Indians. As far as the teacher were concerned I can name them Mrs. Isacson was our Headmistress, then Mrs. Bannister, Mrs. Sampayo, Mrs. Clarke, Mrs. Madera were our other Anglo Indian Teachers.
Among our other teachers Mr. Jogesh Chandra Dey has had a lasting influence on me. He was apart from a teacher a good sports person. I learnt the basics of Scouting from him. He was also our games teacher. Once we also attended a scout camp under his guidance. I still remember the knots , songs of scouting learnt from him. Once I was ill during a terminal exam and he personally visited our quarter to enquire why I didn’t appear in the examination.
Amongst our Anglo Indian friends were Mark Smith, David Rosario, Edward Nobert, Alistair & Annabu . I owe my speaking power to them as English was the only language. Few of them have moved to Australia.
It would be a mistake if I do not mention the names of other teachers such as Miss Chacko, Mrs. Majumder Mr. Rao who also had a influence on me.
My non Anglo Indian friends Sukumar Subramanium (Suku), Sanjoy Guha ( Dechki), Seema Dewan, Asha Patnaik, Neera Gupta etc.
The Annual School Sports were a fantastic event. The students were divided into four houses namely red , green, blue and yellow. A march past marked the beginning of the sports where Patriotic songs in a gramophone amplified by a loud speaker were played, followed by the different events flat race, sack race, obstacle race, spoon race, go as you like, tug of war etc. Prizes were distributed the same day.
Other notable events were singing of different songs everyday in the assembly. Our principal was an expert pianist and she would play the piano while we sung. A song “Mother of Mine”is one which I still remember and play in the guitar.
The annual day function was marked with different cultural functions, their was the gypsy dance, drama and various other events. Mrs. Madera use to teach us the dance steps.
Our school had a beautiful playground and we use to play hockey and football in the games period, as mentioned earlier Master J.C.Dey was our games teacher. Sometimes we also played cricket. We competed in local school tournament. In football I played in the stopper position.
Life in school apart from studies was full of fun and very enjoyable. The moments flashes in my memory now and then.
From Class IX I shifted to High School, the medium of instruction was Hindi but I used to write my papers in English. I remember our teachers Mr. Gupta ( Principal) who also taught us biology in English Medium School, Arjun Prasad, B.N Singh, Trivedi sir, P.Jha etc ( Trivedi sir and Jha sir was also my private tutor), class IX,X in high school and XI,XII in Jawaharlal Nehru College were busy study day. Nehru college had our teachers as Mahapatra sir, Mohanty sir etc. However when I got time I played cricket with our para friend and also Table Tennis at the Railway Institute.
LIFE BEYOND SCHOOL
1. Chakradharpur a beautiful Place to live
As I said earlier we lived in the Railway East & West colony. During that period Chakradharpur was a quiet township with neat railway quarter and roads. The air was free of pollution and all around was lush green trees. Chakradharpur has mountains on most of the sides and the Sanjay river runs through the eastern fringes which make it a picturesque and scenic place. The people were friendly, ever ready to help each other in times of need.
Many of our relatives who stayed in Kolkata used to visit us and would exclaim about the beauty of the place.
The main places of interest were the pump road side near river Sanjay, which is an ideal Picnic spot. All around was the mountain, jungle and in the middle was the Sanjay river. The local people had created a bridge with big stones and pebbles to cross the river. Since my father was a doctor with the Railways, every year in the winter the families of the doctors had a grand picnic at this site.
The Railway station at Chakradharpur had a hub of activity. All-important trains of the Howrah Nagpur Mumbai section passed through and stopped at the station (Bombay Mail, Geetanjali Express, Bombay Express, Ispat Express etc.). I remember once when due to some reason a Tatanagar bound train from Mumbai carrying the Mumbai Ranji trophy team got held up and a huge crowd gathered to see Sunil Gavaskar, Ghavri Sandip Patil etc. I was sure among the crowd.
The Railway station had the Wheeler book stall where we went to purchase Bengali detective books. Around the station was various shops and also the buses to Chaibasa and Ranchi passed from nearby.
The Railway township was a fantastic place to take a idyllic walk or cycle. Neat bungalows and streets with the trees painted with lime were a beauty. The Railway township had many amenities , The Railway officers club with Lawn Tennis and badminton court, T.T, Library etc where we used to go for functions like Deepawali, get to gether and also in the weekends for games, The South East and South West Institute where films were shown. The Institutes also had a very good library and indoor games facility. Then the Stadium where every year the Steel Express Football tournament was held with participation from many railway teams, teams from the industrial places like Jamshedpur, Durgapur, Burnpur, Ranchi. Many important player from Mohunbagan and East Bengal representing their office team also participated in the very absorbing tournament. I remember having seen Sudhir Karmakar, Tarun Bose, Bidesh Bosu and Manas Bhattacharya etc to play in the tournament. The team from Chakradharpur with Local heroes like Manik Meghmallar also participated in the tournament and used to get all round support of the jam-packed crowd..
The other notable places in the township were the Itwari bazaar area which catered to the people living in the township. Vegetables, grocery, meat fish everything was available here, including the ration shops. Never to forget the Dutta stores for confectionary and biscuits.
There was the Paanch Mather More near the railway station and on the Ranchi Chaibasa road. Here there was the famous Paramanick hotel. It used to sell delectable snacks like vegetable chop, singara, jallebi, all kind of sweets etc. Their Kalakand were a speciality. The hotel also served lunch and dinner..
Other Places to visit in the township were the Railway offices. Various schools, Railway Hospital etc.
The Choto kalibari was near the Itwari Bazaar established by Bengal Club.
The only Cinema Hall Prabhat talkies was near to the High school.
Other than the Railway colony was the private area, the burra bazaar had many great stores and shops selling all kinds of items from electronic good, to clothes, books and various other items. The notable shops at that time were Poddar Stores, Bharat Bastralaya, Oswal stores, Fancy dress store to name a few.
This apart The JLN college, Gandhi High School were situated nearby. The Boro Kali bari and Samshan Kalibari were also here.
2. Pujas & Festivals/ Yatra etc
In our Para was the Nava Ratna Kishore Samity club. The members were Dipu ( Annirudha Chowdhury), Paanchu ( Pankaj Banerjee), Ramji , Jairam, Mani, Ashok Sarkar, myself and others.
Other para friends were Subroto, Titu, Mithu, Ratan ghosh, Dilip, Sushanto, Bapi etc.
We played cricket with tennis ball. In our quarter there was a big ground and we played football, volleyball and badminton there. We enjoyed thoroughly.
Our club celebrated the Saraswati puja. We used to collect subscription even from far away places. We decorated our pandal on our own. Songs were played in the loud speaker/ audio system and we enjoyed puja, anjali and bhog. We had a great time in organizing the event.
In Chakradharpur the Durga Puja was special. Notable among the pujas were the Bengali Association Puja held in the GM school ground and the East colony Puja. The Bengali Association Puja preparations started well ahead of the Puja days. On the night of Mahalaya , Mohishashur Mordini was broadcast live from All Indi Radi and the same was played through the Loud Speaker.The protima used to be prepared by sculptors from Kolkata or brought from Kolkata. An exhibition called the mina bazaar was organized in the ground. Different stalls were put up, including magic, arts and crafts, painting, confectionery, food stalls, railways etc. It was a big event for the children like us, we used to spend those festive days inside the mina bazaar and visiting pandals. In the middle of the Mina bazaar a stage used to be built up, where orchestra’s like Sunder Orchestra, Sursangam performed during the night. Artisted from Kolkata would also appear sometimes without notice, like once Sumitra Sen notable exponent of Rabindra Sangeet came. Then their was Baul Gaan etc. Kotha bala putul ( Talking doll), mini zoo, movie everything was present inside the puja. This apart people with gorgeous new dresses and the teenagers got an opportunity to meet their sweet heart away from their guardians.
The Puja Pandals were beautifully decorated and the pujas were held in a very religious manner. The soshti, saptami, aasthami sandhi puja, nabami and then dashami. The puja system was very well organized and systematic. Like in Aashtami and Sandhi Puja, thousands offered their personal Puja Daalis, which were numbered and a token was given. The Aanjali in the ocassion was also well organized being repeated three times. Dhakis from Kolkata used to come. Each day there were also events like Alpona competion, Dhunuchi naach, sit and draw etc. New Bengali song albums were played in the loud speaker.
The RE colony puja was also similarly organized and it was famous for the very sweet face of goddess Durga.
This apart surrounding the puja pandals numerous stalls came up selling and showing different things and games. We thoroughly enjoyed thePuja.
After the pujas it was the time of Bijoya Dashami. We visited our acquaintances in the para as well as to far of places. The schedule was fixed for visiting in the morning and the evening. I remember we never used to have breakfast or evening snacks for 7-8 days after the puja. Even some unknown boys and girls also used to visit our home for Bijoya Mishti.
Now coming to Kali Puja there were four big Pujas near to our quarter. The Bengal club puja ( choto kali bari premises), Youngs Corner , Bengali association and Station Kali. The features were in Bengal club there used to be 200 or more boli – sacrifices of goat, the station Kali used to be around 40 feet high, the Young corner pandal had different architecture made of bamboo and cloth each year and the Bengali Association puja was traditional with Shyama sangeet of Pannalal Bhattacharya being played all day. We used to make Diwali Ghar and decorate our respective houses with tuni bulbs and candles/ diya. In the evening it was beautiful scene with all electric lights inside the houses being turned off and the diyas , candles and tuni bulbs being lit up simultaneously in all the quarters, What followed was burning crackers and there were numerous – Dhani phatka, Kali phatka, Tal phatka, single sound, double sound, bullet , chocolate bombe , rocket, charki, tubri rang moshal, electric tar, ful jhuri, coloured matches. My father was very enthusiastic in this and most of the years he bought a huge collection of crackers from Kolkata. After burning the crackers our whole family went pandal hopping and seeing the decorations in town
The day after we had similar celebrations / cracker burning and dinner in the officers club. After bhaiphota the celebrations and the festive temporarily ended because after that there was the yatra or open air theatre. Notto Company and various other yatra groups performed for 6-7 days each year . I remember having witnessed a few of them each year.
3. My Para & Acquaintances
Doctors and their family : Dr Kamalendu Roy- his daughter Tinku was two years senior to me, Dr S.N.Banerjee – his daugter Mummum was one year senior to me, Dr. D.H.Maity – his son Biplab was in my class, Dr S.K.Moitra- his son Shibaji was in my Class, Dr. Nath – his son Joy was in my class., Dr Dey Chowdhuri – his son and daughter was junior to me, Dr P.K.Mukherjee – his daughter was with me and son one uear junior to me. Dr A.N.Choudhuri or Choudhuri Jethu our neighbour had a lovely garden which he created himself, Dr Konika Banerjee our neighbour. Dr Sunil Biswas and Dr D.N Biswas and their families, Dr. D.K.Das etc.
Other than Doctors : Dipu , Subroto, Ramji , Jairam, Dilip, Khokon, Ratan, Pankaj, Titu, Mithu etc my para friends. Dinu also.
4. Obituary
I left Chakradharpur in 1984, never visited again, though I have strong desire to do so. In between many of the acquaintances have left this world for their heavenly abode. They are
Master J.C.Dey
Dr. Kanika Banerjee
Dr A.N.Choudhuri
Dr. D.H.Maity
Titu Mithus younger sister Mouki
My Father Dr. N.N.Bhattacharjee
I wish them peace in heaven.
It is with great sadness that I want you to Know that one of my closest friend Ramji’s both the hands got cut in an accident. It was a great shock when I first learnt about this and tears run from my eyes often when I think of him for he was a brave and beautiful person full of life.
Annirudha (Dipu) , Subroto, Dipak are now in Kolkata along with me. Pankaj is in Chennai. I have lost most of my other CKP friends in this great world.
If I want to reflect on my life, Chakradharpur or CKP invariably comes into the discussion. Chakradharpur is the place where I spent my childhood formative years from 1970 to 1983.
Chakradharpur was not a sub-divisional town then but only a South Eastern Railway division. We used to live in the Railway Colony. Initially in the East than in the West. CKP was popular for its vast Anglo Indian Community. I studied in the S.E.Railway English Medium School and many of our Teachers and school mates were Anglo Indians. As far as the teacher were concerned I can name them Mrs. Isacson was our Headmistress, then Mrs. Bannister, Mrs. Sampayo, Mrs. Clarke, Mrs. Madera were our other Anglo Indian Teachers.
Among our other teachers Mr. Jogesh Chandra Dey has had a lasting influence on me. He was apart from a teacher a good sports person. I learnt the basics of Scouting from him. He was also our games teacher. Once we also attended a scout camp under his guidance. I still remember the knots , songs of scouting learnt from him. Once I was ill during a terminal exam and he personally visited our quarter to enquire why I didn’t appear in the examination.
Amongst our Anglo Indian friends were Mark Smith, David Rosario, Edward Nobert, Alistair & Annabu . I owe my speaking power to them as English was the only language. Few of them have moved to Australia.
It would be a mistake if I do not mention the names of other teachers such as Miss Chacko, Mrs. Majumder Mr. Rao who also had a influence on me.
My non Anglo Indian friends Sukumar Subramanium (Suku), Sanjoy Guha ( Dechki), Seema Dewan, Asha Patnaik, Neera Gupta etc.
The Annual School Sports were a fantastic event. The students were divided into four houses namely red , green, blue and yellow. A march past marked the beginning of the sports where Patriotic songs in a gramophone amplified by a loud speaker were played, followed by the different events flat race, sack race, obstacle race, spoon race, go as you like, tug of war etc. Prizes were distributed the same day.
Other notable events were singing of different songs everyday in the assembly. Our principal was an expert pianist and she would play the piano while we sung. A song “Mother of Mine”is one which I still remember and play in the guitar.
The annual day function was marked with different cultural functions, their was the gypsy dance, drama and various other events. Mrs. Madera use to teach us the dance steps.
Our school had a beautiful playground and we use to play hockey and football in the games period, as mentioned earlier Master J.C.Dey was our games teacher. Sometimes we also played cricket. We competed in local school tournament. In football I played in the stopper position.
Life in school apart from studies was full of fun and very enjoyable. The moments flashes in my memory now and then.
From Class IX I shifted to High School, the medium of instruction was Hindi but I used to write my papers in English. I remember our teachers Mr. Gupta ( Principal) who also taught us biology in English Medium School, Arjun Prasad, B.N Singh, Trivedi sir, P.Jha etc ( Trivedi sir and Jha sir was also my private tutor), class IX,X in high school and XI,XII in Jawaharlal Nehru College were busy study day. Nehru college had our teachers as Mahapatra sir, Mohanty sir etc. However when I got time I played cricket with our para friend and also Table Tennis at the Railway Institute.
LIFE BEYOND SCHOOL
1. Chakradharpur a beautiful Place to live
As I said earlier we lived in the Railway East & West colony. During that period Chakradharpur was a quiet township with neat railway quarter and roads. The air was free of pollution and all around was lush green trees. Chakradharpur has mountains on most of the sides and the Sanjay river runs through the eastern fringes which make it a picturesque and scenic place. The people were friendly, ever ready to help each other in times of need.
Many of our relatives who stayed in Kolkata used to visit us and would exclaim about the beauty of the place.
The main places of interest were the pump road side near river Sanjay, which is an ideal Picnic spot. All around was the mountain, jungle and in the middle was the Sanjay river. The local people had created a bridge with big stones and pebbles to cross the river. Since my father was a doctor with the Railways, every year in the winter the families of the doctors had a grand picnic at this site.
The Railway station at Chakradharpur had a hub of activity. All-important trains of the Howrah Nagpur Mumbai section passed through and stopped at the station (Bombay Mail, Geetanjali Express, Bombay Express, Ispat Express etc.). I remember once when due to some reason a Tatanagar bound train from Mumbai carrying the Mumbai Ranji trophy team got held up and a huge crowd gathered to see Sunil Gavaskar, Ghavri Sandip Patil etc. I was sure among the crowd.
The Railway station had the Wheeler book stall where we went to purchase Bengali detective books. Around the station was various shops and also the buses to Chaibasa and Ranchi passed from nearby.
The Railway township was a fantastic place to take a idyllic walk or cycle. Neat bungalows and streets with the trees painted with lime were a beauty. The Railway township had many amenities , The Railway officers club with Lawn Tennis and badminton court, T.T, Library etc where we used to go for functions like Deepawali, get to gether and also in the weekends for games, The South East and South West Institute where films were shown. The Institutes also had a very good library and indoor games facility. Then the Stadium where every year the Steel Express Football tournament was held with participation from many railway teams, teams from the industrial places like Jamshedpur, Durgapur, Burnpur, Ranchi. Many important player from Mohunbagan and East Bengal representing their office team also participated in the very absorbing tournament. I remember having seen Sudhir Karmakar, Tarun Bose, Bidesh Bosu and Manas Bhattacharya etc to play in the tournament. The team from Chakradharpur with Local heroes like Manik Meghmallar also participated in the tournament and used to get all round support of the jam-packed crowd..
The other notable places in the township were the Itwari bazaar area which catered to the people living in the township. Vegetables, grocery, meat fish everything was available here, including the ration shops. Never to forget the Dutta stores for confectionary and biscuits.
There was the Paanch Mather More near the railway station and on the Ranchi Chaibasa road. Here there was the famous Paramanick hotel. It used to sell delectable snacks like vegetable chop, singara, jallebi, all kind of sweets etc. Their Kalakand were a speciality. The hotel also served lunch and dinner..
Other Places to visit in the township were the Railway offices. Various schools, Railway Hospital etc.
The Choto kalibari was near the Itwari Bazaar established by Bengal Club.
The only Cinema Hall Prabhat talkies was near to the High school.
Other than the Railway colony was the private area, the burra bazaar had many great stores and shops selling all kinds of items from electronic good, to clothes, books and various other items. The notable shops at that time were Poddar Stores, Bharat Bastralaya, Oswal stores, Fancy dress store to name a few.
This apart The JLN college, Gandhi High School were situated nearby. The Boro Kali bari and Samshan Kalibari were also here.
2. Pujas & Festivals/ Yatra etc
In our Para was the Nava Ratna Kishore Samity club. The members were Dipu ( Annirudha Chowdhury), Paanchu ( Pankaj Banerjee), Ramji , Jairam, Mani, Ashok Sarkar, myself and others.
Other para friends were Subroto, Titu, Mithu, Ratan ghosh, Dilip, Sushanto, Bapi etc.
We played cricket with tennis ball. In our quarter there was a big ground and we played football, volleyball and badminton there. We enjoyed thoroughly.
Our club celebrated the Saraswati puja. We used to collect subscription even from far away places. We decorated our pandal on our own. Songs were played in the loud speaker/ audio system and we enjoyed puja, anjali and bhog. We had a great time in organizing the event.
In Chakradharpur the Durga Puja was special. Notable among the pujas were the Bengali Association Puja held in the GM school ground and the East colony Puja. The Bengali Association Puja preparations started well ahead of the Puja days. On the night of Mahalaya , Mohishashur Mordini was broadcast live from All Indi Radi and the same was played through the Loud Speaker.The protima used to be prepared by sculptors from Kolkata or brought from Kolkata. An exhibition called the mina bazaar was organized in the ground. Different stalls were put up, including magic, arts and crafts, painting, confectionery, food stalls, railways etc. It was a big event for the children like us, we used to spend those festive days inside the mina bazaar and visiting pandals. In the middle of the Mina bazaar a stage used to be built up, where orchestra’s like Sunder Orchestra, Sursangam performed during the night. Artisted from Kolkata would also appear sometimes without notice, like once Sumitra Sen notable exponent of Rabindra Sangeet came. Then their was Baul Gaan etc. Kotha bala putul ( Talking doll), mini zoo, movie everything was present inside the puja. This apart people with gorgeous new dresses and the teenagers got an opportunity to meet their sweet heart away from their guardians.
The Puja Pandals were beautifully decorated and the pujas were held in a very religious manner. The soshti, saptami, aasthami sandhi puja, nabami and then dashami. The puja system was very well organized and systematic. Like in Aashtami and Sandhi Puja, thousands offered their personal Puja Daalis, which were numbered and a token was given. The Aanjali in the ocassion was also well organized being repeated three times. Dhakis from Kolkata used to come. Each day there were also events like Alpona competion, Dhunuchi naach, sit and draw etc. New Bengali song albums were played in the loud speaker.
The RE colony puja was also similarly organized and it was famous for the very sweet face of goddess Durga.
This apart surrounding the puja pandals numerous stalls came up selling and showing different things and games. We thoroughly enjoyed thePuja.
After the pujas it was the time of Bijoya Dashami. We visited our acquaintances in the para as well as to far of places. The schedule was fixed for visiting in the morning and the evening. I remember we never used to have breakfast or evening snacks for 7-8 days after the puja. Even some unknown boys and girls also used to visit our home for Bijoya Mishti.
Now coming to Kali Puja there were four big Pujas near to our quarter. The Bengal club puja ( choto kali bari premises), Youngs Corner , Bengali association and Station Kali. The features were in Bengal club there used to be 200 or more boli – sacrifices of goat, the station Kali used to be around 40 feet high, the Young corner pandal had different architecture made of bamboo and cloth each year and the Bengali Association puja was traditional with Shyama sangeet of Pannalal Bhattacharya being played all day. We used to make Diwali Ghar and decorate our respective houses with tuni bulbs and candles/ diya. In the evening it was beautiful scene with all electric lights inside the houses being turned off and the diyas , candles and tuni bulbs being lit up simultaneously in all the quarters, What followed was burning crackers and there were numerous – Dhani phatka, Kali phatka, Tal phatka, single sound, double sound, bullet , chocolate bombe , rocket, charki, tubri rang moshal, electric tar, ful jhuri, coloured matches. My father was very enthusiastic in this and most of the years he bought a huge collection of crackers from Kolkata. After burning the crackers our whole family went pandal hopping and seeing the decorations in town
The day after we had similar celebrations / cracker burning and dinner in the officers club. After bhaiphota the celebrations and the festive temporarily ended because after that there was the yatra or open air theatre. Notto Company and various other yatra groups performed for 6-7 days each year . I remember having witnessed a few of them each year.
3. My Para & Acquaintances
Doctors and their family : Dr Kamalendu Roy- his daughter Tinku was two years senior to me, Dr S.N.Banerjee – his daugter Mummum was one year senior to me, Dr. D.H.Maity – his son Biplab was in my class, Dr S.K.Moitra- his son Shibaji was in my Class, Dr. Nath – his son Joy was in my class., Dr Dey Chowdhuri – his son and daughter was junior to me, Dr P.K.Mukherjee – his daughter was with me and son one uear junior to me. Dr A.N.Choudhuri or Choudhuri Jethu our neighbour had a lovely garden which he created himself, Dr Konika Banerjee our neighbour. Dr Sunil Biswas and Dr D.N Biswas and their families, Dr. D.K.Das etc.
Other than Doctors : Dipu , Subroto, Ramji , Jairam, Dilip, Khokon, Ratan, Pankaj, Titu, Mithu etc my para friends. Dinu also.
4. Obituary
I left Chakradharpur in 1984, never visited again, though I have strong desire to do so. In between many of the acquaintances have left this world for their heavenly abode. They are
Master J.C.Dey
Dr. Kanika Banerjee
Dr A.N.Choudhuri
Dr. D.H.Maity
Titu Mithus younger sister Mouki
My Father Dr. N.N.Bhattacharjee
I wish them peace in heaven.
It is with great sadness that I want you to Know that one of my closest friend Ramji’s both the hands got cut in an accident. It was a great shock when I first learnt about this and tears run from my eyes often when I think of him for he was a brave and beautiful person full of life.
Annirudha (Dipu) , Subroto, Dipak are now in Kolkata along with me. Pankaj is in Chennai. I have lost most of my other CKP friends in this great world.
Recently I have made contacts with Jai Gupta, son of our Principal in High School and also brother of Neera Gupta my class mate. It is due to him I have come to know that Mrs Bannister is alive in CKP. I tender my sincere apology for putting her name in the obituary list with out verifying the facts. Jai Gupta is presently in Chennai.
In my life Chakradharpur occupies a deep memory indeed.
In my life Chakradharpur occupies a deep memory indeed.
