The Buxa Fort

The Buxa Fort is located at an altitude of 867 m in th Buxa Tiger Reserve. It was built by the rulers of Bhutan and was used by them to guard the trade route that passed through this area.

During the British Rule this was used as a high security prison and was the most notorious and unreachable prison in India after the Cellular Jail in Andaman. Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was said to have been imprisoned here for some time. The prisoners had once wrote a letter to Rabindranath Tagore from this prison and the venerated poet had sent them a reply. The replicas of these letters enscribed in marble can be seen in the ruins of the fort.

The fort was last used by the police to keep the Naxal rebels during the Naxal rebellion in the seventies.

Only ruins of the fort can be seen today. What remains of the formidable fort and prison of the yesteryears are three small cells where prisoners were kept. We were lucky enough to spend a night in these cells.

This is one piece of our history which is very much worth preserving.