I was born in Cuttack in the year 1954 and my father was a police Officer. My fathers’name was Nityananda Mohanty .My father has two brothers and three sisters .My father was a police officer, who moved from place to place. While my father was on a transferrable Job , I moved from city to city. I continued my schooling in Cuttack where I stayed with my maternal uncle. His mother’s father was a school teacher. He has five brothers. All of them were established in different Govt. Depts and were having a very stable source of Income. I have two sons and one daughter. All of them are staying outside India as IT professionals.
I was staying in Dolamundai then. In 1962, his father joined CID and he shifted to Bhubaneswar with Family. Thus I could able to come to Bhubaneswar and became a Bhubaneswaria. I was reading in class 2 then. They stayed together as a family in Unit-1 Govt quarter.
I completed his schooling in Unit-1 School and studied there till class-5. I then continued my education in Unit-1 high school. I joined BJB college in 1970 and then Joined Burla to study engineering in 1972. In 1977, I got a job in civil engineering the day, I passed my final exam. In 1981, I joined as an Asst. Engineer in the Dept of Housing and Urban Development Dept.
I retired in 2012 but I continued in the dept for one more year as a contractual employee. I have been staying in Nayapalli after retiring as an Engineer and now rendering consultancy services for different agencies. In the year 2013, I came to reside in the present house.
During my time class two officers were getting a salary of Rs 400 per month. The grade fourth employees were getting Rs 100/ where as senior officials were getting Rs 1000/-. Businessmen belonged to outside Odisha. Most of the shop owners belonged to South India.
Bhubaneswar was very small in size. Old town, Kalpana chhaka, Ravi Talkies Chhaka are prominent places. People used to visit these places for films. Film was only mode of entertainment. People also visited Khandagiri, Dhauligiri for picnics etc.
Ramakrushna Pati was very popular in the then Bhubaneswar. He has won elections uncontested many times, People loved him.
Unit-6 Capital Hospital was the only small hospital and it was also having very limited facilities. IRC village areas developed much later. The buildings that were created for IRC session were later given to people or Govt. institutions for Office purpose. Each Unit was having one small dispensary set up my municipality.
There are three film halls in Bhubaneswar. At Kalpana Chhaka there is Kalpana Film Hall, in Old town there was one Rupa Mandir film existed. It was covered by bamboo sheds. There were wooden planks attached to bamboo stack and people used to pay 32 paise per ticket at Rupa Mandir. Rupa Mandira was famous for action movies that featured Dara Singh and Kingkong etc.
As far as marketing infrastructure in Bhubaneswar was considered, Unit 1 used to be a large market. It almost had more than 20 shops. Bhadi Sitaram was very famous grocery shop in the Unit-1. There was also a shop named Nagu Shop, who also sold grocery items. Vegetable sellers sat outside the market. The no-1 market was having two units named eastern market and western market. There are less people and market was almost empty every time.At the side of western market there were few shops selling evening snacks. Burma General Store existed in market place. The shop did not negotiated with audience but audience has no other choice but to buy from Burma General Store.
Football was very popular in Bhubaneswar. Football tournaments were organised in the UNIT-1 playground. Staff from the secretariat used to spend quite few hours in the playground in the evening after the office is over. Cricket was not very popular then. Similarly inter School and inter college tournament were organised in front of the playground of Secretariat. There were good football clubs in Bhubaneswar. Capital Sports of Bapuji Nagar & Friends’ Premium of UNIT-2 are good football clubs. Players like Suvendu Pattnaik, Manoranjan Mohanty, Bhakta Das were brilliant football players. People used to come to watch these players play. Caroom, Playing cards were played in secretariat club. People loved to play indoor games than doing Gossips.
People used to go to office by walk or by cycle. Later people bought scooters like Lambrada to move to office. Cycle was mode of communication. Robinhood and Rayleigh were popular cycle brands. Yezdi and Rajdoot were prominent motor cycles. Ambassador was very popular whereas some wealthy people also afforded fiat car. Bus ticket from Burla to Bhubaneswar during 1977 was Rs 30.00. The sleeper coach was introduced during that period. Govt bus was plying from Acharya Vihar to Old town at the cost of 1.00 rupees.
Cuttack to Bhubaneswar route doesn’t have many bus. It used to take almost two hours to reach Bhubaneswar from Baramunda. Due to limited bus and heavy traffic, pick pocket in the bus was very much reported.
Suchana Bhawan was very active. Bhanja Loka Kala Mandap also existed. Many theatres and drama teams put their performances.
People were serious for studies. They want to ensure that their kids get good education in schools. Hence, they brought news papers and magazines to their home. Samaj & Prajatantra are important news papers whereas Jhanakar & Nabarabi was good magazines’ people subscribed. The Railway station of Bhubaneswar was faced towards laxmisagar. But soon it was also opened towards master canteen and this added to the traffic of the city. Lots of Rickshaws were visible in front of Bhubaneswar railway station but this is not visible now.
Old Bhubaneswar was famous for Korakhai. It was very popular. Such Korakhai is no more available. The quality is very bad now a days. People repent missing them. People also miss the free flowing winds in the afternoon of Bhubaneswar.
People from Badagada and Laxmi sagar were finding it difficult to cope with increased population and competition with new Bhubaneswar. Hence, class conflict emerged between members of Old Bhubaneswar and New Bhubaneswar. The people of the old Bhubaneswar thought that because of the salaried employees the cost of the products, are rising which is increasing pressure on villagers.
The affinity between people of Bhubaneswar cannot be compared with that of Cuttack. But people have slowly started maintaining relationship with each other. Especially at areas of Nayapalli, where more and more senior citizens are staying without their kids ( as the kids are settled abroad) the bonding between the neighbours are increasing.
Now water scarcity is not there but once upon a time supply for the water was an issue. The water supply was limited to one to two hours per day. People faced getting adequate and appropriate water at household level, even though Bhubaneswar was relatively small town and populations were few and far fetched.
Natural Drains were clogged and people have constructed homes on it that creates water logging situation during rainy season. This has created problem for many people. This position will further worsen during upcoming years.
Bhubaneswar would fast grow in next 75 years. More widened roads, fly overs no. will grow up. Burial grounds and barrack might be shifted to outside the city in future. This shifting would result in creating more space and Govt can create residential and commercial property.
