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Siliguri

City in West Bengal, India

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  • 11 chapters
Siliguri in birds eye
Sourik8 · CC BY-SA 4.0

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Through Himalayas, Urban area and Bengal

Siliguri has great strategic importance in West Bengal, with convenient access to three international borders: Nepal, Bangladesh and Bhutan. It also connects the North-East with mainland India. Located in the foothills of Eastern Himalayas, Siliguri is a significant trading and transportation hub.

History

Etymology

According to Sailen Debnath, "Siliguri" means a stack of pebbles or stones. Until the 19th century this region was called as "Shilchaguri" when there was dense Dolka forest covering the region.

Sir William Wilson Hunter in his work A Statistical Account of Bengal, mentioned the name of this place as "Sannyasikata".

Modern history

Siliguri was a small agricultural village in the Kingdom of Sikkim. It was captured by the Kingdom of Nepal in 1788, after which Kirati and Lepchas came to settle in this region.

At that time a river port on Mahananda, South of Siliguri in Phansidewa had an important role in having trade bond with Malda, Bengal and Bihar. This riverine trade line was thus used by the Bhutanese and Sikkimese to bring goods into their mainland.

Siliguri started as a small area in the northern part of city, on the front of Mahananda River, which is now Dagapur. The Treaty of Sugauli in 1816, signed between Britain-Nepal, changed the prospects of Siliguri, and it became a point of transit for the Darjeeling hills and Nepal mainland. From 1816 onwards, Siliguri started growing rapidly as a small city due to its strategic location in trade routes. In 1865, the British captured Darjeeling and the entire Dooars region to build tea plantations and export the produce to England. To scale up exportation they introduced the Siliguri Town railway station which stands to this day, and introduced the Toy train from the station to Darjeeling in 1880. This helped Siliguri gain sub-divisional town status in 1907.

The Siliguri Corridor was formed when Bengal was divided into West Bengal and East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) in 1947, with Sikkim later merging with India in 1975. At this point many immigrants came to settle here for better infrastructure, which led to an increased population. Later in 1950 Siliguri achieved municipal status. Keeping in mind the importance of Siliguri, in 1951, the Assam rail link was established with newly made (1949) Meter gauge Siliguri Junction railway station. After few years in 1961 all these stations were connected with broad gauge New Jalpaiguri Junction railway station which later became the most important railway station in Northeast India.

Due to tremendous growth, Siliguri is now far away from its past outlook, becoming the largest and fastest growing city in eastern India after Guwahati. The growth rate of Siliguri was 57.8% during 1971- 1981. Considering this growth, Siliguri came under the Integrated Urban Development Project program in 1981. Siliguri population growth rate rose to 46.8% of 1981–1991. A treaty between India and China for trade through Nathu La Pass, has expedited development and prospects of Siliguri as an international transportation and logistics hub. Later in 1994 Siliguri built a Municipal corporation which has been responsible for the civic infrastructure and administration of the city of Siliguri. Siliguri has now achieved the status of becoming the third-largest city in West Bengal, after Kolkata and Asansol.

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