Tollygunge

Hello, friends. After couple of days I am back again with another story of this City of Joy. I said it quite often that name doesn't come at random. So, today we are going to unfold the name 'Tollygunge'. Obviously this is not the only name which Tollygunge ever have. The first name of this place was 'Rasha Pagla'. Sounds weird isn't it? Well, behind this name we have two theories. The first one is - It was believed that in this place there was a village which was named after a Sadhu called 'Rasha Pagla'. Somewhat like Vabha Pagla. The second theory is quite weird. Before 1847 we have only one mental asylam which was in Rasha road means in today's Deshopran Sashmal road. After some time it was shifted to Hastings and the new building of the mental asylam is now known as PTS- Police training school. From mental asylam or in bengali 'Paglagarod' to 'Rasha Pagla'. Well, this is obviously the old name but what about the new one.

Well, through our city flows the Adi Ganga( not nowadays). Around 16th century the changed it's course and the Adi Ganga became a small ditch which was known as Govinda Pure er Khari. This name changed to Surman's Canal when East India Company's Jon Surman started to live beside it. This guy, Jon Surman went to Delhi in 1715 and received a 'Farman' from Samrat Farookh Siyar that East India Company will not pay any taxes for their business here. At Dalhousie, just beside the tomb of Job Charnock there is a tomb of Dr. Willia Hamilton. He also went to Delhi with Jon Surman in 1715. Cut to 50 years later. Army Engineer Captain William Tolly started to live here. In 1775, he gave a proposal to East India Company as a Major that he wants to wide up the Surman's Canal so that all the big ships can carry their loads upto Garia. East India Company accepted this proposal and Surman's Canal became 'Tolly Canal'. The whole area started to develop. William Tolly set up a  market their and the name of that market, yes today's Tollygunge. William Tolly also purchased a house from Hastings and the name of that house is 'Belvedere'. Today's National Library.