Sitting with coffee with a friend in Jamshedpur I spied a book on Mcluskiegunj, the Only Anglo-Indian village in India, authored by Vikas Kumar Jha. Mcluskiegunj is located not more then 200 km from Jamshedpur and barely 66km from Ranchi
A trip to Ranchi was due for my friend Ronny D’costa and Ronny it seems has a friend in Mcluskiegunj well we decided to lengthen the trip to Ranchi add a night in Mcluskiegunj.
We set off at 0630 hours on our trip, this is the season that Flame of Forest flowers and I was hoping we could see some amazing landscape, winter is receding and his might be my last trip for a while as summer sets in,
The roads to Ranchi are amazingly good
Soon we were on the ghat( hilly terrain) section where the roads continue to be great and we keep making good time
and soon we were in Ranchi, and reaching early helped as there was barely any traffic along the way inside Ranchi city
We wereat the venue and the clock read 0830.
We were the first ones at the venue (as is normal am such a early bird as is Ronny)
And Rotary District conference on diversity Equity and Inclusion the guest speaker was from Mumbai, Retired High court Judge anyway I digress
We attended the talk and were out by 1300 hours, as we went out there was a revelation waiting for us.
The parking lot was full of cars of attendees, most of the vehicles is white or silver, and is it because of the mature audience or cause it is summer? Food for thought I say.
AS we headed out of the city we had to cut across town, and it was going to be 15 km in the city itself, thankfully it was relatively straight road and not much of traffic.
As we headed out Google map being our guide predicted we would be in Macluskiehgunj by 1430 hours, and if we stopped for lunch, which we would maybe by 1500 hours, we would be in the ONLY ANGLO-INDIAN village of India.
Time was 1330 hours and we were looking for food along the way but it did not come easy. We made 2 stops but the hotels did not have food, they had run out of food, and hotels were few on this stretch.
Finally we came across a Dhaba 16 km short of Mcluskiegunj, and we were relieved that it was open and willing to serve us. Yes there was a cow peeking out of the Restaurant but it was not eating there, just giving milk for tea.
We ordered Roti and Dal, (cant really go wrong with this I say, and we were not disappointed, the gentleman who runs the hotel was a interesting person and very quick to get us our food, he shared his Phone number with us, in case we wanted food on our way back we could call him in advance and order food, thus his service would be faster. A very enterprising kind of guy dare I say.
The road was state highway and soon the road tuned into picturesque narrow road with Flame of Forest and Shimul trees on both sides of the road and made for a very pretty picture.
We were soon in Mcluskiegunj and at our homestay,” aMYRA Homestay” which was right on the main road run by Group Capt. (retd) RK Prased. A former air force pilot and a very charming person, the homestay is run by his wife and him, and is a labor of love and a home away from home,
If interested you can contact him on: 9973990214
His 3 Dogs are a charming group and very loving playmates and gave us a very warm welcome as we arrived.
Ronny and Raj Kishore too had lots to catch up on and we stood outside chatting for a while before we took a small tour of his property and then without wasting time we headed out to see the town of MacluskiGUnj
.
Starting with the furthest point we went off to Meet Mr. Deepak Rana, a long time resident of this place.
Pict
He too runs a home stay but is more a palace then a Home stay, a pleasure to meet him, and look around his property and have a cup of coffee with him
Daylight was fading and we wanted to catch a view of any Anglo Indian house as many as we could, We hurried along and came across a house which stood abandoned.
And then we went to Meet Kitty; Her mother’s father ( Grandfather) was Personal Assistant to British Governor of Assam. Sir William Reed, and she herself was quiet a catch in her hay days am told.
She herself has married a man from the Adivasi Community and is a example of AngloIndian- Adivasi community fraternization.
We had a wonderful meet and greet of a few Anglo-Indians who are here and know the history of this village, before we had dinner, at " Getaway Ecovillage cafe"
a Chinese restaurant, great food and then we retired early we were quiet tired and had done quiet a bit today.
Tomorrow
we will start back by 1100 or so we thought.
to be continued ...
© Rajat Ghosh, available as stock image/footage
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