Calcutta

The city's `lungs' is the Maiden, an enormous open expanse used by Calcuttans for recreation, cricket and football matches, political assemblies, yoga sessions, grazing flocks. The park's peaceful setting is in stark contrast to the streets that enclose it and it is large enough to engulf the massive Fort William. The fort is still in use today, although visitors are only allowed inside with special permission (rarely granted). At the southern end of the Maiden stands the huge white-marble Victoria Memorial. Fronted by a statue of Queen Victoria. The museum houses an extensive collection of British-Indian historical objects and is probably the most solid reminder of the Raj to be found in the country.

On the square's north side is the Writers' Building, built in 1780 for the convenience of young `writers' brought out from Britain by the East India Company. Inside is a Kafkaesque of endless corridors and vast chambers.

The Indian Museum, the largest and probably the best museum in the country.

The Botanical Gardens, home to a 200-year-old banyan tree is claimed to have the second-largest canopy in the world (the largest is in Andhra Pradesh).

Howrah Bridge is considered to be the busiest bridge in the world.

Previously known as Ochterlony Monument, located in the heart of Esplanade. The panoramic view of the city from the top of the monument is really captivating. With 218 steps. This 52 meters high monument consists of a combination of Egyptian base, Syrian column and Turkish copula.

Birla Planetarium is located at the top end of Chowringhee the only planetarium in the country whose dome houses a collection of projectors and optical equipments expensively imported from East Germany. It is the largest planetarium in South-East Asia and the 2nd. largest planetarium in the world.

Citadel of Calcutta with the permission of the Nawab of Bengal, this fort was built between 1696 and 1702 by the British East India Company and named after King William III of England. In 1756 the fort was taken by the Nawab of Bengal, Siraj-ud-dullah. In 1757 East India Company regained their power and demolished this fort and they started reconstruction of the fort. The new fort was completed in 1773 and it is still there.

This is indisputably the richest, quaintest, eeriest, most haphazard and the most most astonishing, lovable and the saddest relic in what by about the start of the nineteenth century was beginning to be called the City of Palaces. In the middle of this towering mess you find unbelievably a real garden of maybe of an acre with a Palladian mansion set square in the centre. This could easily be a luxurious pocket in Rome not Calcutta and there is a fountain in the garden that would not be out of place in the Piazza Navona or at the bottom of the Spanish steps. It has Neptune figures brandishingconch shells with indeterminate water beasts gaping at them from the surrounding pool and four nubile naiads upholding a classical urn on top of the central column.

"The Magic Of Eden Gardens” - Raju Mukerji (Sport star, 13th Nov, 1993) The portrait of Indian cricket was indelibly etched by the early English expatriates. That was 200 years ago when in a pioneering zeal they banded together to form the Calcutta Cricket Club. In its edition of February 23, 1792, the Madras Courier reported that a cricket match was played of Englishmen residing in the districts of Barrackpore and Dum Dum. Eden Gardens has an exclusiveness of its own.

The garden was founded in 1787 by the East India Company and formerly known as Royal Botanic Garden. It is famous for its huge collection of bamboos, orchids, palms and the plants of screw pine genus. The area of the garden is more than 270 acres and more than 1700 plant species can be found. The Central National Harbarium of the Botanical Survey of India is here and has 2500000 dried plants in its collection. A Zoological Garden laid in 1876, extending over an area of 16 hectares it has considerably large collection of animals. White tiger, tigon ( a hybrid between tiger and lion), the reptiles and the Royal Bengal tigers are the special exhibits. During winter the migratory birds from all over the world are the special attractions.

This is the oldest museum in India and one of the most comprehensive museums in Asia;. The archaeology and numismatic sections contain the most valuable collections. The Museum is divided into six sections dealing with Archaeology, Art, Anthropology, Geology, Zoology and Industry including Botany. There is marble everywhere in ninety different varieties and it is said, all marble was transported across the seas by the ton to provide floors and wall panels and table tops.