Blast from the past: Civic body restores 200-year-old milestone at Kemps Corner
MUMBAI : In an effort to showcase Mumbai’s history, the municipal corporation restored and inaugurated a 200-year-old heritage milestone at Kemps Corner in south Mumbai on Friday. Marked ‘3 MILES’, this is the only milestone inscribed with the numeric 3, among at least 14 others across south Mumbai marked with Roman numerals.
The ‘3 MILES’ milestone was located by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in January 2018 at Kemps Corner, along with one other milestone inscribed with Roman numeral ‘III’ near Bhatia Hospital in Tardeo. The ‘3 MILES’ marker was restored over three months at a cost of ₹50,000. According to information from the BMC’S heritage department, 15 milestones were installed across Mumbai between 1817 and 1837, as distance markers for travellers in the city limits. They marked the distance between the then zero point marker for the city at St Thomas Cathedral at Fort, up to Sion on the East, and Dadar on the West. At least one of the milestones, marked ‘III’, was installed before 1817, and has not yet been located.
Vishwas Mote — assistant commissioner of D ward, who initiated the restoration of the milestones at Tardeo and Kemps Corner — had earlier stumbled upon another milestone inscribed ‘V Miles’ near KEM Hospital in Parel, during a demolition drive in April 2017. Mote was then the assistant commissioner of F South ward in Parel. After being transferred to D ward (Girgaon, Tardeo, Kemps Corner, Cumbala Hill) in 2018, Mote started identifying milestones in the area.
“I heard there are two milestones in the D ward. When my team found them, we began the restoration work,” he said. When they were located, both the fivefoot tall milestones were halfburied under the concrete footpath, and damaged, with encroachments adjoining them.
With the help of conservation architect Tapan Deshpande, the civic body dug out the milestones from the surrounding concrete, removed the layers of paint, and restored them to the original grey colour of basalt stone.