The Streets That Built Me: Growing Up in India’s Cantonment Towns

From the desk of Vitasta Raina
Dated: July 2025
Time: Casual Sundays

I remember growing up in Faridkot Cantt, where we used to play chor-police on our bicycles, zooming down the streets without a care, not having to pay heed to speeding trucks or autorickshaws that might mow us down if we didn’t pay attention. Instead, the streets offered us safety, a place where even a three-ton would slow down and allow pedestrians and cyclists the right of way.

In Deolali Cantt, as young adult, I would cycle down from my house on lazy afternoons to the library, and spend the entire evening poring over books, leaving only after dark when the library closed, and I would cycle back, along the ancient banyan tree-lined roads, without double-checking behind me for unruly men. On Sundays, we would take our dogs to an open field where both the dogs and us, would run wild with the wind through the tall grass.

Nasirabad Cantt offered us an experience of open-air theatres, where the whole unit would watch movies at night under the stars, the only danger being mosquitoes in the sultry summer months. And then there was Temple Street, where a mosque, a church, a gurudwara, and a temple peacefully coexisted. I remember being perfectly at ease eating langars or attending a midnight mass.

It was only after I moved out for college in Pune and came to face-to-face with the chaotic urban geography of the cities in India-slums, garbage-ridden streets, and beggars asking for alms, did I understand how truly alien my formative years had been. I grew up in streets that offered safety, walkability, green spaces, and an intermixing of sacred geographies; planned towns that respected good urbanism.

Historically, Cantonments were military stations established by the British at strategic locations to house troops, officers, and their supporting infrastructure. Initially, these cantonments were positioned away from civilian centres, with the first three cantonments established in Barrackpore, Danapur, and St. Thomas Mount near Chennai. Under the British administration, 56 cantonments were created across the country- in hill stations like Shimla and Wellington, in Secunderabad and Pune, and in more remote areas like Deolali. These cantts were designed for control, efficiency, and segregation, ensuring that the officers' quarters were away from the barracks that housed Indian soldiers.

Plan of Pune Cantonment, 1850. Image Source: Christopher Cowell

Post Independence, the military cantonments expanded to include civilian populations. The planning of cantonments areas borrowed heavily from European Models of ‘Ideal Towns’ that emphasized hygiene, zoning, and open spaces. Residences were carefully divided: officers’ lines, soldiers’ barracks, civilian bazaars, and military headquarters were each laid out in neat sectors. Roads followed radial or grid layouts for troop movement, and there was a generous allocation of open spaces such as ‘parade grounds. 

Over time, due to urban expansion, there is a situation where cities have engulfed cantt areas, such as the case of Pune, where there is now a stark spatial divide between the city and the cantonment in its heart. This has resulted in a situation of ‘parallel urbanism’ where cantonment areas, cut off from the rush of Indian cities, and designed for discipline, are negotiating with the rest of the city that is grappling with a lack of green open spaces. 

Pune Cantt Area (Right) and Pune City (Left) showing a difference in built density and open spaces. Image Source: Google Maps

Cantt areas typically contain 4 types of land- Type A for military operations and Types B & C, which house more civilian operations that support the military area. Last year, the Government of India issued orders to merge Types B & C lands within cantonment areas with the rest of the city by handing over the administration of cantt areas to the local municipal governments. As a result, the cantonment areas of Dehradun, Deolali, and Nasirabad among others, will be handed over in phase 1. Currently, the FSI of cantt areas is 0.5, and this is set to increase as these areas are brought under local governance. 

I wonder if cities will take some notes from the tree-lined avenues of cantonment areas, or if cantt areas too will fall victim to rapid and haphazard growth. Here's an old photo of me sitting in the garden in Deolali Cantt in 2006, spaces that I hope the cities of India create and preserve. 

Shanti. 
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