If I am to believe my sources, I spent my first years in a house in Dhakuria. There are pictures of me in a house, but who is to tell it is the same one I am given to believe I was living in. The birth certificate, of course, mentions only the hospital. Be that as it may, I remember the days - as I am sure many of us do - when the streets around our house weren't so well-lit as they are today. It is tempting to embark on a history of street-lighting in Calcutta. P. Thankappan Nair has a wonderful section in his Calcutta Municipal Corporation at a Glance, but that can be reserved for another day, another discussion.
For now let me share this one photograph I clicked on my mobile camera today. Between Maharaj Thakur Road and Dhakuria Station Road there are several narrow lanes which run parallely (I didn't know until now that 'parallely' isn't a legitimate word)...so, narrow lanes which run parallel. One of these is the Kali Bari Lane, which I happened to take tonight on my way back. This is a few steps into the lane.
I am not sure if this was the only street lamp the lane had at one time or whether, when they were being replaced by the new ones, some nostalgic soul left this single lamp-post behind. It reminded me of Wall-E and EVE. (Ooh, did the worker who left it behind also defy orders from above, favouring sentiment? No. I'm romanticizing.) These lamps sometimes had wire-grid baskets to prevent the light-bulbs from getting borrowed. In the background you can see the Indian Oil building towering. The change in the colour of street lights is also visible. The main road is amber. This lane is white, fluorescent. I realized while passing through the lane that this is also where our old car mechanic, Rishi, had his workshop. Our Standard Super 10 or after that the Fiat Premier Padmini would occasionally force us to take a detour on our way to some place or the other, to stop here for some minor repair-work. I remember being told-off once when, while the Fiat (or was it the Super 10?) was malfunctioning somewhere near Gariahat (Ghatak Bari to be precise) and my father was trying his best to fix it, I was restricting my contribution to wisecracking. I had just started reading Hergé's Quick and Flupke series, and, drawing on recently acquired vocabulary, I was calling the car "Double Trouble".
And the Hindustan 14 before the Standard Super 10, but that was before your time.
ReplyDeleteThat's a beautiful lamp-post. I also remember people in Dhakuria going round the neighbourhood at dusk with a long hooked stick, switching on the streetlamps.
Yes, the Hindustan 14 would be before my time. I remember the 'lamp-lighters'. I'm sure you remember this poem (with punctuation?):
DeleteTHE LAMPLIGHTER
My tea is nearly ready and the sun has left the sky;
It’s time to take the window to see Leerie going by;
For every night at teatime and before you take your seat,
With lantern and with ladder he comes posting up the street.
Now Tom would be a driver and Maria go to sea,
And my papa’s a banker and as rich as he can be;
But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I’m to do,
O Leerie, I’ll go round at night and light the lamps with you!
For we are very lucky, with a lamp before the door,
And Leerie stops to light it as he lights so many more;
And O! before you hurry by with ladder and with light;
O Leerie, see a little child and nod to him to-night!
Robert Louis Stevenson
I'm guessing the amber and not-amber lights are sodium and mercury vapor, respectively.
ReplyDeleteThe amber ones are sodium-vapour, but the white ones may not be mercury vapour. The Kolkata Municipal Corporation decided some time back to introduce LEDs. Or, like in Jamshedpur, they may be "metal allied lamps".
ReplyDeleteThere's a street lamp outside the Park Street metro entrance (the Bazaar Kolkata side) which is, if I'm not mistaken, one of the old gas lamps. It would seem there is someone in the KMC who leaves one specimen of each old lamp behind.
ReplyDeleteI'll take a look at this a.s.a.p. Thanks for pointing it out! That would be quite cool - if someone were to systematically leave behind one of each.
Deleteanna hazare jindabad
ReplyDelete