Memories of a Bygone Age (contd.)

Beyond the Plains .....

Fortunately for the mothers and aunts, before the pullovers are pulled off, a pink and blue bus with the words “PEPSU Road Transport Company Ltd.” trundles up. A flying horse (my sister, more educated than I, tells me it is ‘Pegasus’) is painted on both sides, and a board stating the destination is fixed in front. Though the bus has come all the way from Patiala, on its way to Chail, there are hardly any passengers on board and there is plenty of space for our group of 4 adults and 7 children. The moment Bimla Masi asks for seven and a half tickets to Kandaghat, the conductor’s face lights up. He knows where we are going, for grandfather is a well known personage of that small village. He is an advocate and, at some time or the other, almost everybody in those parts has been represented by him. Grandpa Madhok (or Papaji as everybody called him) was also a personal friend of the then Maharaja of Patiala – Yadavindra Singh – and since the bus belonged to Patiala State Government, the conductor’s response is understandable. By 11 am the bus is loaded with the passengers (of whom our group forms the majority) and baggage (again our stuff dominating the roof space) and off we go. As the bus turns left on to the main Delhi – Shimla highway, I feel my adventure is well under way.

As the bus literally moaned and groaned its way up the slope from Kalka towards Shimla (or Simla as it was then spelt), one could not help but recall the lines recorded by Sir Edward Buck in his paper presented before the Simla Natural History Society in 1855 – “Let us hasten up from Kalka, then, as quickly as we can, and pass by that noble mango tree which, spreading over the road a few miles from the foot of the hill, always seems to me like a huge boundary mark erected by nature for the purpose of noting the division between the flora of the plains and the flora of the hills.”  The huge mango tree on the outskirts of what is now Parwanoo might well be the same tree as alluded to by Buck. Interestingly, there was hardly any tree vegetation up till Dharampur, from where the road branched to the left towards Kasauli, except for a few scattered Mango, Amaltas and Semal. This I came to realise only after I joined the Forest Service in 1971 and got allocated to Himachal Pradesh. In 1956, however, the only indication one had of entering the coniferous tree zone, and thus really and truly the hills of Himachal Pradesh, was the cool, pine oil laden, breeze from Koti onwards. It is claimed that, while other trees during respiration take in carbon-dioxide and give out oxygen, the pine tree gives out enriched oxygen, or ozone. It was perhaps for this reason that TB sanitaria were set up in the hills, whether at Murree, Kasauli or Dharampur. Though I have not been able to find anything in literature to substantiate the claim, I am sure there is something to be said about the healing powers of the forests. Alexander’s soldiers are reported, after the day’s battle, to have renewed their energy by standing with their backs against trees. In any case, the recuperative powers of the tranquil surroundings, the cool air and the enforced rest afforded in the forested hills cannot be denied.

It was also at Koti, coincidentally, that the engine of the bus would get heated up. The bus drivers had it down to a T – either they knew the exact distance the buses would go before heating up, or they had conditioned their buses to heat up only at the locations where water springs were available – but the fact remained that whenever the engine heated up, and before the radiator cap blew off, the bus would stop at a natural spring. The conductor would extract an empty oil can from beneath the driver’s seat, jump off the bus, rush to the water trough and start splashing water on to the radiator, with the driver gunning the engine all this while. Now I realised why the winged horse symbol was painted on the bus. The open flaps of the engine bonnet did indeed give the impression of wings sprouting from the extended front of the bus. While all this was going on, the passengers would also alight and wash the dust and sweat of the plains off their faces and arms with the cold water emanating from the hillside. Interestingly these water troughs were also the ‘stages’ where the ponies and horses taking the sahibs and tongas from Kalka to Simla prior to 1903 paused to refresh themselves.

As a matter of fact, soon after British officers started frequenting and spending summers at Shimla from 1820 onwards, the Kalka-Shimla Cart Road via Kasauli/Subathu was laid. There were 17 stages of 4 miles each to cover the 60 odd miles (96 km) from Kalka to Shimla. Since every ‘stage’ had to have facilities for food and water, for animals as well as humans, it is fairly safe to presume that there were at least 17 ‘Baolies’ – or natural springs – fairly well distributed along the entire route. I distinctly remember at least four natural springs in and around Kandaghat – one at ‘Ded Ghraat’, another two between that place and Kandaghat Bazaar, and another at Srinagar, just opposite the SDM residence. It is reputed that water from this last was transported to Patiala on a regular basis for use by the Maharaja there. As related by someone a few days ago, 40 odd springs and ‘baolies’ existed between Kalka and Shimla about 25 years ago – today there are just 9 ! What has led to this decline is worth researching. 

.... To be continued