Kolkata is a proud multi-cultural city, a fulcrum of the Indian intellectual tradition. Its personalities have included Subhash Chandra Bose, a freedom fighter, Rabindranath Tagore, a Nobel Prize-winning poet, and Swami Vivekananda, a Hindu spiritual leader. For legacy reasons, the National Library of India is housed here, not in New Delhi. It is also home to the Calcutta Madrassah, the oldest educational institution in the city.
The Calcutta Madrassah is a proud building, sensibly designed. It opened in 1824 off Haji Mahammad Mohsin Square, some 50 years after the founding of the original Islamic college. On approach through the compact urban turmoil surrounding it, the building looks like some sort of Alexandrine temple complex. Overpowering Doric columns flanking the main entrance direct you inward, where two floors of classrooms surround a courtyard. At the far end of this attempt at a grassy space, there is a lone water hand-pump. Despite its somewhat topsy-turvy condition, the Calcutta Madrassah is a haven of peace in the tightly-knit urban landscape.
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Calcutta Madrassah: Portfolio Management in a Post-Crisis World
by Douglas Clark Johnson
16 October 2009
The Calcutta Madrassah is a proud building, sensibly designed. It opened in 1824 off Haji Mahammad Mohsin Square, some 50 years after the founding of the original Islamic college. On approach through the compact urban turmoil surrounding it, the building looks like some sort of Alexandrine temple complex. Overpowering Doric columns flanking the main entrance direct you inward, where two floors of classrooms surround a courtyard. At the far end of this attempt at a grassy space, there is a lone water hand-pump. Despite its somewhat topsy-turvy condition, the Calcutta Madrassah is a haven of peace in the tightly-knit urban landscape.
…continue reading
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