Urban development around an ancient settlement, case application: Chandraketugarh, West Bengal, India

Abstract

Ganga – Sindhu – Bhahmaputra, these three rivers along with their innumerous tributaries and branches of this sub-continent have given us a series of civilizations for 5000 years and with time they got destroyed, decayed due to change in course of river, natural calamities and other mishaps. Some got rebuilt, some got discovered and few remained unknown. But when some get discovered yet unnoticed, unheard even after having a historical lineage of more than 1000 years, it’s a tragedy. One such urban heritage is Chandraketugarh. It is just an hour drive from the ‘city of joy’, with a decorated past, still unheard of. Though its an ASI site for more than 5 decades, still neither the excavation work nor the area got developed as it should be. It can be a bigger tourist destination if the urban development takes place. Being a responsible habitat of this region and an urban designer, I challenged myself to design a solution to make people aware of this heritage as well as developing it as a tourist destination.