Hazarduari Palace

Coordinates: 24°11′11″N 88°16′08″E / 24.186409°N 88.268755°E / 24.186409; 88.268755

Hazarduari PalaceBengali: হাজারদুয়ারি, earlier known as the Bara Kothi, is located in the campus of Kila Nizamat in Murshidabad, in the Indian state of West Bengal. It was built in the nineteenth century by architect Duncan Macleod, under the reign of Nawab Nazim Humayun Jah of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa (1824–1838).

The foundation stone of the palace was laid on August 9, 1829, and that very day the construction work was started. William Cavendish was the then Governor-General. Now, Hazarduari Palace is the most conspicuous building in Murshidabad.

In 1985, the palace was handed over to the Archaeological Survey of India for better preservation.

Kila Nizamat

Kila Nizamat or Nizamat Kila (English: Nizamat Fort) was the site of the old fort of Murshidabad. It was located on the present site of the Hazarduari Palace, on the banks of the Bhagirathi River. The fort was demolished to build this grand palace.

Murshidabad

Murshidabad (Pron: ˈmʊəʃɪdəˌbɑ:d/bæd or ˈmɜ:ʃɪdəˌ) is a city in Murshidabad district of West Bengal state in India. The city of Murshidabad is located on the southern bank of the Bhagirathi, a tributary of the Ganges River.

Geography

The District Of Murshidabad has an area of 2143 sq. m. It is divided into two nearly equal portions by the Bhagirathi, the ancient channel of the Ganges. The tract to the west, known as the Rarh, consists of hard clay and nodular limestone. The general level is high, but interspersed with marshes and seamed by hill torrents. The Bagri or eastern half belongs to alluvial plains of eastern Bengal. There are few permanent swamps; but the whole country is low-lying, and liable to annual inundation. In the north-west are a few small detached hillocks, said to be of basaltic formation.

History

Murshidabad was a town and district of British India, in the Bengal Presidency. In the Mughal period it was the capital of Bengal. The town of Murshidabad is on the left bank of the Bhāgirathi-Hooghly or main sacred channel of the Ganges.

Nizamat Imambara

Coordinates: 24°11′18″N 88°16′07″E / 24.188374°N 88.268623°E / 24.188374; 88.268623

The Nizamat Imambara is a Shia Muslim congregation hall in Murshidabad, India. The present Nizamat Imambara was built in 1847 AD by Nawab Nazim Mansur Ali Khan,. It was built after the old Imambara built by Nawab Siraj ud-Daulah was destroyed by the fires of 1842 and 1846. This Imambara is the largest one in India and Bengal.

Construction

Old Nizamat Imambara

The old Nizamat Imambara was built by Nawab Siraj ud-Daulah in the Nizamat Fort Area. He bought bricks and mortar, and laid the foundation of the building with his own hands. However, the old Imambara was primarily made up of wood. The plot where this Imambara had been built was dug to a depth of 6 feet. It was refilled with soil which was brought from Mecca so that the poor members of the Muslim community could have an experience of Hajj.

Destruction

The old Imambara which caught fire for the first time in 1842 and was partly destroyed. But it was completely destroyed by a fire on 23 December 1846. That day the Nawabs along with the Europeans threw a party to celebrate the weaning ceremony of five-year-old Hassan Ali Mirza. The Imambara caught fire at midnight due to the fireworks left off and was completely burnt down. Nothing survived except the old Madina Mosque.

West Bengal

West Bengal (/wɛst bɛŋˈɡɔːl/; Bengali pronunciation: [pɔʃtʃimbɔŋɡɔ]) is a state in eastern India and is the nation's fourth-most populous state, with over 91 million inhabitants. Spread over 34,267 sq mi (88,750 km²), it is bordered by the countries of Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan, and the Indian states of Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar, Sikkim, and Assam. The state capital is Kolkata. Together with the neighboring nation of Bangladesh, it makes up the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal.

Ancient Bengal was the site of several major janapadas (kingdoms). It was also part of large empires such as the Maurya Empire (second century BC) and Gupta Empire (fourth century AD); and part of the regional Buddhist Pala Empire (8th to 11th century) and Sena dynasty (11th–12th century). From the 13th century onward, the region was controlled by the Bengal Sultanate, Hindu kings and Baro-Bhuyan landlords under the suzerainty of the Mughal Empire, until the British East India company took control of the region from the Mughals in the late 18th century. The company consolidated their hold on the region following the Battle of Plassey in 1757 and Battle of Buxar in 1764 and by 1793 took complete control of the region. Kolkata (or Calcutta) served for many years as the capital of British controlled territories in India. The early and prolonged exposure to British administration resulted in the expansion of Western education, culminating in development of science, institutional education, and social reforms in the region, including what became known as the Bengali renaissance. A hotbed of the Indian independence movement through the early 20th century, Bengal was divided during India's independence in 1947 along religious lines into two separate entities: West Bengal—a state of India—and East Bengal—a part of the newly created Dominion of Pakistan that later became the independent nation of Bangladesh in 1971.

Clock tower

Clock towers are a common sight in many parts of the world with some being iconic buildings. One example is the Elizabeth Tower in London commonly called 'Big Ben' (although this name strictly refers to the bell inside the tower). Clock towers are a specific type of building which houses a turret clock and has one or more clock faces on the upper exterior walls. Many clock towers are freestanding structures but they can also adjoin or be located on top of another building.

Definition

There are many structures which may have clocks or clock faces attached to them and some structures have had clocks added to an existing structure. According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat a building is defined as such if at least fifty percent of its height is made up of floor plates containing habitable floor area. Structures that do not meet this criterion, are defined as towers. A clock tower historically fits this definition of a tower and therefore can be defined as any tower specifically built with one or more (often four) clock faces and that can be either freestanding or part of a church or municipal building such as a town hall. Not all clocks on buildings therefore make the building into a clock tower.