In a virgin beach

A clean beach. Clean in real sense. Absolutely unknown to the tourists. Only a few villagers stroll here every morning and afternoon. I saw some local  fishermen with small handmade fishing nets in the morning and some teenagers to play football or volleyball in the afternoon. One or two village girls were trying to manage their skills in bicycle there. 

Plastic bags? Beer bottles? Cold drinks can? 

No way.

Not a single.

Yes, not a single! At least I have not seen any.  

The water is so clean that even the smallest of all the sand particles can easily be visible through it.

You can neither find a clean beach, nor a lonely one. The particular beach that I am mentioning here are one of the rarest in real sense. India is having a coastline of 7515 kilometers but most of the sea beaches are dirty and overcrowded. Yes, it is true. So, finding a virgin beach in India is not so easy. 

Red crabs. Yes, red crabs are the most common of all the living creatures here in this sea beach. You will definitely be surprised to see them on the beaches. If you would like to capture a few, you will definitely fail. They are so fast and really shy. But do not worry, you will get a chance to take some photographs of the crab activity. 

Stroll around the Casurina forest. You may take rest and can have some food (only if you carry; there are no hotels or food stalls there at the beach). Please remember, do not drop the food wastes in the beaches.

It is basically a local unorganized fishing harbor. The fishing season starts around September October every year and it ends around Jun- July which is the late summer or early monsoon here. You can hardly find any fishing boats on the sea beach during the late monsoon. And I certainly find it the right season to be there. 

Have you ever seen a process of boatmaking? You can see it in the late monsoon there. Local fishermen keep busy themselves in boat making and repairing along with the skilled carpenters. It is a lovely experience to see. The boat making in the shades of Casurina could be very good subject for the photographers.

The Govt of India planed to set up a 6000 MW nuclear power plant here                                                   with technical help from Russia.                                       The project faced hard resistance in 2007-2008 till 2009 from the local villagers who believed that a nuclear power plant can harm livelihood. After the political change of power in West Bengal in 2011, the newly formed State Government passed a resolution in the State assembly against the project. The government declared to start an eco- tourism project with a fishing harbor within a few years.

What to see-

• The sea beach itself is the main attraction.
• The environment.
• The activity of the villagers around the beach.
• Crab activity. 
• The colours in and around the beach and villages. Sea weeds (see the photograph third from the top) are nice to see, particularly in the afternoon or in the morning. The gorgeously shining Green is rarely seen. 

Season- 

From July to February/ March every year. My suggestion is to avoid the summer. 
There is not much fishing activity during the monsoon here and the temperature is much cooler, so monsoon is the best time to be here. 
Road condition is bad. You have to leave your car around one kilometer of the beach. It is better to walk through the muddy narrow country road on the way to the beach. 

 

                                           Fishing activities at the beach 

Photography- 

• Morning and evening is the best time as usual. 
• Try to get some good shots of the Crabs. It will definitely get much of your time and you need to be ready to toil much.  
• Colours are extremely important. Be ready to capture all the colourful nature. 

                                                                          Fish processing unit                                                                  

Location- 
Around 200 kilometers from Kolkata. 
No place to stay here. Obviously, camping can be a very good idea. You can get help from the local villagers. 

                                                                         

 Homeland of the Bengal terracotta

Some modern decorative terracotta figures

The terracotta horses are more than six feet high

Perhaps some of you have already seen this beautiful handicrafts either in the internet or in someone's drawing room. These are one of the most popular haqndicraft items of Bengal specially the terracotta horses.  The terracotta horse is the logo of All India Handicraft and adorns all over the world as a symbol of Indian folk art. The terracotta horses and the other terracotta figures were more often used for religious purpose years ago but now it is widely used as decorative items. 

Though it is widely popular but at the same time it is becoming a dying art. The artisans who have been making this for generations are struggling to survive. There are no alternative source of income in the village. The artisans are in shortage of this particular type of clay. The clay is basically the top soil which is collected from the paddy fields and from the depth of around five feet. For collecting the clay, the artisans need to buy valuable fertile land every year. After digging up, the land thus become infertile and looses its resale value. 

In West Bengal, Manasa, the Hindu snake goddess is worshiped through a tree shrine constructed from multiple thrown and modelled parts. It is popular in the villages of Bengal. ( a lady is making the shrine in the above photo)

The condition of the artisans are clearly visible form the picture below. The old man is a master in this kind of art. Got award from the Government of India yet his financial condition is not is not up to the mark. There is not much general infrastructure in the village. 

I was there in September 2010, just at the end of the monsoon. The artisans were busy. I noticed that most of them were aged. The young artisans were rarely seen. The new generations in most of the artisan families are much interested to shift in other modern professions.  

                   

Why you should be there-

1. To know how the terracotta horse and other terracotta items of Bengal is made. To meet the traditional artist in their homeland.

2. To collect those beautiful items directly from the artisans and not from any handicraft shop.

Photography- 
1. A unique place for photography. A paradise to be precise. You can get some idea from the two black and white pictures in the blog. But you need to be prepared for low light indoor photography as you have to take photographs inside the artisans houses.

                 Agradwip and the hungry river

      Agradwip is a large locality in the Burdwan district of West Bengal. Floods and soil erosion have been a major issue in Malda, Dinajpur, Murshidabad and in some other districts of West Bengal. Thousands of people have already been effected due to soil erosion here in Agradwip. The entire socio- economical structure have been changed because of the soil erosion around the river. It has become a regular phenomena in all these areas. The erosion has reached to such an extent that thousands of acres have been totally eroded by the river. The villagers regularly flee from one place to another. The effort from the State irrigation department is mostly unfruitful still now.  The local BDO & the pradahan of the gram panchayet has visited the area several times & witnessed the effect of the  calamity. Although they have ordered for preventive measures, the villagers are still under trauma & most of them refused to return to the village. 

         

            This is life in Agradwip. People are familiar with this kind of situation here in the                      village.  

            Even the roads has been eroded ( the boy is sitting just on a piece of the eroded road).

 I was there at summer 2006 and again at the end of the monsoon in 2010. All the photos uploaded here were taken in 2010 with a very simple Nokia 5130 cell phone camera. I can still remember that it was a tough journey so far.

I crossed the river with these people just to get an experience of daily life in Agradwip. Remember country boats are the only way to cross the river. 

         

                                    A mystic afternoon at the ferry ghat Agradwip.

         It was at the end of the monsoon in Bengal in 2010. I was on my way to Agradwip. From Burdwan I took a hired car to Katwa. It was around two hours journey. A local friend was accompanying me. We had to reach Dainhat from Katwa. I arrived at the ferry ghat of Dainhat an hour later.

                                     

                                                     The eroded riverbank 

        It was basically a makeshift ferryghat near the bazar. A bamboo platform just on the bank of  the river Ganga. People were waiting there. I was hesitating a bit at the beginning. A motorized country boat came a few minutes later. It took nearly fifteen minutes to cross the Ganga. We had to jump at knee deep water from the boat...an unforgettable experience indeed. 

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Sunderban now

                                                               ...the Tigers are watching you, so the crocodiles...

This photo was taken on September 22, 2010 in Kumirmari, West Bengal, INDIA, using a Nokia 5130c-2 cell phone.

Kumirmari is a small village surrounded by creek and rivers at the Sunderban. The village was devastated in a deadly cyclone in the year 2009. People lost everything. One year after the devastation,  I was there. Little has been changed. Most of the villagers were living in tents or shanty. The land once fertile still submerged in saline water and thus become infertile. Most of the land either became salty or permanently under shallow brackish water. The devastation changed the      entire lifestyle of the villagers. After losing the land to the mother nature, the farmers become fishermen for their livelihood just within a few days.

In Sunderban, the boats are the main and the only source of connectivity. We buy car but the people of Sunderban buy boat.

It was at the end of the monsoon in Bengal. The sky was not so clear when I was taking these pictures.

It is not easy to be at Kumirmari, Lahiripur. These are basically large riverine island near the Bay of Bengal. Villages do not have electricity. Only a few villagers does have the privilege of solar electricity. 

unknown bengal

West Bengal, one of the Eastern states in India, is a state full of natural beauty. It is the only state where you can get a chance to see the snow covered mountains and the blue sea.

1. The first photo from the top- Location- Katwa. Dist- Burdwan. Camera- Nokia cell phone 5130. Colour of the water is very much significant. 

2.  Second from the top- Location- Labhpur. Dist- Birbhum. 

3. Third-  Location- Agradwip. Dist- Burdwan. Soil erosion on the bank of Ganga is a common phenomena  here in Agradwip. Several attempts to protect the villages from the erosion have been made in vain. 

4. Fourth- Location- Lalgarh. Dist- West Midnapur.