Thursday 9 February 2017

Ooty / Udhagamandalam / Ootacamund / ஊட்டி / உதகமண்டலம் - Charing Cross, Municipal Office, Tamil Nadu Electricity Board office, Bridges - A Heritage Visit to Nilgiri Hills.

06th February, 2017.
As per official note March 1821CE in Madras Gazette, Udhagamandalam was called as Wotokymund. In early times it was called as Ottkakalmandu and Mund means a Village in Toda language. The present name is the corruption of the local name. The local tribes Toda lived with Kota, Irula and Kurumba. The hill was referred in the 2nd  century  tamil work Silapathikaram in which Chera King Senguttuvan, ruled this place. He also stayed here for some time on the way to Himalayas.

After 1117 CE this place comes under the rule of Hoysalas, Satavahanas, Cheras, Gangas, Kadambas, Rashtrakutas, Cholas, Hoysalas, Vijayanagara empire and Rajas of Ummathur. Tipu sultan captured Nilgiris in the eighteenth century and handed over to East India Company  by the treaty of Srirangapatna in 1799 CE. During 1819 CE, John Sullivan, the collector of Coimbatore  Visited Kotagiri and described this place looks like  Switzerland, in a letter to Thomas Munro. A Road was laid in 1823 from Sirumugai to the newly built Bungalow at Dimhatti,  which was latter extended to Coonoor in the year 1830 to -32 CE. 

Ooty served as a Summer Capital for the Britishers Madras Presidency. Wellington has become the home for the Madras Regiment of the Indian Army and after independence it was developed as a Hill resort and called Queen of Hills. The names of the Place and streets reminds the British rule.  This post does not cover all the heritage buildings and structure, but the building I visited.

The Details of  some of the places Visited are .. 








CHARING CROSS.
It was told this fountain is very much similar to the one available in London. It will be very nice to see with water flowing and light.


MUNICIPAL OFFICE
Municipal office of Ootacamund ( OOTY ) was constituted in the year 1866 and this office was constructed in 1894. Then the building was extended in 1946. The building was constructed by the contractor M. Joghee Maistry. Commissioner, Engineer, Health officer, Town Planning, PA To Commissioner and Manager offices are functioning in this building. The first floor and steps are constructed with wood.






TAMIL NADU ELECTRICITY BOARD OFFICE.
The single floor office was constructed during 1923 CE with tiled roofing. ADE, DE and Bill collection offices are functioning here. Except the age of the building there is no special features.



BRIDGES:
On the way to Ooty we have to cross 3 iron bridges constructed during 1900 to 1923 with riveted joints by a contractor from Calcutta. 


I will try to cover some more buildings during my next visit and post in this blog..
---OM SHIVAYA NAMA---

2 comments:

  1. I specially liked the history of Ooty that you have given at the beginning of this post.

    ReplyDelete