Branching off the main Delhi-Chandigarh-Shimla highway on National Highway 22, which some still call by its earlier name of Hindustan-Tibet Road, are three quaint hill stations—Kasauli, Dagshai and Subathu—all military cantonments, which you cannot miss if you are a travel enthusiast.
The charm of long leisurely walks, chirping of all varieties of colorful birds, smell of wild and exotic flowers, the fresh coat of green on leaves when it rains, the smell of fresh wood, a monkey watching your steps from a distance, a bird barely noticing your movements, a watchful and fierce looking crow shouting at the top of its voice…You have all this and much more here at the three hill stations. You can actually hear silence in all its manifestations without even closing your eyes and sitting in meditation.
The feel of silence and the sound of silence envelopes you, provided you know the right secluded place to feel it in all these three hill stations, originally conceptualized and developed by the British and now administered by Cantonment boards. locals point out that British families still come to these hill stations in Himachal Pradesh to look for the place of work of their ancestors and also to pay homage to those whose mortal remains lie buried in the country which was a colony of the British Empire for over a century and half.
Kasauli may have a limited accommodation for tourists but undoubtedly it is the most popular of these and the footfall here is only increasing over the months and years. If you have not booked in advance, forget of getting any accommodation in the weekends as hordes of people from Punjab, Haryana and Delhi descend here on all sorts of transport. I once even saw a group of Sikh tourists on a tractor trolley from Punjab who had come prepared with gas cylinders, folding chairs and mattresses. Obviously, they cooked their food in the open, sat on the chairs and spread the mattresses for rest, oblivious of what the regular visitors thought of them. It’s the only place of the three where you can find a place to stay but demolitions of illegal hotel structures recently has further reduced the number of rooms in and around Kasauli. Being a frequent visitor, I qualify to give a simple advice to those who love solitude and want to be left alone—do not come here in the weekends. Take leave from your work and prefer working days from Mondays to Fridays to enjoy the salubrious weather and everything else which the place offers.
A Major District Road branches off just after the Dharampur Police Station on National Highway and 12 kilometers of uphill driving takes you to the scenic Kasauli via the busy and crowded streets of Garkhal. Set up by the British as soon as they strengthened themselves in the early decades of 1800, the buildings here were built on the style with which the colonial masters were familiar with back home in Britain. You can still see these buildings and bungalows all around the small town, giving it that old world charm which is so endearing.
The Christ Church, built in grey, is a fine example of the Gothic architecture which the British brought to India and used extensively in the construction of Churches. This Church, billed as the oldest in Himachal Pradesh, also acted as the clock tower for the town and its clock was repaired recently after lying in disuse for several years. Entire history of the town comes alive the moment you enter the Church complex, sit on the benches in the prayer hall or the ones placed outside in the open areas of the complex. While sitting in the complex, I recalled scenes from a movie, Madras Café of John Abraham in which the opening and closing shots of the film were shot here. The actor, who played an Intelligence Officer, confesses to a priest about his failure to prevent an assassination in this Church.
Introspect, pray, think; let your mind and imagination run wild in the Church complex or any other place of solitude you have discovered by now. Then when free from this wonderful exercise of self discovery, take a walk on the Mall Road to explore the little market which Kasauli offers. You will find a photo studio at the beginning of the Mall which has Black and White pictures of all film stars who visited the hill station and also those famous personalities who studied in the public schools around the town. Khushwant Singh’s photo, finds a place of pride here as the writer-journalist spent summer months in Kasauli writing his books and his son Rahul Singh brought the Khushwant Singh literature festival to this hill station in his memory. I wondered about the fate of the photo studio as no one now steps inside except perhaps the locals for a passport size photo with the ever increasing Megapixels of Mobile phones fulfilling all the photography requirements of tourists.
If you are hungry, go for the hot and spicy Bun-Samosa combination washed down by a steaming cup of tea, barely 25 meters from the photo studio. The middle aged gentleman also sells hot spicy pakoras if you care for one and are not diet conscious. Be careful here as a horde of monkeys could be watching you and the moment they get an opportunity, they will snatch whatever you are eating. The monkeys target the children in particular if they eat in the open and snatch away their chocolates, pop corn or whatever eatable they find in their hands. There are several other eating joints too which offer anything from Momos to Indian-Chinese cuisine besides the staple diet of Punjabis—Tandoori chicken and tikka. Some Tibetans too have set up their shop here selling woolens as well as their signature dishes.
If you want a drink, purchase a bottle from the shop on Mall Road but do not drink it in the open as there are several boards warning of heavy monetary fines if caught drinking openly. The counter Manager will roll your bottle in an old newspaper and you can keep it in your bag for the evening when you pour a drink for yourself sitting in a balcony and looking at the flickering lights of vehicles on the serpentine roads or watch the stars and moon on a clear night.
Take a leisurely walk all across the small town in an hour or two. The Heritage Market is on a slightly lower elevation on the same road and goes down to the Post Office and then a Viewing Gallery from where you can see the valleys and plains of Punjab below if the weather gods oblige. Now, take a rest at one of the pavements, lie down if you wish, look straight into the clear skies and marvel at nature and the wonderful weather.
There are several private bungalows here which the rich and famous owned at one point of time during the British era. They still exist and are in use by the elite who are either retired or semi retired. Ross Common, the British era bungalow, has now been converted into a hotel by the Himachal Pradesh government but what strikes you is the fact that it does not resemble a commercial hotel. For all practical purposes, it looks like a grand bungalow, has a decent campus of its own, lounge chairs of iron and the rooms have the old heating system in which wood was burnt for warmth once upon a time. Staying here, gives you the feeling that you are putting up in a big colonial house and not a hotel. The restaurant, which also serves some Himachali delicacies if ordered in advance, too is in a small room with hardly a few tables, resembling a dining hall in a privately owned bungalow, rather than a commercial eating place.
For me, morning walk in Kasuali is perhaps the single most important reason why I keep frequenting the place whatever the season. Stunning silence and a little fog welcomes you as you move towards the sunset point, towards the Manki point or take a walk through the army settlement and the police station to the old Parwanoo Road—the choice is yours. You can also take a lot of other walkways, depending on your stamina…but what is common to all of them is the sheer magic woven in the woods, proliferation of small bamboo trees all around, flowers blooming in the wild and magnificent views of the valley and even Chandigarh on a clear day from one side of the cliff. Just sit on a bench erected by the Kasauli Cantonment Board and keep sitting there for hours after the morning walk. Your day is made as at several locations all you could hear was your heartbeat or the wind caressing the leaves and the trees and the birds trying to distract you with their antics.
Sunrise and also the sunset are always mesmerizing, a magical experience whatever the place. It’s life in a nutshell; for me symbolizing birth and death and everything in between. In a slow motion, the sun comes out from behind the mountains in the morning displaying a unique colour which keeps changing as the sun becomes bigger and bigger, giving you the view of a life time. The pale yellow light of the receding sun too is an experience to cherish as the provider of light and energy takes a break and rests for the next 12 hours.
While returning back from the morning walk and it was almost noon now, I found a person who was enjoying the solitude in his own way. The middle aged person had spread a towel and was lying down, looking at the trees and the hillocks and singing an old Bengali song, a tribute to the monsoon. His wife and two kids watched him. “This is life,” he told me as I stopped and watched him. I nodded in agreement and joined the chorus for a while.
I have not been able to find a mechanism to enter the famous Kasauli Club, again founded by the British in the 1880s. I am still trying to crack the code to a find a spot for myself in the evenings, which might happen soon. But having walked across the club, you can well imagine its history, the romance associated with it, how it has seen great moments and how the British colonial venture was discussed over drinks and ballet long time back.
Subathu, training centre of Gurkha regiment, known for their tales of bravery, is again a left turn from the NH 22 and is on an opposite hillock from Kasauli but at a much lower elevation. The drive from the crowded Dharampur to Subathu passes through scenic villages and valleys below and at several places I saw yellow mustard plants, creating an optical illusion of sorts, forcing me to see it from close what exactly was this beautiful spread of yellow. A couple of villages, like most in Himachal Pradesh, have a small board naming the village, size of its population and also its elevation from sea level. The neat and clean cantonment town has numerous photographs of the war heroes—winners of the highest gallantry award of Paramvir Chakra and Mahavir Chakra, donning the Cantonment with a brief description about their bravery which led to the awards.
You can find the Gurkhas undergoing training here with a big board saying “Veer Yodha Dwar” (Brave Warrior Gate) where the 14 Gorkha Training Centre is located. Take a walk, move around, merge yourself with the surroundings, park yourself on one of the benches placed by the Subathu Cantonment Board and you will enjoy the surroundings without fail. There is a park, a Palace fort, war museum, a temple—places from where you can enquire and learn about its history—how the British occupied Subathu from the Gurkha generals of Nepal who ruled the place in the early 1800s and how the brave Gurkhas became an essential part of the then British and now the Indian army.
The third Cantonment town or the “weekend wonder” of Dagshai is not far off. In fact all the three hill stations practically face each other and form a trinity, perched as they are on top of hills and cliffs in specially chosen locations amid thick trees. Perched on top of a sunny hill on the highway to Shimla just after you cross Dharampur, there is a detour on the right to Dagshai. A signage of the Cantonment Board welcomes you to Dagshai, set up by the East India Company of the British, to escape the intense summer hills of the plains, 30 kms away.
In fact, so conscious were the British about the weather that they set up three Cantonments nearby — Kasauli, Subathu and of course Dagshai in close proximity. Then, a little ahead is Shimla, the summer Capital of the British, which also has a significantly large military setting. Whenever I visit these areas, I wonder what the strategic importance of these Cantonments was in those days which prompted the British to set them up in the first place. The reason has to be only one — salubrious climate which reminded the British of their homes and the weather in England.
Of course, for travelers like me, Cantonment Boards like Dagshai, Subathu and Kasauli still are islands of cleanliness, devoid of commercialization which still preserves the old world charm. You can still find the romance and glory of a bygone era in these three Cantonments in close proximity. It looks as if some areas have been preserved for posterity and will look the same 200 years from now.
Back to Dagshai, what attracts a traveler like me is silence. When I was in Class I or II, the teachers used to shout “pin drop silence” whenever the naughty boys in the all boys school were at play in the classroom during the interregnum between two periods. I never understood the meaning of pin drop silence in school, despite the teachers berating us and forcing us to do so. But here, in Dagshai, just choose any place off the bitumen road, sit there and all you would hear is “pin drop silence”. Even if you drop a pin, you could hear it falling here, literally. Of course, chirping of birds, the melody of flowing breeze, dancing leaves on the numerous trees as the gentle wind caresses them…these cannot be considered sound. This is nature’s magic.
There are no hotels to stay here. Dagshai is not meant for commercial exploitation. But even for a routine tourist, the place has several sightseeing options. The most prominent is a British era Jail — a formidable structure, this is popularly called the Cellular Jail of north India with 54 high security cells. Maintained by the Engineering Wing of the Indian Army, you can see how tough a jail life was in the British era for the Indian freedom fighters.
Irish soldiers, who served in the British Army and revolted in 1920 as part of a freedom movement back home in Ireland, were kept here during their trial. The mutineers were shot dead in a Capital punishment and buried in a cemetery in Dagshai. One of the Irish heroes James Daly, who was buried here for 50 years after taking part in the mutiny and then being shot as a punishment, got a new resting place in his home country of Ireland in the 1970s. His mortal remains were taken to Ireland with military honours and he is still a celebrated hero back home.
Indian freedom fighters were also kept in the jail which has a wooden floor. This meant that even the slightest of sound was captured by the sentry who could raise an alarm. Four Indian freedom fighters of the famous Komagatamaru ship, all ex-servicemen, who were refused entry in Canada in 1914 had to return back where 20 of them were arrested on arrival and sent to the Dagshai jail. Four of them were hanged. The plaque in this jail lists the entire sequence of events.
When I reached this jail and a small museum on a Sunday, it was closed for the afternoon. But the immaculately dressed friendly army sentry promptly opened the doors, saying that very few visitors come here. He placed the visitor’s book for my comments. I simply wrote, “Had never seen a jail in my life before. I hope the world becomes crime free and jails become a thing of the past in the next century”. I could not even spend half an hour here and to imagine that freedom fighters spent years and were even awarded Capital punishment, was indeed a nightmarish experience.
The museum in the jail compound houses old photographs which recreates the history of the place and some memorabilia from the British period. The architecture of both the jail and the museum are typical British in green color which not only jell with the woody surroundings but also the entire material used has been procured locally.
Over to the cemetery, not used now but well known for several spooky stories built around it. The spooky stories started when the Irish soldiers were executed and buried here, triggering local rumours about their ghosts moving around. There are also local stories of unrequited love and untimely deaths which gave birth to a different genre of ghost stories. Old timers swear that they used to hear unfamiliar sounds.
During my brief visits to the cemetery twice in the recent past, all I could hear on the road above the cemetery was extreme silence—Nothing else. This was the final resting place for several army British officers and soldiers, forcing me to think how they could not even go to their birthplace for their final rest. Born in United Kingdom, died in India…that is what it should have been written on the epitaph. As the cemetery was neglected for years, stones and the written words are missing in most of them. I took a walk and only found squirrels surprise me with their deft and swift movement, colorful birds finding a perfect mating place, a hairy street dog watching me carefully from a distance. There was no ghost to encounter.
There are boarding schools here, one for the army and at the other a public school and as part of learning nature, treks by school students in uniform are common, including in the cemetery area. I envied these kids. What a wonderful place to be in a boarding school—amid hills, nature, birds and clear blue sky devoid of smog and fog in the winters and intense heat and humidity of the summers.
The St Patrick’s Church, now hardly used, came up with the small Cantonment town itself and is a typical colonial architecture, now attracting curious visitors, keen to know their history and heritage. Thick pine and oak trees ass to the charm of the place as you decide to take a walk all around the place and stare at the architectural marvel of a bygone era.
After spending the day roaming around all over the quite Cantonment cum hill station, sipping tea at a couple of tea stalls, munching some snacks and also closing your eyes for a quick nap on one of the numerous benches and shades, overlooking wonderful valleys, drive down to Kumarhatti on the other side of the hillock where Dagshai is located. The stiff down hill drive will take you to the crowded market and all of a sudden you will realise how important is solitude to a human life. How important it is to spend time in nature's company...How important it is to realise the value of silence and nothingness which envelops you in these marvels of nature.
