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| Khowai area in Santiniketan, Bolpur |
I went to Santiniketan for the first time in November 2004. It was, and still is, one of those places that do not offer much to do apart from a quiet corner to soothe your nerves and rest your weary bones after hectic weeks of work. But, that is precisely the charm of Santiniketan, which literally translates to ‘abode of peace’.
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| Kopai River |
Santiniketan, and the small town of Bolpur near which it is located, are quite famous because of Visva-Bharati, the university Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore founded. However, apart from the VB campus, there are quite a few places that people can enjoy on a two-days-one-night trip to Bolpur.
I went back to Santiniketan again in January 2016. Though quite a few things have changed in these 11 or 12 years, it still has its own appeal, thanks to the red soil of central Bengal, its sal forests, and the rural flavour that Bolpur has managed to hold on to.
There are many types of accommodation in Bolpur. However, the Santiniketan Tourist Lodge, owned by the West Bengal government, is definitely the most popular. We stayed there both times.
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| The Santhal village of Bonerpukur Danga |
Rooms can be booked from the West Bengal Tourism Department office at BBD Bag in Kolkata, or online. We went without any booking this year, but the lodge staff made the online booking on our behalf after granting us the room. Room rent starts from Rs 900. The food they serve is mostly traditional Bengali stuff, and it’s quite good.
The first time, we had taken a train—the Santiniketan Express, which leaves from Howrah station—to Bolpur. This time, however, we drove all the way from Kolkata, and I would recommend it highly for those who love road trips. Santiniketan Tourist Lodge is marked on Google Maps and we had no trouble finding it by using GPS.
Durgapur Expressway is a beautiful, well-maintained road lined with trees and the last leg to Bolpur passes through the trademark red soil of central Bengal, telling you that you have entered the district of Birbhum. The lodge has drivers’ quarters, too.
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| Chital deer at Ballabhpur Wildlife Sanctuary |
We reached the lodge in about 3.5 hours of leaving Kolkata. It’s best to leave as early as possible to make the most of the day.
Instead of driving around in our own car in Bolpur, we booked a local auto (tuktuk) for sightseeing. That’s mainly because it would have been difficult to find all the local places on GPS. One of the lodge staffers called the auto and we left in it after having lunch at the lodge. Do bargain a bit to lower the fare.
One of the best things about Bolpur is the charming bungalows with sprawling gardens that have sprung up along its uncluttered streets. Some of the houses look straight out of the pages of some fairy-tale picture book.
We first headed straight for the Kopai River. In winter, it was not a very pretty sight. It’s not a grand river by any means. But, we Bengalis have grown up reading so much about the river in literary works that it has become a sort of tourist attraction for us. If you are not a Bengali, you may be disappointed.
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| Lesser whistling ducks at Ballabhpur Wildlife Sanctuary |
Our next stop was the Santhal village of Bonerpukur Danga. The Santhals are one of the major tribes of India and their revolt against the British in the colonial era is still remembered with awe.
Bonerpukur Danga is a model village especially maintained for tourists where they can see Santhal lifestyle first-hand. Many television soaps and movies are shot there, too. So, the residents are used to visitors and their cameras. They will carry on with their work without sparing a second glance at you.
The houses and the central road that runs through the village are spic and span, and you won’t even find a scrap of paper lying around. Carpets of grains lay drying right in the middle of the road. Some of the houses had decorations of rough terracotta relief work on their walls. The scenes depicted Santhal life, like a farmer on his way to work with bullocks and a plough, women sowing paddy, a man hunting deer with a bow and arrow, and the like.
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| Lesser whistling ducks at Ballabhpur Wildlife Sanctuary |
A nondescript building displayed a board announcing a ‘crèche’ though, from the outside, it looked deserted. A couple of kids ran around—throwing frequent shy glances and grins at us—as their mothers worked on the grains. A couple of handcarts stood at strategic points to add to the overall picturesqueness of the village.
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| One of the watchtowers at Ballabhpur Wildlife Sanctuary |
As you walk your way out of the village, you will find yourself in Khowai—an arid landscape dotted with sal trees, which depicts the quintessence of Birbhum and other central Bengal districts like Bankura and Purulia. It is great as a picnic spot. Or, you may just walk around and relish the unique topography a bit.
The auto drove us through the Khowai area and made its way to the Deer Park, or the Balabhpur Wildlife Sanctuary, which is one of my favourite places in Bolpur. There is a very nominal entry fee (Rs 5, as far as I remember) and the best time to go in is during the deer’s feeding time in the afternoon. It is open from 10am to 4pm every day except on Wednesdays.
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| Ramkinkar Beij's 'Sujata'. The building at the back is Rabindra Bhaban museum |
The park houses a huge population of chital (spotted) deer and you will keep meeting them as you walk along the path that winds itself around the campus. The walk itself is immensely enjoyable as there is no dearth of greenery and birds. If you love bird-watching, go early in the morning and you will have an enjoyable day.
A couple of waterbodies flank the campus and you will find them teeming with migratory birds like lesser whistling ducks during winter. There are several watchtowers from where you can enjoy photographing birds.
Keep at least a couple of hours in hand, or more, for the deer park if you love wildlife.
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| The five houses of Tagore in the Uttarayan complex |
Our next stop was the most famous destination of Santiniketan—Tagore’s Visva-Bharati university, conceived on his idea of universal education. You will be charged Rs 40 if you are an adult Indian citizen (for students and children, it's Rs 10; for foreigners, it's Rs 300 per head) to enter Rabindra Bhaban museum and Uttarayan complex that houses five buildings associated with Tagore.
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| Tagore's car |
The path leads left to the museum, which houses many of the poets’ and his family members’ personal possessions. The items on display also include a copy of his Nobel medallion and citation; the originals were stolen several years back and no one ever found them.
Among the other items are unique gifts he received from countries all over the world. So, the museum is also a mini-storehouse of global artistry. Photography is prohibited inside the museum.
On leaving the museum, make your way down the path, past the replica of ‘Sujata’, a sculpture by renowned artist Ramkinkar Beij, to the Rathindra Museum. Rathindranath was Tagore’s son and this house served as a studio for him and his wife Pratimadevi.
The path will take you through a beautifully sculptured garden to the Uttarayan complex. Each of the five houses is a museum now and you can take your time to go through each item on display. However, you will have to take off your shoes everywhere. So, remember to put on something easily removable and wearable.
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| A Kala Bhaban student paints in one of the gardens on the campus |
The first one you will come across, on the left, is Udayan. Tagore’s car is housed in a garage next to it. Opposite Udayan is another sculpture by Beij, ‘The Santhal Family’. The grounds are separated by a small arched gateway, which will lead you to the houses Konark, Punascha, and Udichi.
Even further down is the clay house of Shyamoli, which was under renovation by the Archaeological Survey of India when we went last January. There is a stunning rose garden nearby and this entire area open to tourists is full of manicured gardens or potted flower plants and you can catch Kala Bhaban (art school) students trying to capture a scene or one of the houses on their canvas.
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The next point of our visit was another part of the campus which houses ‘Chhatimtala’, where Tagore’s father Maharshi Debendranath Tagore is said to have meditated. The spot gets its name from the ‘chhatim’ trees (blackboard tree/Indian devil tree) that shade it. It is a heritage zone now and entry to the central spot is restricted. You can see it across the low iron fences.
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| Chhatimtala |
The road leads through the campus to the Brahmo Mandir—a temple of the Brahmo faith that was born out of a reform movement against orthodox Hinduism. Debendranath was one of the founders of the faith. Again, entry is restricted and tourists can only watch it from a distance.
Do not forget to visit Kala Bhaban. There are several artworks by Beij, Nandalal Bose, and Benode Behari Mukherjee. It’s a long walk through the campus. We had hired a rickshaw the last time. But now, they are apparently banned. So, keep enough time on your hands for the walk.
You may hire a guide if you wish to. Personally, I find them quite amusing. They seem to know just as much about Tagore as a kindergarten kid knows about Neptune. But, they will tell you all kinds of fantastic tales about him and the campus which Tagore himself may not have known.
They will point to a tree and say confidently, “Tagore wrote so-and-so poem after watching this tree in a storm” and stuff like that. And, people do actually listen wide-eyed and open-mouthed.
My personal advice: Do not hire guides. You won’t need them.
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| Brahmo Mandir |
Our next stop was a fair at Sriniketan. In winter, you will generally find some or the other fair going on in Bolpur. Some of the most famous ones are the Basanta Utsav on Holi (spring) and the Poush Mela, which begins on the 7th of the Bengali month of Poush. This date corresponds to December 23.
The fair was a delightful experience. It was a fantastic demonstration of simple village life that we miss in cities like Kolkata. There were cultural programmes displaying local rituals, music by the mystic sect of bauls, and lots of to eat and buy.
There is a cooperative centre called Amar Kutir from where I had shopped for mementoes in 2004. But, this time, we shopped at a local market in Bolpur. Amar Kutir is a bit more expensive though it has the choicest products.
You can buy several things as mementoes. There are the leather bags with typical Santiniketan motifs. Then you have the ‘dhokra’/‘dokra’ (lost-wax casting) figurines, and sun-dried clay and terracotta handicrafts. You can also buy scarves and other items of clothing with ‘kantha’ or batik work. Among edibles, there are the famous pickles and murabbas of Birbhum’s Suri town. All these items are unique to this area.
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| A village fair at Sriniketan |
The next morning, we visited the Kankalitala temple dedicated to the Hindu goddess Kali. It is around 9 km from Bolpur and the place I had liked the most on my first visit to Santiniketan. I remembered it as a small temple in the middle of a thick sal forest with no one around but the priest of the temple. There was an eerie quiet about the place which I had enjoyed tremendously.
However, times change and I was extremely disappointed to see that Kankalitala has not been able to hold on to that unique charm. Much of the forest surrounding the temple is now gone. Rows of shops selling sweets and flowers to be offered to the goddess have come up near the entrance, and beggars sat waiting for alms from devotees.
We were even accosted by a man who claimed to know everything about the temple and offered to tell us all of it for a fee. We refused him politely.
A board proclaims that Kankalitala is one of the 51 ‘Shakti Peethas’. For those who are not familiar with Hinduism and its myths, Shakti Peethas are the 51 spots where Goddess Shakti’s (Durga/Kali) body parts are supposed to have fallen.
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| Kankalitala Kali temple |
The legend goes that Goddess Shakti killed herself when her father spoke badly of her husband, Lord Shiva. The latter went mad with grief and anger, and refused to part with the body. This threatened all creation.
Lord Vishnu then chopped the body into 51 pieces with his Sudarshan Chakra (wheel) to help Lord Shiva get over the state of trance. The pieces apparently fell in different parts of what are now India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. These are the 51 Shakti Peethas, some of the most revered religious destinations for Hindus.
The board claims the pond next to the Kankalitala temple holds Goddess Shakti’s ‘kaankaal’ or the side of the hip. Some other sources claim that the goddess’s skeleton fell in that spot, from the similar-sounding word ‘kawnkaal’ that means skeleton.
We ended our Santiniketan trip here and left for Bishnupur in the neighbouring Bankura district. I will write about the temple town in my next blog post. ========================================================================
How to go: By train (you will get many trains all through the day. Santiniketan Express is especially for Bolpur. It leaves from Howrah station). You can also go by road.
Where to stay: Many types of accommodation. Santiniketan Tourist Lodge is the most popular.
What to eat: Traditional Bengali fare.
What to buy: Leather bags with typical Santiniketan motifs, dokra/dhokra, clay or terracotta handicrafts, scarves or Indian wear with 'kantha' or batik work, pickles and murabbas of Suri.
Best time to visit: Autumn/fall and winter.