Jamshedpur Knowledge Guide

History

At the end of the 19th century, Jamsetji Tata met steelmakers in Pittsburgh to get the most advanced technology for his plant. It is said that he got the idea of building a steel plant when he heard Thomas Carlyle declaring that "the nation which gains control of iron soon acquires the control of gold" in a lecture in Manchester. At the turn of the twentieth century, Jamshetji Tata asked geologist Charles Page Perin to help him find the site to build India's first steel plant. The search for a site rich in iron, coal, limestone and water began in April 1904 in today's Madhya Pradesh. Then Maharaja of Mayurbhanj appointed in his court renowned geologist Shri Pramatha Nath Bose, who had been instrumental in setting up of the steel plant at Sakchi. Bose, on the request of the Maharaja of Mayurbhanj, surveyed the Gorumahisani hills of Babanghati region of then Mayurbhanja state, and found Hematite deposit there. P. N. Bose insisted Jamsetji Tata choose Sakchi for his dream plant. The prospectors C. M. Weld, Dorabji Tata and Shapurji Saklatvala took nearly three years in a painstaking search across vast stretches of inhospitable terrain to find a location. One day they came across a village called Sakchi, on the densely forested stretches of the Chota Nagpur plateau, near the confluence of the Subarnarekha and Kharkai rivers. It seemed to be the ideal choice and the place was selected.In 1908 the construction of the plant as well as the city officially began. The first steel ingot was rolled on 16 February 1912. It was a momentous day in the history of industrial India.Jamsetji's plan for the city was clear. He envisioned far more than a mere row of workers' hutments. He insisted upon building all the comforts and conveniences a city could provide. As a result, many areas in the city are well planned and there are public leisure places such as the Jubilee Park. While building the city, Jamsetji Tata had said, "Be sure to lay wide streets planted with shady trees, every other of a quick-growing variety. Be sure that there is plenty of space for lawns and gardens; reserve large areas for football, hockey and parks; earmark areas for Hindu temples, Muslim mosques and Christian churches." Messrs Julin Kennedy Sahlin from Pittsburgh prepared the first layout of the town of Jamshedpur. What the city looks like today is a testament to their visionary plans. Jamshedpur is the only million plus city in India without a municipal corporation. Legend has it that in the late 1980s when the state government proposed a law to end the Tatas' administration of Jamshedpur and bring the city under a municipality, the local populace rose in protest and defeated the government's proposal. In 2005, a similar proposal was once again put up by lobbying politicians. The target audience was the working class. A large majority sided with the government and set up protest meetings outside the East-Singhbhum Deputy Commissioner's office. However, the objective was never achieved and Jamshedpur remains without a municipality.

Transportation

Railways

Tatanagar Junction is a railway junction and an A-1 category model station on the Chakradharpur division, of the South Eastern Railway. Other railway stations in the city are Adityapur, Gamharia, Kandra, Govindpur etc.

Roadways

Jamshedpur is connected to other parts of India through national and state highways. The major highways are: National Highway 33 (NH-33) touches the city and connects it to Mumbai and further joins the NH32, which connects with Kolkata, Delhi NH-2, NH-33 and NH-6 connects it to Kharagpur, Kolkata. National Highway 32 (NH-32) connects Jamshedpur to Dhanbad, Via Bokaro. Tata-Kandra Road connects Jamshedpur to Kandra via Gamahria. Marine Drive, Jamshedpur connects Adityapur Toll Bridge to Mango via Kadma, Sonari through the western corridors of Jamshedpur

Airport

Sonari Airport is serving the city at present. It is spread over a 25-acre area in the Sonari area of the city. The airport is primarily used for bringing in chartered planes of TATA group. Dhalbhumgarh Airport is a proposed public airport located at Dhalbhumgarh, in the state of Jharkhand, India as a Greenfield airport for Jamshedpur. It will be built on the site of an abandoned World War II airfield situated 60 kilometres from Jamshedpur on NH-33. The old airfield was built around 1942, as an ancillary runway for other airfields in the vicinity that were being built around India's eastern frontier as part of the war effort. It was one of the airfields used by Allied forces to repel the advancing Japanese troops and to maintain transport links with China. As the Japanese forces came to control shipping in the China Sea, seaborne supply routes to China were cut and the difficult, 500 km route over the Himalayas was increasingly used. The airfield was abandoned after the war. The technical team of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) conducted survey in 2017 and approved the Dhalbhumgarh site for a greenfield airport. The government plans to invest Rs 300 crore through AAI for the new airport which will have a 3 kilometre long runway. In January 2018, Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha announced that the Union Civil Aviation Ministry and the Jharkhand Government would sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the construction of Dhalbhumgarh Airport.