Chandigarh

As it had been described by a client as the Milton Keynes of India, my expectations of Chandigarh were not great. The second test had been moved from Mumbai to initially Chennai and finally to Mohali which is effectively a suburb of the capital Chandigarh. So after arriving on Tuesday, I have full week to spend including the 5 (?) days of the test match.

So today was the usual city tour – beforehand it had not received a great billing and it was to cover the three main attractions of the city – the rose garden, rock garden and lake.

I must admit to never having spent any time in Milton Keynes. I have got many trains through it, have changed trains there and have probably driven through the outskirts on a few occassions. Its reputation is mixed, those that live there enjoy it, those from outside who spend time there or like me who barely know it, generally regard it as souless. But it is an example of urban planning, you start with a fairly blank sheet of paper and design a town to accommodate the needs (everchanging) of a new population.

So the same is true of Chandigarh, it was created after the partition of India/Pakistan as the capital of the Punjab state, which had been divided between India and Pakistan. A number of archtiects were used but the most famous is Le Corbusier, who included wide boulevards, parks running down the whole of the town (the lungs of the town) and plenty of open space. Design of new buildings need to provide mix of living and green space, this will never be high density, and is controlled.

So this meant the traffic was less chaotic, and also it seemed generally less crowdy than the India we had seen todate. The highlight of the tour is the rock garden.

Built over many years it is effectively a rubbish tip – ie the most environmentally friendly garden in the world made up of rubbish collected and displayed in highly thoughtful manner. It is difficult todescribe but was featured in Monty Don's best 80 gardens in the world and rightly so