Nilgiris

     One of the oldest mountain ranges, older than the Himalayas, located at the tri - junction of Tamilnadu, Kerala and Karnataka.  Nilgiris is a part of the Western Ghats.  It is in the Nilgris where the western and eastern ghats meet.  It was originally tribal land and was occupied by the Todas around what is now the Ooty area, and by Kotas around what is now the Kotagiri area.  The Badagas appeared here much later from the Mysore Plateau, the unconfirmed date being 1550. Although the Nilgiri hills are mentioned in the Ramayana of Valniki estimated by Western scholars to have been recorded in the second century B.C. They remained all but undiscovered by Europeans until 1602.

     The first European resident of the hills was John Sullivan, the Collector of Coimbatore, who went up the same year and built himself a home.  He also reported to the madras Government the appropriateness of the climate Europeans soon started settling down here or using the valley for summer stays. The complete valley became a summer resort. Later on the practice of moving the moving the government to the hills during summer months also started.  By the end of the 19th century, the Nilgiri hills were completely accessible with the laying of roads and the railway line. Its popularity grew because of the gold hunt pursued by early colonialists in the Nilgiris.  Though the gold hunt was given up in the early 20th century, its rich endowments of nature came to the limelight and Europeans and the well-to-do natives settled there.  It became the summer capital of the then Madras Presidency.  It is known as Nilagiri meaning Blue Mountain because of the blue haze that prevailed to look at from a distance.  It is at a height of 2240m, and is the headquarters of the Nilgiris district.  Besides coffee and tea plantations, eucalyptus, pine and wattle dot the hill sides of Udagamandalam.   The summer temperature is rarely higher than 25°C with a minimum of 10°C and winter with a high of 21°C and a low of 5°C, rarely it touches 0°C. 

     Settlement in Udagamandalam began in 1822 with the construction of the Stone House by John Sullivan the erstwhile collector of Coimbatore.  It was locally called ‘Kal Bangala’ and is now the chamber of the Principal of Government Arts College.  Following this, several English Cottage with pretty garden sprang up.  Even today, the atmosphere of the British Raj lingers in places like the club where snooker was invented by a subaltern Neville Chamberlain, the Nilgiris library with rare and invaluable collection of books on Udagamandalam and St. Stephen’s Church which was Ooty’s first church.

     Nilgiri tea is generally described as being a dark intensely aromatic, fragrant and flavourful tea grown in the southern portion of the Western Ghats Mountains of Southern India.

      Nilgiris is India’s first biosphere.  It has been declared as one of the 14 ‘hotspots’ of the world because of the unique bio-diversity.