Bakery unearthed at store room on IIEST campus

KOLKATA: The Indian Institute of Engineering, Science and Technology (IIEST) authorities have discovered a bakery with mammoth size ignition points, baking units, pull out trays and a chimney inside a run-down godown. Gearing up for the 200th year celebration, they have been exploring every nook and cranny of the institute and stumbled upon this slice of now defunct bread-making or selling accommodation.
For most of the students, faculty and administrative staff at the institute, the godown is nothing but an old building that the public health engineering department officials use to keep the stocks of pumps and pipelines. No one even takes a second look at old building that mostly remains locked and is often opened by labourers to access the stocks. In a bid to trace the glorious past, the IIEST authorities have been scanning the old buildings on the campus, that were once part of Bishop’s College. So, they decided to look beyond the ceiling-high heaps of packing boxes inside the godown and unearthed the bakery. The entire set-up is a combination of fire bricks and iron.
“Our eyes became used to the tall chimney and its cupola all these years but it didn’t ever strike us that there might be something underneath. But after we started reading about the history of the Bishop’s College to put up a bi-centenary show, we got references to freshly baked bread served to the British teachers and clergy of the Bishop’s College. After that, we took the initiative to open the godown and found this treasure trove,” said Bibhor Das, assistant registrar, who has been given the responsibility of piecing the institute’s 200-year-old history.
The British government came up with the Civil Engineering College, later known as the Bengal Engineering College and then Bengal Engineering and Science University, on this campus. Now, it has been renamed as IIEST.
Earlier, TOI had reported how the institute is trying to restore the chapel, the adjacent reading rooms and club on the campus, which were all handed down by the Bishop’s College. The discovery has naturally sent a ripple of excitement among the institute authorities who have contacted the officials of Bishop’s College, now located at Minto Park, to authenticate it. “There was a bakery for sure because the European teachers and clergy needed bread and cakes and Shibpur those days did not have such facilities in the neighbourhood. So, a bakery on campus was the only solution. We are sure that our research will lead to more details,” said Biman Bandyopadhyay, registrar of the institute.