Botanical Garden

Colonel Alexander Kyd was the founder of Botanical Gardens in 1786. He was an army officer from the British East India Company. The primary purpose of growing this stunning garden is to develop new plants that will have huge commercial value like teak along with to grow new plant species for trading. The design was made by Sir George King and the changes were planned by a renowned botanist – William Roxburgh, the superintendent of this garden. He was the one to present the idea of bringing plants from the corners of the world and create a herbarium.

With more and more collection of the dried specimen, this garden eventually transformed into the Central Nation Herbarium. The entire garden has more than 25,00,000 items in it. Previously this fantastic lush greenery was popular has “Company Bagan” or “East India Company’s Garden”, but after independence in 1950, it got its new name “Indian Botanic Garden”. Later on 25th June 2009, this got its new designation of “The Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden”.

• This is from the oldest and largest green reserve in the entire South East Asia.
• This garden follows a strict rule of no-litter, no-smoking, and no-plastic.
• The founding father of this green reserve is Lieutenant Colonel Robert Kyd which was established in 1787.
• At present, this garden has more than 12,000 species of perennial plants and over hundreds of the dried plant specimens collected from the corners of the world.
• As per the latest census conducted in 2007, the figures are accurately 14,000 trees and 13,722 plant species. From these, 500 species are rare or endangered.
• The massive Great Banyan Tress is still the primary attraction of the visitors. This is the largest banyan tree and hence is the prime attention seeker.
• The garden hosts some of the rare Victoria Amazonica, water lily.
• Here you can observe trees available in different parts of the world. Some of them are exotic species from Penang, Neal, Sumatra, Java, and Brazil. You can easily find the Cuban palms, Mahogany trees, tamarind trees, mango trees along with other spaces dedicated to the infamous cactus and orchids.
• If you are intrigued to flora and fauna, visit the library present in this garden.

Generally, the garden is opened every day and can be operated from morning to evening except on public holidays. However, the best time to visit this garden is from October to March. The lush greenery will give their natural serenity and help you feel refreshed.

So visit this nature’s reserve and dwell in nature’s lap.

By Road: The Botanical Garden is easily accessible from any part of Kolkata or Howrah by private car or taxi or bus. Or, you can get a bus from any part of Kolkata, just board a bus which says "B Garden" as one of the stops, it will just drop you at the entrance of the Botanical Garden.

By Rail: The nearest Railway Station is Shalimar Railway Station, but you don’t get any train to reach here from other parts of Kolkata except Santragachi. Howrah and Sealdah are nearby major railway station to the Botanical Garden. After arrive at Howrah or Sealdah railway station, hire a cab or catch a city bus to reach here.

By Air: The nearest airport is the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport at Dumdum, Kolkata.