In the previous week we had an educational visit to Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum in Byculla. Here, we had to observe the infrastructure and architecture of the museum and study in detail about the island of Mumbai and it’s history.
As we all know Mumbai is formed of 7 tiny islands and these are connected using bridges and roadways. We also know that Mumbai was earlier Bombay and was the first city of India – ‘Primus Urbis Indus’. Throughout the class we spoke about what we learnt from the visit – the history of Bombay, it’s aspects, how it was named, its development and the landscape layout of it.
The 7 islands that form Bombay – Colaba, Little Colaba, Queen’s Necklace, Mazgaon, Worli, Parel, Mahim had embankments made so as to increase transportation. Parts of Bombay are also reclamations – like bandra. The occupations in these areas was not much and houses were very tightly packed, this means there was no ventilation and hence an outbreak of tuberculosis occurred. Although better town planning was needed, one good thing back then was that schools and hospitals were located within the residential areas which means access to these was very easy. These days that is one major problem.
In the second half of the class we discussed the aspects in detail – the people, architecture, town planning, population, food, films,economy, business, politics, weather,sports, currency,etc. From this discussion the most eye opening part was where we tried to figure out which mints the coins we use daily are made in. This can be recognised by looking under the year printed on the coin – a dot symbolises that it has been made in delhi and a diamond symbolises it has been minted in Bombay.
We ended the class by discussing how much Bombay has developed and what it might look like in the future.
DISHA KALYANI 