Anushakti Nagar
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Anushakti Nagar is the residential township of the Bhabha Atomic Research Center in Mumbai, India. Anu Shakti means atomic power in Sanskrit/Hindi. It is the residential complex for the employees of Department of Atomic Energy of the Government of India in Mumbai. Situated in Northeast Mumbai, it may be reached by taking the Harbour Line suburban train service to Mankhurd station. It houses employees of Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC). This is claimed to be the largest township of any organisation in the World[citation needed].
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[edit] About
In the early 1960's the government decided to expand the nuclear research (see BARC) facility in (what was then) a distant suburb of Mumbai. The township is about 3 km north of the research centre.
Anushakti Nagar is a well planned community with a population of about 40,000. It is a self-contained town with residential flats, local grocery shops, sports and recreation facilities, schools, medical clinics, a large hospital, bank, post office and transport links to many parts of Mumbai. Both the atomic research centre and the town maintenance is funded by the central (federal) government. The complex is sprawling and lies stretched out alongside four suburbs - Govandi, Mankhurd, New Mandala and Trombay. The other facilities in this colony include the BARC hospital, a Dept. of Maintenance for various needs like electric, plumbing or other household maintenance, Two community Centres for social occasions and gatherings, various departmental and co-operative stores, a restaurant, 2 creches, a staff club for indoor games like Badminton & TT and Gym, One field each for Football, Cricket and Hockey, 3 Tennis Courts, 2 Basketball courts and 1 volleyball court. There are vast playgrounds spread across the colony. The electricity to the colony is provided by TATA Power, and the cable (and more recently, cablenet) by ANUSAT club.
Anushaktinagar has 17 high-rises and numerous buildings, and is estimated to have a population of 40,000. The buildings have grades, depending on flat-size, and are allotted on the basis of seniority. The naming of all these buildings is one of the best aspects of the colony, with names taken from Indian Heritage names (Nalanda, Hastinapur, Pataliputra, Indraprastha, Takshashila, Kapilvastu), Rivers (Saraswati, Godavari, Narmada, Saryu, Alaknanda, Bhagirathi etc.), Mountains (Annapurna, Kanchenjunga, Dhawalgiri {Dhaulagiri}, Nandadevi {Nanda Devi} ,Gaurishankar{Gauri Sankar} ,Everest etc.), Hill-stations (Venkatgiri, Almora, Gulmarg, Mount Abu etc.), Hill-ranges (Sahyadri, Vindhya, Satpura, Aravalli, Nilgiri etc.), Historical Places (Ajanta, Ellora, Shantiniketan etc.), Pilgrim Places (Kailash, Badrinath, Kedarnath, Dwarka, Sarnath etc.), Great Saints (Meerabai Chwk., Kabir, Tukaram, Chaitanya etc.), Classical Ragas (the Raagmala buildings - Mohana, Deepak, Malhar, Darbari, Bhairavi etc.). The Mandala "suburb" of this township has buildings named after seasons (Hemant, Sharad, Shishir etc.)
Anushakti nagar can be said to be divided into three parts.
- Anushakti Nagar
- New Mandala
- Western Sector
It is considered to be one of the "greenest" and better maintained parts of (an otherwise polluted) Mumbai city.
[edit] Location
Anushakti Nagar is located about 20km nort-east of Mumbai downtown. It has its own Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) bus depot connecting it to most major Mumbai suburbs. Mankhurd, located about 1km north of the town, serves as its primary railway station connecting it via the harbour line of the Mumbai suburban railway network to downtown Mumbai (about 22km south).
It is part of the Mumbai North-East constituency which until a few years back was the largest (by population) Lok Sabha electorate in India. It is bordered on one side by a large hill which is the highest in Mumbai.
[edit] People
As the education provided to this community is very good and cheap it tends to have a high concentration of very educated (though a bit academic) population. It claims to have one of the highest concentrations of IIT Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) entrants in any given year.
Even by the standards of Mumbai, which is considered very cosmopolitan, Anushakti Nagar is a melting pot of races, cultures and religions from all over India. The "Colony Junta" comprises people from all parts of India - North, South, East and West. These various communities mean a diversity seen nowhere else even in India itself, and a very social celebration of all the Indian festivals. It is one of the cleanest, greenest, diverse and serene colonies in India.
[edit] Education
It is home to the Atomic Energy Central Schools (AECS), which are numbered 1 through 5, and a sprawling Atomic Energy Junior College (AEJC) for grades 11 and 12, on the foot of the Trombay Hill. A sixth primary school is being constructed. Admission to these schools is strictly for children whose parents/guardians are employees of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and/or the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC). The school system follows the CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) syllabus which is considered to be much better in structure and content, and is regarded as one of the tougher ones and more complete than the syllabus of the state run schools of Maharashtra. The medium of instruction is English, but the Hindi language is also taught, but is optional after the 10th standard.
There is a Training School & Hostel (TSH), and the New Bachelor's Hostel (NBH) for BARC trainees, as well as for interns and students who come for various academic purposes (like training for International Mathematics Olympiad or International Physics Olympiad etc.)
[edit] Sports
Anushakti Nagar has very good sports facilities with many apartment complexes having their own grounds which are usually occupied by cricket playing youngsters. It also has 9 floodlit tennis courts, a few scattered basketball courts, volleyball facilities, and a large number of badminton courts.
