The British passion for surveying and cartography has led to the Indian countryside being dotted with zero stones. The indefatigable administrators of the Raj placed them in the general post offices of large cities and towns. Recently, one such zero stone was unearthed from Pune, half-buried under a pavement, functioning as a platform for a fruit vendor to display his wares. It is the boast of many a swish Mumbaiwala that the city revolves around them, but in reality, the people of Mumbai are divided about where its exact centre really lies. The zero milestone, that marks the centre of the city, has no fixed address in our address-obsessed city, with three different locations laying claim to being Mumbai’s Zero Mile. Shweta Karnik reports



The golden milestone

The stone that marks zero miles is also called the Golden Milestone. It was those master-road-builders, the Romans, who first defined the centre of Imperial Rome with the 'Millarium Aureum’ or the ‘Golden Milestone' in 20 BC. This 2.5m tall and 1.2m diameter marble cylinder marked the point from which the major Imperial highways radiated — the Via Aurelia, Via Appia and Via Flaminia. This stone and even its exact location has been lost, as road construction in Rome in 1835 has erased the foundations. The principle of a single datum for a city was rediscovered with the great expansion of road building in the 20th century. That for England, became a statue at Trafalgar Square, and for America, outside the White House.



The Asiatic Society Library

One of Mumbai’s oldest and most elegant landmarks, the sweeping staircase and Doric columns of the Asiatic Society Library provide a scenic possibility for city centre. Its position as one of the oldest public structures in the city lends weight to its claims of being zero mile. In addition, says historian Sharada Dwivedi, “There is a stone beside the steps which has '0' carved on it. It indicates the datum level [a level surface, such as mean sea level, which is used as a reference from which elevations are reckoned].”

St Thomas Cathedral Church at Horniman Circle

This location would place zero mile in the spiritual centre of the British settlement in Bombay. Built in 1718, the church’s claims to marking the point where city limits begin is rooted in the fact that it was the first place of worship built by the British in the city. “Since it is one of the oldest structures in the city, it could be the starting point,” says Abha Lambah, conservation architect.



The Anglican church itself has an interestingly chequered history. Work on constructing a garrison-church began in 1674. During 1681-90, its walls were raised to 15 feet before work started to peter off. The bare walls of the half-built church were left in neglect for a generation, until the foundation stone of a new edifice was laid by deputy governor Stephen Strutt on November 18, 1715. On Christmas Day, 1718 the church was formally opened by order of Governor Charles Boone.



General Post Office

All across the country, the GPO is the standard location from where distances are measured. There’s no X that marks the spot, but in Mumbai too, it’s the GPO (near Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus) which is widely considered to be the zero mile. It was established in 1794 by the then postmaster general of Mumbai Presidency, Charles Elphinstone. Before the present building, Mumbai had only an agency post office. In those days, this GPO was housed in a coterie of small buildings near Apollo Pier. k_shweta@dnaindia.net