The Sewri Fort (also spelled Sewree Fort) (Marathi: शिवडी किल्ला) is a fort in Mumbai built by the British at Sewri. Built in 1680, fort served as a watch tower, atop a quarried hill overlooking the Mumbai harbor.Up to the eighteenth century, Mumbai consisted of several small islands. In 1661, seven of these islands were ceded by the Portuguese to the British as part of the dowry of Charles II of England. The harbor proved eminently apposite, and the British planned to shift base from Surat to Mumbai. The Siddis, who were of African descent and noted for their navies, had allied themselves with the Mughals. The British, under the East India Company and the Mughals were constantly waged war on each other. As allies of the Mughals, the Siddis also declared the British as enemies.Faced with relentless attacks by the Siddis in 1672, several fortifications were constructed in Mumbai, and in 1780 the Sewri fort was complete. It stood on the island of Parel, on a hill overlooking the eastern seaboard and Indian mainland. It had a garrison of 50 sepoys and was managed by a subedar. It was also armed with eight to ten cannons.
How would Mumbai look today if the African Siddi Yakut had captured the island city from the British in 1689? If the British hadn’t filled the coffers of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb to end the nine-month siege of the Mazgaon fort, Mumbai’s history would have been very different.Chances are that the city would perhaps never have witnessed its transformation into the 18th century modern city and the present-day financial nerve centre.Most Mazgaon residents who frequent the amazingly clean and well-maintained civic garden atop Bhandarwada Hill for evening walks don’t know that a fort once existed on this hillock, perched above the Dockyard railway station and overlooking P D’Mello Road. Nor do the elders who frequent a shelter created for senior citizens in the garden.But, Suman Tate with Bhau Daji Laud Museum, Byculla, however, confirms that Bhandarkar Hill was the place where the Mazgaon fort stood. ‘‘After the Siddis captured the Sewri fort, they attacked the Mazgaon fort. I came across references to a battle between Chhatrapati Shivaji’s son Sambhaji and Siddi Yakut on this fort, but that needs to be confirmed. I even remember seeing a cannon there several years ago,’’ says Tate, who is engaged in a research project on Mumbai’s forts.The Bombay Gazetteer, a highly detailed account of the city by the British, provides a fascinating glimpse into the strategic location of the Sewri Fort and the ferocity of the invasions by the Siddis, the generals of North African origin who worked with Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. The Siddis repeatedly attacked the islands in Mumbai harbour from 1672, at a time when the British had acquired the island city from the Portuguese but were yet to shift their trading headquarters from Surat to Mumbai. The increasing invasions by the Siddi fleets were one of the reasons why the East India Company finally moved its base to secure the Mumbai harbour.There are references to show that the Siddis terrorised Mumbai’s natives; they drove people from their houses, pillaged and burnt their homes, adorned the heads of massacred Marathas on poles along the Mazgaon shore, and sold Maratha captives in the town market.According to the Gazetteer, the most ambitious of Siddi invasions was in 1689, when Siddi Yakut, backed by 20,000 men, stormed Mumbai. The fleet first captured the Sewri fort, plundered Mahim town, and moved towards Mazgaon. The news that the Siddis had arrived at Sewri frightened Mazgaon the ‘‘natives’’ so much that they abandoned the fort.Despite British Governor Sir John Child’s attempt to dislodge the Siddi, he had captured virtually the whole of the island city except the fortified British garrison in South Mumbai. The Siddi siege, from April to December of 1689, forced the British to survive on stocked food, and eventually strike a deal with Aurangzeb to get rid of him.The Gazetteer notes that in December, Child despatched envoys to Aurangzeb to buy peace. In February, 1690, the Mughal emperor issued an order agreeing to withdraw the Siddi fleet if the British paid Rs 1.5 lakh and sacked Child as governor.Siddi Yakut eventually withdrew his forces on June 8, 1690, but before leaving Mazgaon, he burnt and destroyed the fort in a single act of defiance.After the decline of the regional powers, the fort was subsequently used to house prisoners. It was later converted as a Bombay Port Trust godown.
The fort was built primarily for defence, and embellishments are absent. It is bordered by high stone walls, including an inner ring for added protection. It is landlocked on three sides, and sits atop of sheer cliff of about 60 m (197 ft).Today it is in a pitiable state, just like other heritage monuments in Mumbai:(( The plight of these monuments is not solely due to the neglect of the authorities but also due to the indifference of the elite. Since we cannot depend on the authorities, who are always short on money and imagination, it is the people who should take the initiative to preserve these structures.
The Sewri Fort is currently owned by Maharashtra state's Department of Archaeology and Museums. It is classified as a Grade I heritage structure, and efforts are underway under Phase I of Mumbai Fort Circuit Project to restore it.The restoration involves the creation of two zones. Zone I includes the immediate fort area. The crumbling walls are to be repaired, debris cleared off, roofs rebuilt, steps fixed and a garden created in the complex. A museum is also to be constructed. Zone II renovation consists of the surrounding areas that belong to the Mumbai Port Trust. In this, a sea-facing promenade is to be created that links the fort to the waterfront, along with the creation of a landscaped garden, food court, and amphitheater. The total cost for this project estimated in 2008 is Rs. 3.65 crore (US$ 732,000).The strategic location of the fort would also promote ornithology as the area overlooks the Sewree mudflats, that are frequented by migratory birds, particularly the lesser flamingos. Mumbai is never short when it comes to surprises. One of the surprises is the arrival of beautiful flamingos in this highly polluted and crowded metropolis. Currently these flamingos are in the news as plans for the construction of the Sewri-Navi Mumbai bridge are taking shape. Environmentalists are voicing their concerns as they see a total destruction of this habitat.The huge expanse of colorless mud flats in Sewri glow with the arrival of countless pink lesser flamingos. For 6 months this area gets a look of an exotic bird sanctuary. They are coming to Mumbai since the early 90s and stay on these mudflats from October to April/May.
Nearly 10,000 Greater Flamingos and Lesser Flamingos can now be spotted in large groups on the wet and marshy mudflats of Sewri bay.We decided to go on impulse after our Bandra-Worli sealink tour & I drove there on pure memory from our school-trip!‘‘No one knows exactly where the flamingos come from at this time of the year. Some experts feel that the birds fly here from the Rann of Kutch, where they normally breed,’’ Isaac Kehimkar, the spokesperson of Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), said in a DNA interview.Best time to watch them is between high tide and low tide. A good pair of binoculars, a cap and patience are the only things required to make this visit a memorable experience.
Apart from flamingos, numerous other species including gulls, terns and waders can also be spotted at Sewri. Standing there on the BPT jetty,looking down at the grease stained, rocky beach with plastic bags strewn in all directions, with the heavy rumbling of the Colgate Palmolive factory behind us, we saw a distant line of light pink covering the mudflats, the pink birds eating tiny mussels and walking about like Japanese puppets in the hot sun. I needed a better vantage. Walking away from the jetty I could see the ruined Sewree Fort above so I decided to make a photo-stop at the fort. Looking down at the mud-flats, I could visually imagine the historical sea-battles for supremacy of the Mumbai harbor. I then decided that I would keep my free weekends to explore our heritage in and around Mumbai....
I came back to the jetty at 9:00am & saw serious bird watchers with their equipment. We were given impromptu lessons by an experienced bird-watcher from the UK, who let us take a close-up view with his 30X telescope. Kids, their parents & grand-parents started arriving in droves & we decided to come another day with a foldable table & have breakfast at dawn on the jetty with Flamingos as our guests. Just as we were about to return to our respective cars, we saw this diminutive local, who came in sliding from the mud-flats towards the jetty. He was carrying his catch of fresh live crabs. Twenty crabs took him all of 5 hours in the hot sun. He gave us some education about crab-catching & also tales about the mud-skippers!!!(seen in my photograph).We saw these "skipping" fish all over the mud-flats. Mudskippers are completely amphibious fish, uniquely adapted to intertidal habitats, unlike most fish in such habitats, which survive the retreat of the tide by hiding under wet seaweed or in tidal pools. Mudskippers are quite active when out of water, feeding and interacting with one another, for example to defend their territories.Compared with fully aquatic gobies, these fish present a range of peculiar behavioral and physiological adaptations to an amphibious lifestyle. These include anatomical and behavioral adaptations that allow them to move effectively on land as well as in the water. As their name implies these fish use their fins to move around in a series of skips. They can also flip their muscular body to catapult themselves up to 60 cm into the air. We were amazed by their acrobatics & there were serious fish watchers video-filming these jumps & flips!!!
What an amazing and memorable Sunday morning!
