Told in the hills
Looking across the old Bhutan border
From Ramdhura you look west across the Teesta, and for part of the 19th century that river was an international frontier. Sikkim granted Darjeeling to the British in 1835, and in 1850 the British annexed more of Sikkim's lower hills and terai. The country west of the Teesta became British Darjeeling. The ridges east of the river, where Ramdhura stands, belonged to Bhutan, as they had since the Bhutanese defeated the Lepcha chief Gaeboo Achyok in the early 18th century.
That changed with the Duar War. Under the Treaty of Sinchula of 11 November 1865, Bhutan ceded the hill tract east of the Teesta to British India, and it was joined to Darjeeling district. The new administration encouraged settlers to clear and farm the forested slopes, and farmers, many from Nepal, terraced the land that villages like Ramdhura still work. The government also planted cinchona, the source of quinine, on these hills. Kalimpong district was finally separated from Darjeeling on 14 February 2017.
Pinned to the board
Did you know
The hills east of the Teesta, including Ramdhura, were part of Bhutan until the Treaty of Sinchula of 11 November 1865.
Cinchona, the tree whose bark gives quinine against malaria, was planted in these hills by the British and still grows on slopes around Ramdhura and Sillery Gaon.
Ramdhura is in the Kalimpong II block of Kalimpong district, which became a separate district on 14 February 2017.
