Sunday, February 7, 2010

A Beautiful Day for the Park, and a Political Rally

Taking advatange of the last weekends of cool weather, we headed over to the Indian Botanical Garden in Howrah, the district on the other side of the Hooghly river. The garden is known for being the largest and oldest of this kind in South East, nearly two centuries old.

It is also home to the largest Banyan tree, which is over 250 years old, with 2800 protuding roots covering an area of 1.5 hectares.



Sicily took her camera also and got some great shots:





And here is my photo of people taking photos of us.

On the way home, we ran into political rally traffic, people being bused in to attend a CPM demonstration at the Maidan. CPM is the Communist Party of India (Marxist) which has been in power in West Bengal since the 1970s, but has recently lost its standing.







The demonstrators not only get paid for their time but served a hot lunch from trucks parked around the periphery. This one had fresh puri with chick peas. Despite the traffic, the demonstrators were having a good time.

2 comments:

Gr'Ma said...

Thanks for the tour-a very impressive garden. Sicily is adorable and photogenic on the other side of the camera, too!

Colleen said...

Great pictures! I've heard that these political rallies are full of village side people of West Bengal taking advantage of the free ride and food to do some sightseeing in the city. I can't blame them. They also get advantages and extra facilities back home from their local political leaders for good attendance.