Mumbai before 1947 - A Heritage walk |#mumbai | #7StoriesofIndia |#azadikaamritmahotsav | #Bha2Pa
Today, we are going to learn about, a few things that took place in Mumbai, during the struggle for independence. We are going on a walk for the next 2, 2.5 hours. We are going on a walk named Castle to Gateway, and know the importance of these places, and Mumbai's contribution to the struggle for independence. Hello! I am Somesh and you are watching Bha2Pa.
Today we will visit places in Mumbai that have importance, in the battle for independence. Bharat sir from Khaki Tours is going to take us on that walk. We are at Asiatic Library right now. What is its importance? Mumbai's roots are burrowed in this area, i.e. Horniman Circle, Asiatic Library, etc.
Earlier it was called Bombay Green. Just like in Pune, there is Kasba Peth; in London, there is the Tower of London. These are the main lands. It all started from these places. The oldest landmark in South Bombay is right behind this building.
It called Bombay Castle. It's not a fort, it's just a gate. But it is 100 years older than the Taj Mahal.
We can't go there as it's the Naval Dockyard. So we start our walk from here. The colonial Mumbai starts from here. Firstly, the British East India Company ruled over India. In 1857, we fought for our independence for the first time. They call it a betrayal but we call it a fight.
After that fight, Queen Victoria took over. So first we were serving the company, then we started doing the Queen. The proclamation of the Queen's ruling took place right here. People listened to that proclamation standing on the ground in front of this Town Hall.
It's Mumbai's Town Hall originally. The urn of Mahatma Gandhi was kept here after his death. People have been here just to see that urn.
Mahatma Gandhi is the father of India, and Mohammad Jinnah the Father of Pakistan has also had a contribution here. It was decided that there will be a statue in the memory of the local Governor of Mumbai. Jinnah and his followers blew off the whole meeting regarding this statue right here.
The Jinnah Hall in Girgaon, where you stay, is built in memory of this event. To remember his contribution to the fight for independence. The fathers of both nations have been here. The area right in front of us is Horniman Circle. The first garden that was built 150+ years ago. When you look at the centre of this gate, you can see the Queen's crown.
Those who can't speak English call it Hanuman Circle, whose name is Horniman Circle. You might feel why they named it horny but it was the name of that person. You can read the importance here. Dedicated to the memory of Benjamin Guy Horniman. Who lived and worked for the freedom of press in India.
He gave us the Mantra- Liberty. This is what Mahatma Gandhi said. Mahatma Gandhi appreciates the person after whom this garden is named. He was the only Britisher who wrote against the British in newspapers. His office is right around the corner.
If you see the original board the name 'Mumbai Samachar' is written in Gujarati. Marathi board was added later. And in English, it's written Bombay Samachar.
Firoj Shah Mehta started the English of Mumbai Samachar. He is known as the Lion of Bombay. Benjamin Guy Horniman was editor of that paper.
Bombay Chronicle is mentioned here even today. Bombay Samachar was the only English newspaper that raised questions, against the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in which a lot of innocent people died in the year 1919. Not a single English newspaper wrote about it. Bombay Chronicle was the only paper that wrote about it. As a result of his writing, Horniman was sent back to England. After independence, we named places in the memory of those two people who helped us.
Annie Beasant Road in Worli, and Horniman Circle in CSMT. People blindly believe that if he is British, he is definitely against India. What is the full form of DN? Dadabhai Naoroji And MG? Mahatma Gandhi. Full marks. Both of you deserve a Five Star. On the left side...
It's the Ready Money building, which looks like Puneri Wadas and their balconies. Isn't the name 'Ready Money' interesting? They had a lot of money. Whenever government needed the money Ready Money used to give it. It was a Parsi family. They were the founders of Jahangir Art Gallery along with Ready Money. They were the government's ATM back then.
When you travel by local, which station do you get down at? Churchgate. Where is the Church there? Have you seen a Church there? In Amitabh Bachchan's song, 'Churchgate hai par Church hai lapata'' There is the Lapata (missing) Church. Where is the gate? Gate was right here where you are standing right now. It's called Flora Fountain or Hutatma Circle because it has the Martyrs Memorial.
From here, the DN road starts and goes to CSMT station. And you can see the statue of Dadabhai Naoroji. First Asian member of the British Parliament. He was born in Mumbai.
Here you can see he is sitting in the Britain Parliament. A crow has done his potty on the Britain Parliament. Dadabhai Naoroji started school for girls. And the two communities with the most progressive mindset are being represented. You can see Parsi and Marathi ladies.
Did the British have a guarantee that they won't leave us for at least the next 50 to 60 years, as they have built such significant buildings and spent a lot on them? We will get back to this, when we talk about how a Marathi man challenged them in their own buildings. The grounds we see today were the Esplanades. They were to protect the fort from Marathas. Later when the fort was demolished people built buildings, on a lot of Esplanades and the rest were turned into grounds.
Cooperage, Oval, Cross and Azad grounds have significance in the independence movement. Cricket is like a religion in India. Cricket was first played on Oval ground in India.
The freedom fighters were all educated. Mahatma Gandhi, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, were lawyers. Amongst the 3 sedation trials of Lokmanya Tilak, the 2nd one was most important as they were sent to Mandale.
The trial took place in the biggest courtroom in the upper pyramid area of that building. In that trial, Tilak said, 'If you punish me now, more people will be inspired, and India will soon be independent'. That's exactly what happened.
Who was his lawyer for that trial? A lawyer offered to fight for him during the second trial. Tilak denied it and fought his own case. In the 3rd sedation trial the same lawyer saved him. His name was Mohammad Ali Jinnah We all think that history is all about black and white. Like he asked for Pakistan so he is a bad person. But we should concider the facts that he was a follower of Gopal Krishna Gokhale.
This is the place where a lot of freedom fighters had their trials. I'll advice you visit the museum inside. It's closed on Sunday. LLB students or people who have an interest in Law must visit inside.
It's a court of Session, in Mumbai but earlier, it was the Ministry of Mumbai. The whole province of Mumbai was administered from here. PT. Nehru hoisted the flag in Delhi. A Marathi man hoisted the Indian flag in Mumbai for the first time at this place. BG Kher, the former Chief Minister of the Mumbai state, hoisted that flag. And then hoisted it on the High Court.
A lot of people gathered on the Oval ground to watch, how the Union Jack was taken down and the Tricolour was hoisted. Let's go ahead. Towards Kala Ghoda area. Shilpa, what do you think of this walk? I am having a great time, it's amazing. Now I can flaunt all the information I have learnt today.
Now I can answer any questions you ask me during the Dandigul video on Vishay Khol. Thank you for the taunts. We are in the Kala Ghoda area, where you can see a building that is about to fall right behind me. This was the top hotel in Mumbai named Watson.
Back then Jamshedji Tata wasn't allowed in this hotel. So he built Taj hotel. Only Europeans and no Indians were allowed in Watson. These and a lot of other things happened here. But an important thing happened here in 1896. The first film in Asian content was shown in this hotel by the Lumiere Brother from Paris.
The famous song back then, was 'Dur hato a duniya valo Hindustan humara hai'. When the sensor board objected, we told them that the song is against Japan and Germany, as they are attacking India and not for you. But people do get the right message.
The Indian films in Mumbai have played a significant role in the fight for independence. Ant it started here. Indian films helped us gain independence back then, but now it is spoiling the generation. Our generation isn't spoilt. He is talking rubbish. Okay. We are not spoilt.
Then tell me what is that song, 'Zandu balm'? What are you doing to the film industry of Maharashtra. Along with that we have given some outstanding songs like 'Vata Vata Vata', etc. So we are not spoilt. There are 2 important places here. One is Panjab Grill.
There was a café named 'Way Side In'. It's like a trend to sit in a café and work. We used to go there, eat and leave. You guys need to show off.
Way before it became a trend a person sat in a café, And tied together an important book. That book is the Constitution of India. Was written by Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar in that restaurant. There is no board. He loved the tea here so he used to sit there. Instead of sitting in any government office he sat in here.
Britishers had a policy back then to teach Indians in English. Indians will be good as clerks if they learn English. They didn't realise that the education they brought here, taught us about French Revolution and other happenings all over the world. That was the reason we thought we should also be independent.
Jagannath Shankar Sheth started Elphinstone Institution. Now it is known as Elphinstone College Jamshedji Tata, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Firoz Shah Mehta and many other personalities studied here. Bhau Mahajan started the first nationalist newspaper named Prabhakar. The first Secret Society was started by the students of Elphinstone in 1940. In the book, Makers of Modern India by Ramchandra Guha, 50% of people are Marathi, and 80 to 85% amongst them are from Mumbai. The foundation of Modern India is in Mumbai.
It was all possible due to Elphinstone College. If think that Britisher gave this to us, it's wrong. Makers of Modern India is a great book. The writer said that Maharashtra is the Crucible of Modern India.
It's not Bengal. You must have visited Regal Cinemas ample of times. Woodhouse road, i.e. Nathalal Parekh Road, has a sculpture at its end in the next circle.
It's called Naval Uprising Memorial. That is the rebellion of the Sailors. We learn about the Satyagrahas, but we don't know about the rebellion by Indian Navy against Britishers. One year before India got Independence. The Britishers realised that they would have to leave India soon. The rebellion preponed our independence.
Did the sailors live there? No, it is their memorial. It's the actual memorial. What size of glass does everyone want? Small. - Medium. Tell me in ml. - 400 ml. Cheers.
This is the budget of Bha2Pa. Shilpa, bring us some brands. The walk we did, is named Castle to Gateway.
We started from where the Britishers entered India. And we will end it at a place from where the Britishers left India. This place is known as Apollo Bandar.
Does anyone know what Apollo is? It's their God, right? It is a Marathi word. This was actually named Palwa Bandar after the Palwa fish. Britishers turned Palwa into Apollo. We forgot the Marathi word and started calling it Apollo Bandar. Palwa Bandar is the original name of this port.
Right behind us is the statue of Shivaji Maharaj riding his horse. Earlier there was a statue of the former king of Britain George V. It was taken down in the 1950 decade. Later, Maharashtra was formed on 1st May 1960. On the next republic day, this statue of Shivaji Maharaj was placed here.
Right in front of this statue is the Gateway of India. Erected to commemorate the landing in India of their imperial majesties, King George V, and Queen Marry. This gate wasn't built when King George and Queen Marry came here. This is built in their memory. This isn't even 100 years old. People look at it and feel like it is 100 years old.
It's built by Gammon India. Oh! In comparison to the Taj Hotel people think the Gateway is older. But actually, Taj Hotel was built way before the Gateway.
After 2 years, Gateway will be 100 years old. This is a ceremonial entrance of India. As Mumbai has a good railway network and a port, many personalities will come here. The Governors and all the important personalities came here. Hence this Gateway was built. Somerset Light Infantry Unit left India in 1948 after independence from here, and was the last to go.
Guys was this walk? Amazing. Actually, I had a question for you Somesh. - Yes. You are taking us to Taj Hotel after this walk right? We are going to see the exteriors of the Taj Hotel. I am saying you should show us the interior as well. Bha2Pa's budget is not that high.
So increase your budget. Guys, subscribe to our channel and help us reach 1 million. So we can take a walk in the interior of the Taj Hotel. We can make Shilpa happy.
Also Shilpa you need to bring some brands for us. Guys, she is the one that brings brands for us. Okay, we will talk later.
When Mahatma GAndhi's Satyagraha in South Africa was a success, he was called back to India by Gopal Krishna Gokhale. And he came back. A request was made when he returned back in 1915, for his boat to be docked here.
It would be docked at Ballard Pier otherwise. They kept a special reception for him. He gave speeches in different areas of Mumbai. He gave his preech at Imperial Cinema, bungalow of Sir Mangal Das, Heera Baug City Tank, and many other places. Till that time, Lokmanya Tilak grew old.
Then after his death, in 1920, the command of the fight for independence went into Gandhi's hands. Then in the memory of Mahatma Gandhi, this board was put up, after 100 years from when he came back to India. During the Congress sessions people used to leave after the speech of Lokmanya Tilak. And come back again for Jinnah's speech. These sessions used to take place the whole day.
When Mahatma Gandhi gave his first speech here, no one was present to listen to it. When he started talking people started gathering. It was like a filmy speech. For congress. An interesting fact is that my grandfather was one of the listeners of that speech. Oh! He was a congressman.
Oh! How? He was actually my mom's grandfather. Okay. He was the congressman present in all those sessions. Was he there for the sessions? Wow! Guys, this wasn't staged at all. I hope guys enjoyed this walk.
We are going this 7 days 7 videos on account of 75th anniversary of Indian independence. How do you feel about 75 years of independent India. We learnt the history of many fights for independences that were ruled by Britishers, and comparing to those nations we are doing pretty good. It's a proud moment being an Indian. The process of India's independence is a lot more inspiring when you read about it.
A lot of people say that Britishers ruling us was a good thing, as they gave us trains and all but it's not the case. It's not the case you'll know that if you saw this video. Despite staying in Mumbai we don't know a lot of things about it.
We learnt about Mumbai's contribution to Indian independence. Where is Yash? - Over there. Yash ran away.
Tell us what you feel. Tell us. After what we heard today we have progressed a lot. We understood many things which we didn't know through this walk. Apart from what we learnt in school, we understood a lot of different things through this walk.
We need to get freedom from improper knowledge. We don't know about a lot of things that happened. I guess you will learn about these things from our video. And everyone will be free from their improper knowledge. We will really value them for what they did.
Sir, what should one do if they want to come on tours like this? You have to visit our website Khakitours.com, where we have more than 60 walks just in Mumbai. I don't think any walking tour company has these many walks in one city. You all should definitely join us. They have a special ghost walk as well which we might join. Yes! It is from 11 p.m. to 1 p.m., and you all have to come.
We could listen to the untold or undiscovered stories through this walk. Comment your favourite story from this tour. And if you want us to cover more such stories along with the interior of the Taj Hotel, then please subscribe our channel. Keep watching Bha2Pa.
2022-08-13 22:49
