Landour

Coordinates: 30°28′N 78°06′E / 30.47°N 78.10°E / 30.47; 78.10
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Landour
Landaur
town
UTC+5:30 (IST)
PIN
248179
Vehicle registrationUK
Websiteuk.gov.in
[1]

Landour, a small

Sir Walter Scott, Thomas Hardy, Robert Louis Stevenson and many others.[4]

Location and climate

Landour 1869
Landour

Landour is located in the Lower

Himalaya. On average, Landour is about 984 ft (300 m) above Mussoorie, which itself is mostly at an altitude of 6,800 to 7,798 ft (2,250 to 2,377m). The town lies largely on an east–west ridge, with a prominent southerly spur connecting its western end to Mussoorie. The altitude differential, aided by Landour being partly Tibet-facing, has a marked effect on the temperature, which can be 2–3 °C (4-5 °F) lower than in Mussoorie. During the monsoon
, Landour receives almost daily rainfall, often heavy. Additionally, pre- and post-monsoon showers mean a rainy season that can run from May to September, though it can be shorter. Before the rains arrive, April–May is the warmest period, with the temperatures rising to over 30 °C. (~85 °F) on hotter days. December to February is downright cold, especially if one does not receive enough direct sunlight, as on the northern slopes. It can snow anywhere between 3 and 15 times in the winter, at times heavily. In a given year Landour receives perhaps twice the snow that Mussoorie does; it also takes longer to melt especially on the north-facing slopes.

If one travels the 290 km (180 mi) to Landour from New Delhi by train or bus, a switch at Dehradun is needed. Buses and taxis, and even "shared taxis", are easily available. There are also direct buses from New Delhi, and one can easily negotiate with taxis at any of New Delhi's railway stations or at the Delhi airport. One can also fly from Delhi in just 40 min to Jolly Grant Airport east of Dehradun, which saves a lot of time, but it takes another 90 minutes to drive up to Landour from the airport.

East of Landour lie the small hamlet of

Jaunsar
bordering Himachal Pradesh.

Early history

Landour is within

Dehradun District of the former United Provinces. The United Provinces themselves were carved out of the former Northwest Province of the vast Bengal Presidency
, which stretched from Burma to the Khyber Pass; accordingly, early accounts show Landour as part of "Bengal", which was technically true though the description was incomplete.

Landour was initially built by and for the

tropical diseases; the hospital closed soon after 1947. Also within the ITM premises is the former Soldiers' Furlough Home, a holiday home for British and Irish soldiers and JCOs in Indian regiments who lacked the means to return to Europe regularly. Or, the holidaying soldiers were serving in British regiments on rotation in India, their tours of duty lasting anywhere from 6 to 48 months. In terms of area, Landour Cantonment comprises about two-thirds of Landour; the remainder includes Landour Bazaar, which stretches along the spur that connects to Mussoorie.[6]

Mussoorie and Landour, 1860s

The first permanent building in all of Mussoorie-Landour was also built in Landour in 1825. The house was built by Captain Frederick Young, the "discoverer" of Mussoorie, who was also the Commandant of the first Gurkha (or Gorkha) battalion raised by the British after prevailing in the Gurkha War. Young's house, "Mullingar" (hinting at his Irish blood), was the family home during the hot summers in the plains. Young's Dehradun-based battalion, then called the Sirmour (or Sirmoor) Rifles, was initially raised in a Gurkha POW camp in Paonta Sahib in Sirmour District – hence the name. The huge L-shaped building, with an outsized courtyard inside the bend of the "L", sits prominently atop Mullingar Hill in Landour Cantonment.

Among distinguished house guests at Mullingar in the early decades were Emily Eden (see below). Mullingar was expanded, changed hands several times and by the early 20th century had become the Mullingar Estate Hotel. During World War II, Mullingar was leased by the army to house the overflow of convalescing soldiers from the sanatorium, given the huge increase in war-related injuries. The hotel was bursting at the seams, as a number of British civilian evacuees from Burma, the Andamans, Manipur & Nagaland, which were occupied by Japanese forces, were also housed in Mullingar before being shipped out elsewhere. Mullingar finally fell into disuse after 1947 when Britons began to leave India, with the army already having vacated it after the postwar demobilization of 1945–46. The building soon fell into disrepair, occupied largely if not entirely by squatters (see below). A number of the families now living in Mullingar are Tibetan. Prayer flags flutter in the wind every day, and Losar celebrations are held in the courtyard every year.

The legal distinction between Mussoorie and Landour did not arise until the 1860s, when after the historic events of 1857 cantonments were properly surveyed and formalized. In particular, control of the ridge-lines and water sources was crucial, given rising British anxieties over their grip on India. The defensibility of garrisons was critical, especially in hill stations with large European populations. The Cantonments Act of 1924 further clarified the rights of the property owners; new construction of any kind, especially of private homes, was virtually banned. Conservation was also a key goal, given the excesses of the 19th century (see below); the Act clearly states that title to all trees remains with the army, hence there has been no logging in Landour since in over a century, as can be seen. By definition, all non-military and non-governmental buildings built after 1924 are 'illegal'. Therefore, there are few 'modern' homes in Landour, though renovations and reconstruction of pre-existing houses are permitted. Thanks to the 1924 Act, Landour Cantonment is—unlike Landour Bazaar—largely free of the commercialization that can be seen in much of Mussoorie proper, especially along the 'main drag' of Mall Road where tourists throng in the summer.

Racially, Landour was distinctly more European than Mussoorie. It was no accident. First, the army presence (albeit non-regimental) offered an excuse to 'keep out' Indians. Second,

Anglo-Indian
families also put down roots in Landour, and in Barlowganj just below Mussoorie, in the 19th century. They were attracted in part by the schools, and by the sense of 'otherness' versus quotidian India. A handful remain, most having emigrated after 1947, but the few who remain (most are in their golden years) are treasure troves of local lore.

Indeed, the events of 1857 led to a spurt in the European population of Mussoorie-Landour, with many families leaving the 'exposed' towns of the Gangetic Plain. Among the Britons who thus moved to Landour were the parents of Jim Corbett. Both had lost their spouses, and would meet and remarry in Landour (see below). His mother had moved from Meerut, where her first husband had been killed in action in 1857. Thousands of Europeans, mostly Britons, are buried in the twin towns. The Cantonment has adjacent Protestant and Catholic cemeteries, though due to overcrowding in the former, the latter has of late become non-denominational – they are managed by the same committee. In 1901, the town had a population of 1720, which climbed up to 3700 in the summers, when the heat of the Indian plains became unbearable.[5]

Climate data for Landour, Mussoorie (1971-2000, extremes 1901-1987)
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Record high °C (°F) 21.1
(70.0)
23.3
(73.9)
26.1
(79.0)
29.1
(84.4)
34.4
(93.9)
31.7
(89.1)
29.4
(84.9)
25.6
(78.1)
27.2
(81.0)
28.1
(82.6)
25.0
(77.0)
23.3
(73.9)
34.4
(93.9)
Mean daily maximum °C (°F) 10.3
(50.5)
11.2
(52.2)
15.7
(60.3)
20.6
(69.1)
23.0
(73.4)
23.2
(73.8)
20.9
(69.6)
20.5
(68.9)
19.8
(67.6)
18.6
(65.5)
15.5
(59.9)
12.7
(54.9)
17.6
(63.7)
Mean daily minimum °C (°F) 2.8
(37.0)
3.4
(38.1)
7.1
(44.8)
11.5
(52.7)
14.3
(57.7)
15.6
(60.1)
15.0
(59.0)
14.8
(58.6)
13.6
(56.5)
11.1
(52.0)
7.6
(45.7)
4.5
(40.1)
10.0
(50.0)
Record low °C (°F) −5.0
(23.0)
−6.7
(19.9)
−2.5
(27.5)
−1.5
(29.3)
3.7
(38.7)
4.1
(39.4)
11.7
(53.1)
7.4
(45.3)
1.3
(34.3)
2.6
(36.7)
−2.1
(28.2)
−3.9
(25.0)
−6.7
(19.9)
Average rainfall mm (inches) 49.9
(1.96)
65.2
(2.57)
73.1
(2.88)
56.2
(2.21)
69.0
(2.72)
200.9
(7.91)
629.6
(24.79)
548.0
(21.57)
264.5
(10.41)
55.5
(2.19)
14.9
(0.59)
10.1
(0.40)
2,036.8
(80.19)
Average rainy days 4.1 5.0 5.1 3.8 5.0 9.5 22.4 21.3 11.6 2.7 0.9 1.3 92.7
Average
relative humidity (%) (at 17:30 IST
)
78 75 66 56 58 70 85 87 85 78 75 75 74
Source: [7]

Civic administration

Since Landour is a cantonment town, it is administered by the cantonment board which is under the control of the Ministry of Defence. The Station Commander of the Cantonment is the ex-officio president of the board, and an officer an officer of the IDES or Defence Estates Organisation is the chief executive officer who is also the member-secretary of the board.[10] The President of Landour Cantonment Board is Brig. SN Singh while the CEO is Shri Abhishek Rathour, IDES.[11] Councillors, or representatives of citizens, are elected from 6 wards in Landour.[12]

A few local facts

A view of the valley from Landour, Uttarakhand

Like Mussoorie and Dehradun, Landour has long been a center of secondary education. The towns have had several schools and "orphanages" for both European and mixed-race

Anglo-Indian children since the mid-19th century. (Hint: "Orphanage" was often a Raj-era euphemism for a school for illegitimate mixed-race children). Also, there were many missionary-run schools, of which the most well-known was (and remains) Woodstock School, founded in 1854 for the children of American missionaries. Practically all of the other prominent schools including Wynberg Allen School, St. George's School, Mussoorie Public School, Waverley Convent (now CJM) and Vincent Hill (now Guru Nanak 5th Centenary School) are in Mussoorie, not Landour. The Indian Army
also runs a primary school in Landour Cantonment.

Landour Community Hospital, originally established 1931

There are under 100 detached private homes in the Cantonment, and under 200 buildings overall. The non-residential buildings belong to either the military, or to the state-owned broadcasters Doordarshan and All India Radio, who have repeater stations atop Lal Tibba hill, at over 7,700 ft. the highest point in all of Mussoorie-Landour. The transmitters are mounted on Landour's answer to Paris, an Eiffel-inspired orange-and-white tower that is the most recognizable feature in all of Landour. Lal Tibba was also known as Depot Hill, referring to the convalescent depot. Nearby Sisters Bazaar likewise referred to the nurses' dormitory at the location; nurses are still addressed as 'Sister' in the Subcontinent, from a time in the 19th century when most nurses were Anglican, Methodist or Catholic nuns. The Cantonment is also home to the well-known Landour Community Hospital, founded by American missionaries. At the time of its founding in 1931 it was one of the first good non-military hospitals in the region. It has been run by the Emmanuel Hospital Association, an indigenous Christian health and development agency, since 1981, and continues to provide affordable (or free) medical care to the people of Landour and the surrounding hills.

Sisters Bazaar

Among natural features in the area, the local peaks are the most prominent. ('Tibba' is a local word for hill/peak). Other than "Old" Lal Tibba and Landour hill themselves (which lie within the Cantonment), there is the hunched, heavily forested Pari Tibba (also called Fairy Hill or Witches' Hill), lurking due south of Woodstock School and due east of Wynberg-Allen School. Once a private hunting estate of the ruling family of

Tehri-Garhwal, it was not deforested for that very reason. It is also called Burnt Hill, referring to the unusual number of lightning strikes it has taken over the years, which has given rise to local superstitions and also helped keep it free of humans. The hill remains a popular hiking spot for the local boarding schools, but not having motorable roads is blessedly free of "tourism". Due north of Landour, 16 km (9.9 mi) away as the crow flies is Nag Tibba ('Serpent's Peak'), at 3,022 m (9,972 ft) the highest peak in the local region. It lends its name to the Nag Tibba Range
, itself the next-northerly of the five folds of the Himalaya. To the east of Landour are Tope Tibba and the oddly shaped Pepperpot mountain; both are hiking destinations.

There are no commercial hotels in Landour Cantonment, and only a handful of rudimentary, quasi-legal "guest houses". Landour Bazaar has fewer than 10 equally rudimentary hotels, none of which would merit a single star, with all of them together having perhaps 125 rooms. (Mussoorie proper has over a hundred hotels at various price points, though). There were never any entertainments in Landour – all the Raj-era theaters, cinemas, dance halls, skating rinks and public gardens were in Mussoorie. Accordingly, the decibel level was – and is – markedly lower (thanks to the military's zoning rules) than in Mussoorie, where it is ever-rising thanks to the explosion in middle-class tourism.

Americana in the Himalaya

Aside from the obvious British legacy, Landour has a thick vein of Americana too, with American missionaries having had a strong footing in the town since the 1830s, when the policy changes introduced by the English administrator

Third Culture Kids) were educated at Woodstock School and/or born in Landour (see John Birch, below). Of late,[when?] their descendants have been deeming a dekko worthwhile. Nowadays, many young Americans on gap years or on exchange programs spend time learning Hindi at the popular Landour Language School, which was founded in the late 19th century to teach newly arrived missionaries. Another durable reminder of the American connection is the ubiquitous Landour Community Cookbook (1st formal edition: 1938; informal stencil copies since c. 1900) though the Landour Community Center—once the locus of Anglo-American community life—is itself moribund. A half-dozen bakers in Landour still offer various breads, cookies/biscuits and cakes from 'The Cookbook', though with the rise of packaged foods and the departure of most missionaries, the bakeries are a pale shadow of their former selves. Landour was also one of the first places in India where an American classic such as peanut butter
was made commercially; Plausibly, a number of houses in Landour have American (rather than British) names, among them Aloha, Hollywood and Roanoke.

Ecology and environment

Landour is for the most part (unlike largely deforested Mussoorie) carpeted by old-growth forests of

Oriental plane (Hindi: chinar) too are seen. A logging ban has long been in place in the reserved forests
around Landour, and the ban is reasonably well enforced.

Himalaya
, from Landour

Landour offers striking views of the

Himalaya, with a wide vista of up to 200 km (120 mi) visible on a clear day. The visible massifs and peaks include (West to East) Swargarohini, Bandarpunch, Yamunotri, Jaonli, Gangotri, Srikanta, Kedarnath, Satopanth, Chaukhamba (Badrinath) and even Nanda Devi. At its closest point, Tibet is about 70 miles (110 km) away as the crow flies; it is through Landour that Heinrich Harrer escaped to Tibet during World War II after breaking out of a British internment camp in Dehradun
.

Birdlife is outstanding in its breadth of species; over 350 species may comfortably be seen at various elevations over the course of the year, including both

langurs are as present in Landour as anywhere. Poaching has severely reduced the numbers of the larger wild mammals, though the habitat itself could support larger populations. Of course, most charismatic megafauna had already been wiped out by the British in the 19th century. Unsurprising, given the British penchant for 'blood sport', especially among the soldiery. After all, Mussoorie was first 'discovered' by Captain Young on a shooting expedition from his garrison in Dehradun. The ecology of the area clearly shows that tiger, Himalayan black bear, striped hyena, sambar, serow, Himalayan tahr, gaur
and other impressive species (all are now locally extinct) were well represented in Mussoorie-Landour before British colonization; 19th-century writings by British hunters boast of the countless trophies they collected in the area.

Deforestation itself dates from British times. There was also an early myth that "Indian forests are full of germs, which European constitutions cannot take";

clear-cutting
) was the answer, as even a casual observer can still see, except in the Cantonment, thanks to the 1924 Act (see above). Many reforestation initiatives began in various hill stations in the late 19th century, thanks to some enlightened Raj administrators, but not in Mussoorie. Of late, the Indian Army has done yeoman service via its 'Eco-Battalions' in terms of re-forestation.

Another local menace is non-

biodegradable
refuse. While there have been some steps by the citizenry (without much help from the authorities) to combat this, it remains a challenge. Much refuse is just dumped down hillsides by many locals—langurs, macaques, civets, stray dogs and other animals forage these open dumps. While the Indian Army has a somewhat better record, Doordarshan and All India Radio (both state-owned, revealingly) are notorious for calmly dumping most of their garbage down the hillsides of the Cantonment. Few in Landour Bazaar seem to take the environment seriously; that is for the "rich" of the Cantonment to worry about. Woodstock School, which remains the largest landowner in Landour behind the Indian Army, has sought to be progressive on this score (e.g., by collecting used plastics from across Landour) but its efforts are more effective within and around their own large campus than elsewhere in Landour.

The citizenry

The year-round population of the Cantonment is under 1,200, and if you include Landour Bazaar it is under 4,000. The summertime population of Mussoorie triples to perhaps 90,000 with the influx of budget tourists (and hotel staff, shopkeepers, tradesmen etc. to service them), but the population of Landour Bazaar only goes up by perhaps 1,000, given the paucity of hotels. But the summertime population of the Cantonment goes up by only 500, if that; there is no place for outsiders to stay. Indeed, the weekend population of Mussoorie proper too now spurts—year-round—to near-summertime levels, given the improvements in India's highways and the ever-rising numbers of private cars.

The Himalayas from near Char Dukan in Landour, upper Mussoorie

The ethnic mix of Landour has changed dramatically since 1947, and since the 1970s–1980s due to the departure of most missionaries, and also via the recent Indian economic boom. Many of the shopkeepers and small-business owners of Landour Bazaar and the Cantonment are descended from bania merchants who came from far afield in the 19th century—as far away as Gujarat and Bombay—to service the then-growing Anglo-American community.

Demographics

According to the 2001 India census,[13] Landour had an "official" population of roughly 3,500. Males constitute 55% of the population and females 45%. Landour has an average literacy rate of 78%, higher than the national average of 59.5%: male literacy is 85%, and female literacy is 70%. In Landour, 8% of the population is under 6 years of age. However, these statistics do not account for the transient population of the Cantonment, which includes military personnel on study tours, or the "second home" crowd that owns many of the properties in Landour Cantonment. Nor does it account for the student population at Woodstock or the language school.

Architecture

Architecturally speaking, Landour is akin to other Raj-era hill stations of Northern India. Since Mussoorie-Landour never rivalled

Home Counties England and of the resort towns of the Scottish Highlands
. Many have well-kept gardens.

Char Dukan literally Four Shops, Landour
Castle Hill and The Castle, Landour by Samuel Bourne (1865)

About the only "architecturally significant" building was The Castle on the aptly named Castle Hill, now part of

Amir of Afghanistan
too was in the town in quasi-exile at various times in the early 20th century as Raj officials engaged in their customary machinations of map-drawing and re-drawing across the Subcontinent.

A prominent local landmark was the Clock Tower at the start of Landour Bazaar. It was of little architectural merit, but informally marked the boundary between Landour and Mussoorie (others say it is the former Picture Palace movie theater a bit lower down). Demolished in 2011, the tower is expected to be rebuilt sometime in the future, having been delayed by local political wrangling.

Landour has four Raj-era churches, two of them distinctly Indo-

Catholic
, and now is disuse and occupied by squatters apparently with the 'permission' of the church committee; it is atop Landour hill.

Residents

Kellogg Memorial Church, Landour, built 1903.

Landour also has an outsized presence on the cultural map of India, its most famous resident being the

Indo-nostalgic" author, is often in town for long stretches . Stephen's father Rev. Bob Alter had been principal of Woodstock in the 1970s and 1980s. The media moguls Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy, founders of NDTV, also maintain a second home in Landour. The Hindi film director Vishal Bhardwaj has a house in Landour and is the next door neighbour to Ruskin Bond. Another famous resident of this quaint town is the Indian actor Victor Banerjee.[16]

Landour was home in the 1850s and 1860s to the multi-talented John Lang, seen as the "first Australian novelist". Lang's 1864 grave was rediscovered by Ruskin Bond in Camel's Back Cemetery in Mussoorie and was restored by the Australian High Commission in Delhi (which also has a bolthole nearby).

Other

Communists
. Landour has, in large part, survived "untouched" thanks to the military presence and also due to its small size.

Sources

  • Landour Days: A Writer's Journal by Ruskin Bond. Penguin, 2002. .
  • Resorts of the Raj, by Vikram Bhatt (1998).
  • Hill Stations of India, by Gillian Wright (1991).
  • Mussoorie: Jewel of the Hills, by Ruskin Bond (1996).
  • Mussoorie & Landour: Days of Wine and Roses, by Ruskin Bond (1992).
  • Birding in the Doon Valley, by Nikhil Devasar, S.B. Dutta & Santanu Sarkar [Editor] (2012).
  • Plain Tales from the Raj, by Charles Allen (1975).
  • Magic Mountains: Hill Stations and the British Raj (1996).
  • All the Way to Heaven: An American Boyhood in the Himalaya, by Stephen Alter (1998).
  • Raj: The Making and Unmaking of British India, by Lawrence James (2000).
  • Memsahibs: The Women of Victorian India, by Pat Barr (1976).
  • Footloose in the Himalayas, by Bill Aitken (2003).
  • Touching Upon the Himalaya, by Bill Aitken & Geeta Kapadia (2004).
  • Stones of Empire, by Jan Morris (1995).
  • India Unveiled, by Bob Arnett (2006).
  • Knowing Dil Das, by Joe Alter (1999).
  • The Great Hill Stations of Asia, by Barbara Crossette (1999).
  • Hill Resorts of the U.P. Himalaya, by Nutan Tyagi (1991).
  • Farewell the Winterline, by Stan Brush (2002).

References

  1. ^ http://www.whereincity.com/india/pincode/uttarakhand/dehradun.htm
  2. ^ "Man on the mountain - Times of India". articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com. Archived from the original on 24 December 2012. Retrieved 17 January 2022.
  3. ^ Jalil, Rakhshanda (14 July 2012). "Mussoorie blues". The Hindu. Retrieved 1 March 2017.
  4. ^ "History – LANDOUR CANTONMENT BOARD". landour.cantt.gov.in. Retrieved 28 October 2023.
  5. ^ a b Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Landour" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 16 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 162.
  6. ISSN 0971-8257
    . Retrieved 28 October 2023.
  7. ^ https://web.archive.org/web/20200215220604/http://imdpune.gov.in/library/public/Climatological%20Normals%20%281971-2000%29.pdf
  8. ^ "Station: Mussoorie Climatological Table 1971–2000" (PDF). Climatological Normals 1971–2000. India Meteorological Department. October 2011. pp. 533–534. Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 February 2020. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
  9. ^ "Extremes of Temperature & Rainfall for Indian Stations (Up to 2012)" (PDF). India Meteorological Department. December 2016. p. M227. Archived from the original (PDF) on 5 February 2020. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
  10. ^ "DGDE".
  11. ^ "CBLandour".
  12. ^ "Landour, Uttarakhand | Writer on the hill".
  13. ^ "Census of India 2001: Data from the 2001 Census, including cities, villages and towns (Provisional)". Census Commission of India. Archived from the original on 16 June 2004. Retrieved 1 November 2008.
  14. ^ Landour Candour The Economic Times, 9 March 2008.
  15. The Telegraph
    , Calcutta, 23 April 2005.
  16. ^ "Walk the Talk with Vishal Bhardwaj". You Tube. NDTV. Archived from the original on 21 December 2021. Retrieved 28 July 2015.