Grand Trunk Road
| Grand Trunk Road | |
|---|---|
| Route information | |
| Length | 2,500 km[1] (1,600 mi) |
| Existed | Antiquity–present |
| Major junctions | |
| East end | Chittagong, Bangladesh |
| West end | Kabul, Afghanistan |
The Grand Trunk Road is one of Asia's oldest and longest major roads.[2] For more than two millennia, it has linked South Asia with Central Asia. It runs from Chittagong, Bangladesh[3][4] west to Howrah, West Bengal in India, then across Northern India through Delhi, passing from Amritsar to Lahore in Pakistan, further up to Kabul in Afghanistan.[5]
The route spanning the Grand Trunk (GT) road existed during the reign of Chandragupta Maurya, extending from the mouth of the Ganges to the north-western frontier of the Empire.[6] The predecessor of the modern road was rebuilt by Sher Shah Suri, who renovated and extended the ancient Mauryan route in the 16th century.[7] The road was considerably upgraded in the British period between 1833 and 1860.[8]
History
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Research indicates that during the time of the Maurya Empire in the 3rd century BC, overland trade between India and several parts of western Asia and the Hellenistic world went through the cities of the north-west, primarily Takshashila (Taxila in present-day Pakistan, see inset in map). Takshashila was well connected by roads with other parts of the Maurya empire. The Mauryas had built a highway from Takshashila to Pataliputra (present-day Patna in India). Chandragupta Maurya had a whole army of officials overseeing the maintenance of this road as told by the Greek diplomat Megasthenes who spent fifteen years at the Mauryan court. Constructed in eight stages, this road is said to have connected the cities of Purushapura, Takshashila, Hastinapura, Kanyakubja, Prayag, Pataliputra and Tamralipta, which had essentially been around 2600 kilometers as per current estimates.[6]
Author Rudyard Kipling described the road as "such a river of life as nowhere else exists in the entire world' He writes: "Look! Look again! and chumars, bankers and tinkers, barbers and bunnias, pilgrims -and potters - all the world going and coming. It is to me as a river from which I am withdrawn like a log after a flood. And truly the Grand Trunk Road is a wonderful spectacle. It runs straight, bearing without crowding India's traffic for fifteen hundred miles - such a river of life as nowhere else exists in the world."'".[9]
Mughals extended Grand Trunk Road westwards. At one time, it extended to Kabul in Afghanistan, crossing the Khyber Pass. The road was later improved by the British rulers of colonial India. It was extended to run from Calcutta to Peshawar (present-day Pakistan). Over the centuries, the road acted as one of the major trade routes in the region and facilitated both travel and postal communication. Since the era of Sher Shah, the road was dotted with caravansarais at regular intervals, and trees were planted on both sides of the road to give shade to the travellers and merchants. Sher Shah made many roads for tax free trade. The Grand Trunk Road is still used for transportation in present-day India and Pakistan.
Gallery
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Jalalabad–Kabul Road, Afghanistan, it is considered the western-most, and most dangerous, stretch of the GT Road -
GT Road above the River Jhelum in Pakistan. -
G.T. Road in Lahore -
G T Road passing by the westernmost point of Margalla Range, Islamabad
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See also
Ancient roads
- Kos Minar - medieval milestones standing in what are now India and Pakistan
- Via Maris - modern name of main ancient international route between Egypt and Mesopotamia, called sometimes "International Trunk Road"
Modern roads in Asia
- AH1, or Asian Highway 1 - the longest route of the Asian Highway Network, running from Japan to Turkey
- Asian Highway Network (AH) aka the Great Asian Highway - project to improve the highway systems in Asia
- Afghanistan
- Highway 1 (Afghanistan) - 2,200 km road network circulating inside Afghanistan
- India
- Golden Quadrilateral - highway network connecting major centres of northern, western, southern and eastern India
- Indian Expressways - the highest class of roads in the Indian road network
- National Highway (India) - network of government-managed highways
- National Highway 1 (India) - a National Highway in North India
- National Highways Authority of India
- National Highways Development Project, a project to upgrade, rehabilitate and widen major highways in India, implemented in 1998
- Pakistan
- Motorways of Pakistan - network of major government-managed highways
- National Highways of Pakistan, all public highways maintained by the government
Literature
- Farooque, Abdul Khair Muhammad (1977), Roads and Communications in Mughal India. Delhi: Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli.
- Weller, Anthony (1997), Days and Nights on the Grand Trunk Road: Calcutta to Khyber. Marlowe & Company.
- Kipling, Rudyard (1901), Kim. Considered one of Kipling's finest works, it is set mostly along the Grand Trunk Road. Free e-texts are available, for instance here.
Notes
- ^ Bergsma, Harold (2011). India: Essays and Insights by a Gora. Lulu. p. 137. ISBN 8183320619. Retrieved 19 July 2016.
- ^ Bhandari, Shirin (2016-01-05). "Dinner on the Grand Trunk Road". Roads & Kingdoms. Retrieved 2016-07-19.
- ^ Steel, Tim (1 January 2015). "A road to empires". Dhaka Tribune. Retrieved 2016-07-19.
- ^ Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey (15 September 2015). "Cuisine along G T Road". Calcutta: Times of India. Retrieved 2016-07-19.
- ^ Khanna, Parag. "How to Redraw the World Map". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2016-07-19.
- ^ a b K. M. Sarkar (1927). The Grand Trunk Road in the Punjab: 1849-1886. Atlantic Publishers & Distri. pp. 2–. GGKEY:GQWKH1K79D6.
- ^ Chaudhry, Amrita (27 May 2012). "Cracks on a historical highway". The Indian Express. Archived from the original on 22 May 2013.
{{cite news}}: Unknown parameter|deadurl=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help)quote: What Chandragupta had begun, his grandson Ashoka perfected. Trees were planted, ... Serais built. p.2 - ^ David Arnold (historian); Science, technology, and medicine in colonial India (New Cambr hist India v.III.5) Cambridge University Press, 2000, 234 pages p.106
- ^ A description of the road by Kipling, found both in his letters and in the novel "Kim". He writes: "Look! Brahmins and chumars, bankers and tinkers, barbers and bunnias, pilgrims -and potters - all the world going and coming. It is to me as a river from which I am withdrawn like a log after a flood. And truly the Grand Trunk Road is a wonderful spectacle. It runs straight, bearing without crowding India's traffic for fifteen hundred miles - such a river of life as nowhere else exists in the world."
- Usha Masson Luther; Moonis Raza (1990). Historical routes of north west Indian Subcontinent, Lahore to Delhi, 1550s-1850s A.D. Sagar Publications.
Further reading
- Arden, Harvey (May 1990). "Along the Grand Trunk Road". National Geographic. 177 (5): 118–138.
- Mozammel, Md Muktadir Arif (2012). "Grand Trunk Road". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. (eds.). Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
- Tayler, Jeffrey (November 1999). "India's Grand Trunk Road". The Atlantic Monthly. 284 (5): 42–48.
External links
- Roads in India
- Roads in Pakistan
- Roads in Punjab, Pakistan
- Roads in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
- Roads in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas
- Roads in Bangladesh
- Maurya Empire
- Sur Empire
- Trade routes
- History of transport in India
- Roads in West Bengal
- Ancient roads and tracks
- History of transport in Pakistan
- Roads in Afghanistan