Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden

Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden
Established	1787
Location	Shibpur, Howrah West Bengal, India

The Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden (previously known as Indian Botanic Garden) is situated in Shibpur, Howrah near Kolkata spread over 109 hectares.

History

Kyd monument.

In a letter dated 1st June, 1786, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Kyd proposed the establishment of a 'Botanical Garden' which would prove economically beneficial to the inhabitants of Calcutta and to British commerce. In this letter he proposed cultivating Cinnamon, Dacca cotton, Indigo, Tobacco, Coffee, Sandalwood, Pepper, Tea. The Court of Directors was sufficiently impressed by Kyd's economic arguments and enthusiastic support was given to it by Joseph Banks, the founding father of the Royal Botanic Garden, and Kew President of the Royal Society (1778-1820). A site adjacent to Kyd's own private garden at Shalimar, across the river Hoogly was selected for the purpose. Preparatory works for the Garden started in April 1787. In May,1787 of that year Robert Kyd was made its Superintendent. The official name of the Garden during the Company's rule was The Hon'ble Company's Botanic Garden, Calcutta

Many of the early schemes of Kyd such as the introduction of trees yielding nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, pepper vines, etc failed because the climate was quite unsuited to these equatorial spices. Equatorial fruits were also tried but met the same fate as did temperate fruits of Europe. Nevertheless, Kyd went on to introduce a large number of plants into the Garden, and transferred seeds and plants to other botanical establishments of the Company. From Roxburgh's Hortus Bengalensis, Colonel Robert Kyd introduced some 300 species of plants into the Garden.

Roxburgh monument.

Kyd's successor, William Roxburgh was undoubtedly the most accomplished botanist to have served the Company. He took charge of the Garden on 29 November 1793. In the same year Christopher Smith was appointed to the post of Gardener. Roxburgh began to collect plants systematically from India, South East Asia, and the Far East, and set up a herbarium. Cinnamon cultivation received his special attention. Smith went to Malacca for Nutmeg and Clove plants. Roxburgh started experiments with the cultivation of various fibrous plants, including hemp and flax. Roxburgh introduced the Mahogany tree into the Garden from West Indian seeds sent by the Court of Directors in 1794-95. Similarly, teak was first planted in the Calcutta Botanic Garden, and plantations were later established at several other places in the Bengal Presidency. Teak plantations, however, were not successful in Bengal. Roxburgh's experiments with fibrous plants were more successful, as he was able to produce a number of Indian substitutes for hemp as well as flax.

Francis Buchanan (afterwards Buchanan Hamilton), the successor of Roxburgh, held office only for a short spell of time (November 1814 to February 1815). Buchanan Hamilton is chiefly remembered for two surveys he conducted, the first of Mysore in 1800 and the second of Bengal in 1807-14. In 1804, he was in charge of the newly founded 'Institution for Promoting the Natural History of India at Barrackpore. Buchanan's collections of plant materials enriched the Herbarium of the Garden considerably.

After Buchanan's departure in 1815, Nathaniel Wallich, a Danish surgeon became the officiating Superintendent of the Garden. He occupied the post till 1846. As Superintendent of the Calcutta Botanic Garden, Wallich made periodic expeditions to India's northern and eastern frontiers, and visited the neighbouring kingdoms. In fact, Wallich collected abundant plants during 1817-1828 through his own efforts as well as from contributions made by botanists and collectors throughout the country. Wallich finally retired to Europe in April 1846.

Before his successor Hugh Falconer arrived in 1848, the Garden was temporarily in charge of John McClelland, a geologist with botanical interests and editor of the Calcutta Journal of Natural History (1841-47). McClelland started the Garden School to produce qualified malees (gardeners). In February 1848 Hugh Falconer, a paleontologist and botanist, joined the Garden as its Superintendent and the Calcutta Medical College as Professor of Botany. His contribution of plants specimens to the Garden collected in Tenasserim enriched its Herbarium. In 1854 he produced an account of the state of the Teak plantations in the Bengal Presidency, started by Roxburgh. He retired from the Garden in 1855.

Thomas Thomson took charge of the Garden on 17th April 1855. In 1856 he produced a 'Report on the Hon'ble Company's Botanic Garden', and the 'Notes on the Herbarium of the Calcutta Botanic Garden, with especial reference to the completion of the Flora Indica' where he reviewed the progress of the Garden and gave concrete suggestions for improvement of its scientific status. During his tenure the Indian collections made by JD Hooker and Thomson himself in 1841-51 (known in Europe as the great Indian Herbarium) were transferred to the Calcutta Botanic Garden to enrich its Herbarium. His successor, Thomas Anderson appointed Wilhelm Sulpiz Kruz, a German, as the Curator of the Herbarium in February 1864. The Library of the Garden was enriched by the purchase of Thomson's personal library. Since the early 1860s the epithet 'Royal' was attached to the name of the Garden. The restorative works suffered serious setbacks because of two successive cyclones of extraordinary violence in October 1864 and in November 1867 which destroyed 1761 trees of the Garden. Anderson was appointed the Conservator of Forests in Bengal. He and his successors were also given the additional charge of Superintendent of Cinchona Plantations in Bengal.

George King was appointed the Superintendent in 1871. With the restoration in 1872 of the ground formerly occupied by the Agri-Horticultural Society of India, the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta, expanded to just over 270 acres. The whole area of the Garden was treated for landscape effects. New roads and footpaths were made. Building for the Herbarium and a number of Conservatories made of iron structure covered by a thin thatch of glass for delicate living plants were erected. A fireproof Herbarium was built to house a rapidly growing collection of specimens (some half a million by 1890). Nursery buildings were put up and comfortable houses were made for the Garden staff. In 1878, 40 acres of land were acquired at Darjeeling to form a botanic garden (The Lloyd Botanic Garden) as a distant annexe of the Calcutta Garden. In 1887, King started the publication of Annals of the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta, a series of profusely illustrated botanical monographs. Since 1891 onwards the name 'Superintendent' was dropped and King and his successors were declared as 'Director'. King also became the Director of the Botanical Survey of India in 1887. Indian Botanical Garden became the headquarters of the Survey and was given regional responsibility for Bengal, Assam, North East, Burma, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

David Prain, Curator of the Calcutta herbarium and famous for his Bengal Plants (1903), succeeded King in 1897. Prain became Director of the Kew Gardens in 1905. Andrew Thomas Gage, a travelling botanist and Curator since 1897 succeeded him in 1905 and held the post till 1923. His successor, Charles Cumming Calder, Professor of Botany at the University of Calcutta, was the last European to become its Director.

He was succeeded in 1937 by the well-known Bengali botanist, Kalipada Biswas, who was the first Indian Director of the Garden as well as the Botanical Survey of India. In the following year, the 150th anniversary of the Garden was held. It was renamed as the Indian Botanic Garden in 1950. It came under the management of the Botanical Survey of India on January 1, 1963. The Indian Botanical Gardens, Howrah was designated the Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Botanical Garden on June 25, 2009 in honor of Jagadish Chandra Bose.

Botanic Collections

Over 12,000 trees and shrubs belonging to 1400 species together with thousands of herbaceous plants are in cultivation in the open in 25 Divisions, Glass houses, Green Houses and conservatories. The garden maintains the germplasm collection of Bamboos, Bougainvillea, Citrus, Jasmine, Pandanus, Water Lilies and has the richest collection of Palms (about 109 species) in whole of South East Asia. In addition succulents, Hibiscus, Ficus, Aromatic plants, Gymno- sperms (in two Pinetums), Creepers, Ferns and a number of floricultural and arboricultural plants are grown in its Flower Garden, National Orchidarium, Student Garden. Besides a large number of medicinal plants in its Medicinal Plant Garden named as ‘Charak Udyan’ enrich the garden.

A few interesting plants of the garden worth to mention are Branched Palm, Bread Fruit Tree, Double Coconut, Giant Water Lilies, Krishnabot , Mad tree, Shivalinga tree, etc. In addition researches are also conducted on plant introduction, multiplication, horticultural aspects and conservation.

Joseph Dalton Hooker says of this Botanical Garden that "Amongst its greatest triumphs may be considered the introduction of the tea-plant from China ... the establishment of the tea-trade in the Himalaya and Assam is almost entirely the work of the superintendents of the gardens of Calcutta and Seharunpore (Saharanpur)."

The large palm house of this garden has several interesting plants including the Double Coconut [Lodoicea maldivica (Gmel.) Pers] which produces the largest known seeds in the whole plant kingdom. They are also famous for their enormous collections of orchids, bamboos, palms, and plants of the screw pine genus (Pandanus).

The Great Banyan Tree

The Great Banyan Tree

The Great Banyan Tree of the Indian Botanic Garden attracts millions of visitors every year and it is the widest tree in the world, in terms of the area of the canopy. A 330m road was built around its circumference, but the tree continues to spread beyond it. Botanically known as Ficus benghalensis, and belonging to the family Moraceae, the tree is a native of India. The fruit is like a small fig but is not edible and is red when ripe. The Great Banyan tree is over 250 years old and in spread it is the largest known in India, perhaps in Asia. There is no clear history of the tree, but it is mentioned in some travel books of the nineteenth century. It was damaged by two great cyclones in 1884 and 1886, when some of its main branches were broken and exposed to the attack of a hard fungus. With its large number of aerial roots, The Great Banyan looks more like a forest than an individual tree. Interestingly enough, the tree now lives in perfect vigour without its main trunk, which decayed and had to be removed in 1925. The circumference of the original trunk was 1.7 metre and from the ground was 15.7 metre. The area occupied by the tree is about 14478.44 square metres. The present crown of the tree has a circumference of 1.08 kilometres and the highest branch rises to 24.5 metre it has at present 2880 aerial roots reaching down to the ground.

Central National Herbarium

Central National Herbarium, the largest herbarium in South East Asia, is situated within the garden at Shibpur in West Bengal. The Central National Herbarium, popularly known as CNH, one of the oldest and largest herbaria in the world, was established in 1795 by Dr. William Roxburgh, the first regular Superintendent of the East India Company’s Garden at Shibpur. Dr. N. Wallich, the successor of William Roxburgh developed this herbarium to a great extent. The herbarium and the associated Library were moved to a fire and moisture proof double-storied building, built adjacent to Roxburgh’s house in 1883 by Sir George King, the founder Director of Botanical Survey of India. In 1971, a new L-shaped, four storied centrally air conditioned building was constructed to accommodate the ever-increasing herbarium specimens. Apart from the collections within the Indian sub-continent, the herbarium houses a large number of collections from different parts of the globe, which were received from different herbaria as a gift or on exchange basis. Presently the Central National Herbarium possesses about 2.5 million of herbarium sheets belonging to nearly 350 families of plants, which are arranged according to Bentham and Hooker’s system of classification. The area under the jurisdiction of Central National Herbarium is confined to the states of West Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand. CNH has a separate Paleontology and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) units. The Central National Herbarium is the nerve center of plant taxonomic research and related activities in India, which caters to the needs of revisionary workers as well as monographers in India and abroad.

Image Gallery

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  Botanical Garden Pathway

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  Great Banyan Tree

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  Water Lilies

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  Victoria amazonica or Giant Water Lily