Buxa Fort : History in Ruins

                          Nidhu  Bhusan Das

      Buxa Fort, now in ruins, in the picturesque setting of Duars, North      Bengal, India is an attraction for tourists interested in the study of archaeological remains. It is obscure when and who built the fort, 867 meters above sea level, but what history confirms is that it had been a bone of contention between the Bhutan king and Koch kings before it was occupied by the British. Invited by the Koch king, the British took over the fort for the king who transferred it  to the British  on November 11,1865 by way of the Treaty of Sinchula.The British replaced the  the bamboo-wood structure of the fort by stone structure which is now in ruins. During the freedom struggle of India, the fort was used by the British as a high security prison and detention camp in 1930s, and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose is believed to be in detention in   prison for a brief period.                                                                                  
                                                                                                                                                              
      A few hundred  Tibetan monks who crossed over to India  pursued by the Chinese troops following the  uprising in Tibet in 1959 took shelter in the fort and turned it into a  monastic study centre and refugee camp. They vacated the fort  on the advice of the Dalai Lama in 1971.

    The fort needs be protected from possible encroachments.