Darjeeling Tour, India (Part-1)

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This article is about the municipality in West Bengal, India. For its namesake district, see Darjeeling district. For the tea named after the region, see Darjeeling tea. For other uses, see Darjeeling (disambiguation). Darjeeling is a town and a municipality in the Indian state of West Bengal. It is located in the Mahabharat Range or Lesser Himalaya at an elevation of 6,700 ft (2,042.2 m). It is noted for its tea industry and the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Darjeeling is the headquarters of Darjeeling district which has a partially autonomous status within the state of West Bengal. The development of the town dates back to the mid-19th century, when the colonial British administration set up a sanatorium and a military depot. Subsequently, extensive tea plantations were established in the region, and tea growers developed hybrids of black tea and created new fermentation techniques. The resultant distinctive Darjeeling tea is internationally recognised and ranks among the most popular of the black teas.[3] The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway connects the town with the plains and has one of the few steam locomotives still in service in India. Darjeeling has several British-style public schools, which attract pupils from India and neighbouring countries. The varied culture of the town reflects its diverse demographic milieu consisting of Gorkhas, Bhutia, Lepcha and other mainland Indian ethno-linguistic groups. Darjeeling, with its neighbouring town of Kalimpong, was a centre of the Gorkhaland movement (Separate State demand within India) in the 1980s. The town's fragile ecology has been threatened by a rising demand for environmental resources, stemming from growing tourist traffic and poorly planned urbanisation. Contents 1 Toponymy 2 History 3 Geography 3.1 Climate 4 Flora and fauna 5 Civic administration 6 Utilities 7 Economy 8 Transport 9 Demographics 10 Culture 11 Education 12 Notes 13 References 14 Further reading 15 External links Toponymy The name Darjeeling comes from the Tibetan word dorje, meaning the thunderbolt sceptre of the Hindu deity Indra, and ling, a place or land.[4] History Main article: History of Darjeeling Bringing in the Darjeeling tea harvest, circa 1890. The 13th Dalai Lama and the King of Sikkim in Darjeeling The history of Darjeeling is intertwined with that of Sikkim, Nepal, British India and Bhutan. Until the early 19th century, the hilly area around Darjeeling was controlled by the kingdom of Sikkim, while the plains around Siliguri were intermittently occupied by the Kingdom of Nepal,[5] with settlement consisting of a few villages of Lepcha and Kirati people.[6] The Chogyal of Sikkim had been engaged in unsuccessful warfare against the Gorkhas of Nepal. From 1780, the Gorkhas made several attempts to capture the entire region of Darjeeling. By the beginning of 19th century, they had overrun Sikkim as far eastward as the Teesta River and had conquered and annexed the Terai. In the meantime, the British were engaged in preventing the Gorkhas from overrunning the whole of the northern frontier. The Anglo-Gorkha war broke out in 1814, which resulted in the defeat of the Gorkhas and subsequently led to the signing of the Sugauli Treaty in 1815. According to the treaty, Nepal had to cede all those territories which the Gorkhas had annexed from the Chogyal of Sikkim to the British East India Company (i.e. the area between Mechi River and Teesta River). Later in 1817, through the Treaty of Titalia, the British East India Company reinstated the Chogyal of Sikkim, restored all the tracts of land between the River Mechi and the River Teesta to the Chogyal of Sikkim and guaranteed his sovereignty.[7] Deed of Grant (1835) written in Lepcha followed by its translation in Hindustani In 1828, a delegation of the British East India Company (BEIC) officials on its way to the Nepal-Sikkim border stayed in Darjeeling and decided that the region was a suitable site for a sanatorium for British soldiers.[8][9] The company negotiated a lease of the area west of the Mahananda River from the Chogyal of Sikkim in 1835.[10] In 1849, the BEIC director Arthur Campbell and the explorer and botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker were imprisoned in the region by the Sikkim Chogyal. The BEIC sent a force to free them.