Every time I go into Fort, I always look at the Flora Fountain with great regret. A beautiful structure, it has been allowed to fall to disrepair. Well, maybe that's overstating it! Ok, it is overstating it, but there is no denying that the structure could do with lots of cleaning and sprucing up..... it is so beautiful that I wish they would!



The East India Company, in 1668, "hired/ rented" the islands of Bombay from the Crown for a princely sum of 10 British pounds a year!!! Indicative of the value that Prince Charles II placed on his wedding gift received by him from the Portugese when he married Princess Catherine!

In 1858, after the famous Sepoy Mutiny (the first war of Indian Independence 1857), I guess the Crown finally figured they had allowed The Company to wreak enough havoc, and the islands reverted back to the Crown. More likely they discovered what cuckoos The Company had made of them! India was the proverbial land of gold!!

n 1862 Sir Baartle Frere was appointed Governor by the Crown, an office which he held until 1867, and, under his stewardship Mumbai saw a lot of construction, land reclamation etc. In his honour, it was decided to erect a fountain in Victoria Gardens (Horticultural society gardens) but for some reason the fountain was moved to the centre of the city!

And that is where it stands even till today, still as majestic as it was 145 years ago!