Ranchi to McCluskieganj - Anglo-Indian Colony Taxi & Travel Guide

Travel Guide & Overview

Nestled in the forested folds of Jharkhand's Ranchi district, roughly sixty-five kilometers northwest of the state capital, lies a town that feels like a fragment of another era suspended in time. McCluskieganj — affectionately called "Mini London" or "Little England" — is not merely a tourist destination; it is a living museum of aspiration, loss, and unexpected resilience. Founded in 1933 by Ernest Timothy McCluskie, a Calcutta-based Anglo-Indian businessman, this hill settlement was conceived as a homeland — a "Mooluk" — for a community caught between two worlds. Today, its colonial bungalows crumble beneath sal trees, its railway station echoes with fewer whistles than it once knew, and yet McCluskieganj endures as one of India's most hauntingly beautiful offbeat destinations, where history, nature, and an extraordinary experiment in religious harmony converge.

The story of McCluskieganj begins with a dream born of anxiety. In the early twentieth century, India's Anglo-Indian community — descendants of British fathers and Indian mothers — found themselves increasingly marginalized. The Simon Commission of 1930 made no provisions for their future, and as independence movements gathered momentum, the community faced an uncertain fate. Ernest Timothy McCluskie, whose own heritage straddled the colonial divide — his Irish father worked on the railways, his mother came from a Brahmin family of Varanasi — envisioned a sanctuary. In 1933, he purchased ten thousand acres from the Raja of Ratu and invited approximately two hundred thousand Anglo-Indians to build a new life in the Chota Nagpur highlands. The Raja's condition was humane: the indigenous tribal populations of the nine existing villages would not be displaced. By 1939, around two hundred and fifty families had answered the call, bringing with them sloping roofs, fireplaces, pianos, bakeries, churches, and the distinct rhythms of Anglo-Indian culture. For a brief, luminous decade, McCluskieganj thrived — a pocket of England in the Jharkhand wilderness, complete with ballroom dances, hunting parties, and gardens that spilled over with flowers.

But utopias are fragile. Without sustainable local employment, the younger generation drifted toward Kolkata, Delhi, and eventually Australia, England, and Canada. By the 1970s, only about thirty families remained. The Colonization Society collapsed in the 1950s, and the grand bungalows — some three hundred of them — were leased, abandoned, or given to loyal attendants. Today, barely twenty Anglo-Indian families call McCluskieganj home. The empty houses, with their Gothic silhouettes and overgrown gardens, give the town an atmosphere of poignant beauty — a place where nostalgia hangs in the air like mist. Some bungalows have found second lives as hostels for Don Bosco Academy and other schools, their fireplaces now warming students rather than colonial families. Others, like the one featured in Konkona Sen Sharma's 2016 film A Death in the Gunj, have become sets for stories about isolation and memory.

Yet McCluskieganj is far from a ghost town. Its true contemporary marvel lies not in its colonial architecture but in a modest compound five kilometers from the main settlement, in the village of Dulli. This is the Sarva Dharma Sthal — the "Abode of All Religions" — perhaps the only place in India where a Hindu temple, a Muslim dargah, a Sikh gurudwara, and a designated site for a Christian church coexist within a single boundary, separated by nothing more than a few steps and centuries of mutual respect. The complex was born from the legacy of Noor Hasan Baba, a Sufi saint who came to the region during British rule and was known for his qawwalis and spiritual presence. When he died in Kolkata, his sons brought his remains back to Dulli, where the British built a mausoleum. Honoring the saint's wish, a Radha-Krishna temple and a semi-built gurudwara were constructed alongside the tomb. A wooden cross marks the spot reserved for a church that was never completed, interrupted by the turmoil of independence and later by regional instability. Today, Shravan Yadav, a local villager, tends to all four sacred spaces with equal devotion, cleaning and maintaining them without distinction. Pilgrims from Jharkhand, Bihar, and Bengal visit to tie threads, offer prayers, read the Fatiha, and sit beneath the ancient banyan tree that spreads its shade over the entire compound. The Urs of Noor Hasan Baba, celebrated annually on November 22, draws descendants from Kolkata and devotees from across the region. Janmashtami at the Radha-Krishna temple is equally grand. There are no land disputes here, no communal tensions — only the quiet assertion that faith, at its core, is a shared human endeavor. Near the complex lies Sita Kund, a natural spring where local tradition holds that Sita bathed during her exile, adding yet another layer of mythology to this already saturated landscape.

For those who seek elevation rather than enclosure, Nakta Pahar rises above the town like a sentinel. This hill — whose name evokes the shape of a nose or beak, depending on local interpretation — offers one of the finest trekking experiences in the Ranchi hinterland. The climb is not arduous, but it rewards the effort with a 360-degree panorama that reveals the full geographical poetry of the region. From the summit, the Duga Dugi River — a tributary of the Damodar — threads through the valley below like a silver ribbon, while the Damodar itself, once known as the "Sorrow of Bengal" for its devastating floods, now flows as a gentler giant, tamed by check dams but still commanding respect. The surrounding sal forests stretch toward the horizon in unbroken waves of green, interrupted only by the red laterite soil that gives Jharkhand its distinctive earth tones. During winter, frost dusts the grass and rooftops of McCluskieganj, and from Nakta Pahar, the morning mist hangs in the valleys like smoke from a thousand invisible fires. The hill is particularly beloved by photographers and pre-wedding shoot crews who have discovered that McCluskieganj's colonial ruins and natural vistas offer backdrops unavailable anywhere else in eastern India.

The town's other attractions weave a tapestry of nature and nostalgia. The Duga Dugi River, which runs dry in the scorching summer months, transforms into a beloved picnic spot during the monsoon and post-monsoon seasons, its banks crowded with families escaping Ranchi's heat. The Jhunjhunia Waterfall, hidden in the forested interior, rewards trekkers with a cascade that feels like a private discovery. Jagriti Vihar, a center for social seminars that draws international visitors during winter, maintains the town's intellectual tradition, while the old St. John's Church stands as a brick-and-mortar elegy to the Anglo-Indian community's devotion. The McCluskieganj railway station, with its colonial-era platform, still connects the town to the Indian Railways network, though the trains now carry more curiosity than commerce.

The best time to experience McCluskieganj is between October and March, when the plateau's winter air is crisp, the skies are clear, and the abandoned bungalows wear a melancholy beauty enhanced by the golden light of the season. The monsoon months of July and September drench the forests in emerald glory, but the trails to Nakta Pahar grow slippery and the Duga Dugi swells unpredictably. Birsa Munda Airport in Ranchi, roughly sixty kilometers away, serves as the nearest aerial gateway, while the town's own railway station provides a more atmospheric arrival — stepping onto the platform feels like stepping into a novel.

What ultimately defines the experience of McCluskieganj is not any single monument but the cumulative weight of its contradictions. It is a town built by a community that no longer lives there, yet it refuses to die. It is a colonial experiment that failed economically but succeeded culturally, leaving behind an architectural heritage that continues to inspire filmmakers, writers, and photographers. It is a place where a Sufi saint's tomb shares a courtyard with a Hindu temple, where a wooden cross waits patiently for a church that may never come, and where a hill named after a nose offers views that take your breath away. For the traveler weary of India's overcrowded hill stations and commercialized heritage circuits, McCluskieganj offers something far more precious: the chance to wander through a living palimpsest, where every crumbling bungalow, every prayer offered at the Sarva Dharma Sthal, and every sunrise viewed from Nakta Pahar tells a story of dreams deferred, faith renewed, and beauty that outlasts its creators.

Key Attractions & Tourist Spots

• Colonial Anglo-Indian Bungalows Walk
• Degadugi River
• McCluskieganj Railway Station
• Nakta Pahar
• McCluskieganj Watch Tower

How to Reach from Ranchi

Short 65 KM cab drive from Ranchi via Khelari route.