The good life of the Raj in a Calcutta hotel and club

In the heart of the city, just off Park Street, as it used to be called, in a nondescript building you wouldn’t otherwise notice, nestles a delightful, Raj-inspired boutique hotel called The Glenburn. Once you get past the unsightly surroundings and the shabby entrance, you enter a world from a forgotten past on the seventh and eighth floors. Its nine rooms have grand four-poster beds, parquet floors and chandeliers, carved wooden sofas and varnished console tables, chintz cushions and brass-framed antique floral prints. The enormous bathrooms contain old-fashioned enamel tubs you can sink into and stretch to your full length.

There’s a morning room where I breakfasted, reading a three-day old copy of The London Times. It felt more relevant than a contemporary edition of an Indian newspaper! The Times’ Court Circular carried details of the King’s programme — he was in Balmoral, perhaps shooting grouse — and when I looked up, I found the Victoria Memorial staring back at me. Curzon couldn’t have asked for a finer view as he sipped his morning coffee!

The view from the other side was of the Calcutta Maidan. Last Sunday, it looked verdant and inviting. In the far distance, I could spot men on horseback, merrily galloping on a cool monsoon morning. Watching them, it seemed, were ladies carrying parasols and little children and their pet dogs playing on the lush green. Would they be coming to The Glenburn for tiffin afterwards? Surely, pink gins would be the most appropriate way of concluding this excursion?

I had been invited to talk to members of the Bengal Club. It’s a world apart from the Punjabi dhabas that Delhi’s clubs have been reduced to. Here, the British connection is fondly cherished, painstakingly maintained, and thoroughly enjoyed.

The audience comprised elegant ladies in chiffon sarees and pearl necklaces and men in well-pressed trousers and sober shirts. There wasn’t a kurta-pyjama to be seen. Nor a bhadralok dhoti. No doubt, they knew Bengali, but I could only hear English. Spoken as it would be in Knightsbridge!

We dined under the stern gaze of a life-size oil painting of General Outram. He was a former president of the Club now, no doubt, keeping a sharp eye on the new membership. He certainly would have approved of the menu.

It was a four-course meal with two wines, and the silver cutlery was resplendently laid on both sides of the shining white china plates. We had carrot and celery soup, rock lobsters, roast mutton with cranberry jelly and mint sauce, rounded off with delicate brandy snaps. The evening ended with liqueurs served frappe in crystal glasses with sleek stems. It reminded me of Curzon’s vaunted boast: “I dine at Blenheim once a week!”

Blighty has changed, but there is a bit of Calcutta that remains defiantly the same. No doubt, the tragedy at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, the mass protests, and the uncertain future of the chief minister were discussed, debated, and, this being Bengal, argued over but they seemed to belong to a different world. The one outside these hallowed precincts.

So, if you’re the sort who prefers to start Sundays with a bowl of steaming porridge, followed by scrambled eggs and bacon, and you’re wondering what Amrit Kaal is likely to do to you, I recommend The Glenburn and the Bengal Club. There, you can be confident that time will always stand still.

Karan Thapar is the author of Devil’s Advocate: The Untold Story.The views expressed are personal

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