What is common between Exide, Philips, Dunlop, Sulekha, and Ruby? If you are from Kolkata, you must have come across these words as part of bus stops like Exide Crossing, Philips Moore, Dunlop Bridge, Sulekha (the ink maker), and Ruby (hospital) crossing. Some streets and especially crossings became more popular among bus routes by the name of the company that had business there. Of course, for Dunlop it was due to the advertisement similar was that of Philips who had a brand-themed bus stop at CIT road. Similarly, one very important crossing at the heart of central Kolkata is popularly known as Dorina Crossing.
This became a topic of discussion a few weeks back when I posted a photo of Chowringhee (Esplanade) Crossing featuring the Metropolitan Building (Whiteaway, Laidlaw & Co). A friend and fellow Calcutta heritage enthusiasts asked me if I knew that the crossing is popularly known as “Dorina Crossing”. Honestly, it had never previously crossed my mind and for a moment even I started thinking why.
Unfortunately, or rather, I should say fortunately there was no straight answer available online. There was just an old article in The Telegraph that happened to mention “Ma Dorina” and Chowringhee while describing the old crumbling building around this section. But there were no more details about this Dorina or Ma Dorina.
It was at this point that I started doing my research and it gripped me for weeks. I would spend nights without sleep trying to get as many answers as possible. To add to the confusion there existed a watch brand by the name “Madorina” which back around the mid-twentieth century was a type of collector’s watch. Many large showrooms in Calcutta used to sell these Madorina watches. A company by the name of Modorina Watch Company also at that time had their head office in Bombay (Mumbai) so that kind of got my research off track in the beginning.
Then I got my first break when in a 1962 tourist guide a shop named Madorina was mentioned as a tailor and dressmaker in Chowringhee. This information was critical however this information was not completely correct which I will tell you shortly.
Then there was verbal information or confirmation from people who were adults back then and clearly remembered the shop but not what it used to sell. Another reason why this shop was so popular was because of an advertisement signage belonging to Lipton Tea. It features a kettle pouring amber liquid into cups. This was a large neon light hoarding which at night due to its strategic position was visible across the whole intersection.
Also, it is to be noted here is back then the street lights were fluorescent (tube) lights and not large powerful sodium vapor or mercury vapor lights because of which the neon lights stood out.
What Was Madorina?
The actual correct word for the name of the shop is Ma Dorina but here comes the tricky part. The shop was exactly at the corner right opposite to Metropolitan Building and the shop had two frontages. On one side was S. N. Banerjee Road while the other frontage was facing Chowringhee Road.
The side facing S. N. Banerjee Road had the hoarding as Ma Dorina Private Limited but this side did not have any entrance instead there was a Kolay Biscuit shop.
The Chowringhee Road facing frontage had the hoarding with the words “House of Fashion & Fabrics” written in small-size lettering and Dorina written in large lettering on top just below the Lipton signage. This side of the shop also had another small store hoarding with the words House Of – Ma Dorina – Fashion & Fabrics written. This was the only side from which one could enter the shop.
This clears out the air that it was indeed a cloth shop and also that it was Ma Dorina and not Madorina as mentioned in the 1962 tourist guidebook.
The Chowringhee Road facing shop hoarding was right beneath that large Liptop neon branding so it was obvious that portion stuck out prominently. This made the shop name popular more as Dorina rather than Ma Dorina.
With the prominent location of this shop, this part of the crossing became popularly known as Dorina Crossing. So much so that news reports and traffic reports also mention this crossing now extended to that whole section of intersecting roads as Dorina Crossing. Search with the word “Dorina Crossing” on YouTube and you will get many search results showing you videos of this intersection.
What Happened To Ma Dorina?
The shop on 8 Chowringhee Road does not exist any longer nor does the large Lipton neon sign. Just around the corner where this shop was once located, we find one of the Esplanade Metro Station gates.
Another old building that was once renowned for its shops is the two-storied building which is 9 Chowringhee Road is still existing but almost on the verge of collapsing. Overtaken by street hawkers who have completely choked the footpath one can still make out some old signages amongst the array of plastic sheets like Italian Stores which existed in the same spot over a century back.
Another shop signage that of Smith Brothers can still be seen peeking out behind the series of cheap denim pants. This used to be a dental clinic run by two American brothers who were both dentists.
Hopefully, next time when someone wonders why this intersection at Chowringhee is known as Dorina Crossing and does a quick online search this article will solve it once and for all.
Location Of Dorina Crossing On Map
Reference
The Telegraph
Seaman’s Handbook For Shore Leave – 1920
Gazette of India – 1959
Sharadiya Sankha – 1969
Ministry of Information, Films Division – Government of India
Tourist India by S. N. Kaul
A Handbook of India – Compiled by D. Chatterjee
The Illustrated Weekly Of India, Vol. 72
Thacker’s Indian Directory (1920)
Thacker’s Indian Directory (1928)