Fascinating History of RBI Building

Anindita Mazumder

If you walk down the Dalhousie Square, past its beautiful Georgian, Victorian or even Edwardian styled edifices, suddenly the Art Deco architecture of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) sticks out like a sore thumb between its more illustrious neighbours– the imposing, crimson-hued Writers’ Buildings or the majestic white structure of General Post Office.

True, it is not as hideous as the Telephone Bhawan, nonetheless, it stands out as a typical, modern upstart among the beautiful Raj-era buildings with Ionian or Corinthian pillars that dot Dalhousie Square. Actually, the building of RBI came up at the site of the old Custom House. It is among the row of buildings which include General Post Office, Calcutta Collectorate and the headquarters of Eastern Railway that came up on the site of the old Fort William, its Black Hole and the ramparts of the fort. We retrace our steps to those days when the English got permission from Ibrahim Khan, Nawab of Bengal, to fortify as a concession for providing assistance against Sobha Singh, a powerful rebel landlord of Burdwan. However, when Siraj-ud-Daulah attacked Calcutta in 1756 neither the British nor their fort could withstand the fire unleashed by Nawab’s forces.

The Battle of Plassey in 1757 helped the British regain Calcutta and their fort but Robert Clive, Governor of Fort William felt the need for a stronger fort at a strategically better located site. The chosen site for the new Fort William was at Gobindapore. The construction of the new Fort was completed in 1773.

But commissioned in 1696 and captured in 1756, the old Fort William remained not a symbol of war readiness but a depot for peaceful pursuits of commerce. Some of its rooms were used as a chapel, before St. John’s Church was built in 1787. And then it was decided that the premises of the old Fort would be used as Custom House. The river flowed much closer and its waters lapped on the western walls of the fort. The plot housing the current Custom House was still under water; so was Strand Road.

Incidentally, the first Land and Sea Custom Master’s office was located at Holwell’s house near the old ditch, close to the old Fort. JZ Holwell was the white zemindar of Calcutta and one of the survivors of Black Hole tragedy.

Holwell sold his property to the Company for Rs 9,500 for its use as Custom House. The godowns and warehouses adjacent were also being used for storage of goods brought through riverine route. But it was soon found that Holwell’s house was not suitable for the functioning of the Custom House since it was an old construction. During the monsoon, incessant rains caused seepage and leakage at many points. The building was, therefore, sold off for Rs 8,051 in 1760. It was decided that the apartments occupied by the Fort Major in the old Fort would be used by the Custom House Master. By the beginning of 1767 the army was withdrawn from the place and various warehouses and other buildings were erected to adapt it to its new uses. The second Custom House thus began functioning from the site of the old Fort.

HE Cotton wrote: “The foundation stone of the New Custom House was laid on Friday, February 19, 1819 with imposing masonic ceremonies, and all Calcutta congratulated itself upon the vast improvement thus effected in the appearance of the city.” In 1891, all buildings between GPO and Custom House were pulled down to make way for government houses, signalling the wiping out of the last vestiges of old Fort. The residents of the White town were relieved because it served as a constant reminder of ignominious defeat of 1756.

AK Raha writing on Calcutta Customs described the Custom House as a wide, two-storied building erected on the site of old Fort between Calcutta Collectorate and Eastern India Railway House in Clive Street with its postal address at No.1, Charnock Place, situated on the western side of Dalhousie Square, then known as Tanks Square. The iron gate of the Custom House faced Clive Street and East India Railway Company was situated to its northern side. The Collector of Customs was occupying the first floor, together with his assistants and clerks, while the ground floor was occupied by warehouses for storing various commodities including opium and weighing rooms etc. The Marine Store Yard, the Dry Docks and the Bankshall were all located at the site on which the present Bankshall Court is situated, together with other office buildings on the Bankshall Street. The ‘Bankshall’ is a Dutch word which means “a place for collecting Customs duty”.

The present General Post Office was erected in 1856 on the partial ruins of old Fort William. In 1899, the Custom House was renovated and re-established in the same place where it was earlier erected in 1819. For additional construction, land was acquired at the price of Rs 1200 per cottah during 1890-91. A laboratory was also constructed. In his “Calcutta’s Edifice: Buildings of a Great City” Brian Paul Bach observed: “It must have been a fascinating warren, for its ‘outhouses’ extended the whole length from Dalhousie Square to Strand Road in a narrow rectangle.” These constructions were demolished around the time of the Second World War after which the present building was erected.

The foundation stone of the new Custom House (the present Custom House), situated at 15/1, Strand Road, Calcutta, facing river Hooghly, was laid on February 10, 1940. The construction was completed sometime in 1942 when the Second World War was in full swing. Hence, the occupation of the new Custom House was without much ceremony.

On the other hand, the office of the Reserve Bank was located on the other side of Dalhousie Square, at Council House Street. It was a delightful Edwardian building, previously occupied by the Alliance Bank of Simla which had gone bust. With Independence, the Reserve Bank’s importance increased multi-fold as it functioned as the country’s central bank over seeing currency, money supply, interest rates and commercial banking system and required its own building at the heart of city. Mackintosh Burn Limited was entrusted with the construction.

“The great tarnished doors were products of Mackintosh Burn’s venerable foundry, which one must have been so impressive. A high priority was set to design and cast suitably Independent doors to replace the symbolic financial gates of the Raj, which were closed to the populace in general during that era,” wrote Bach. The interior is quite austere, especially the third floor. Built in the Art Deco style prevalentin the inter war period it does reflect the exuberance and technological advancement associated with the modern age but the skyline of BBD Bag dotted with Victorian, Edwardian edifices perhaps could have done without it.

FAST FACTS
RBI Building
Location: On Netaji Subhas Road, near GPO
Car park: Difficult in vicinity