Plaque In Memory Of Gerasim Stepanovitch Lebedev - Memorial in Kolkata - Kolkata, India

Gerasim Stepanovich Lebedev ( 1749-1817 ) was a Russian adventurer,translator,musician and writer lived in Calcutta for 10 years from 1787 to 1797.

Lebedev lived in Calcutta (now Kolkata), then the capital of British India, for about ten years. During his stay, he learnt Hindi, Sanskrit and Bengali from a local schoolteacher named Golokhnath Das. In exchange, Lebedev had to teach Das violin and European music. With the support of a Russian doctor, then practicing in Calcutta, he was soon established as a musician. Tickets for his musical programmes were priced at Rs. 12. Lebedev was the first person to use Indian tunes on Western musical instruments. With assistance from local intellectuals, Lebedev founded the first European-style proscenium drama theatre in India. This theatre opened in Calcutta in 1795. Lebedev translated two plays into Bengali; they were Love is the Best Doctor and The Disguise. These two were the first performances in the theatre, with music composed by Lebedev himself and lyrics borrowed from the Bengali poet Bharatchandra Ray. The theatre Lebedev established at Domtala (Ezra Street) used for the first time Bengali actors and actresses. The show held on 27 November 1795 is considered the first performance of the modern Indian theatre. At that time there were two theatre halls for the English in Calcutta. Lebedev was so successful that it aroused envy in Englishmen and two of them burnt down his theatre. Lebedev's attempt was somewhat premature, but it proved that a nucleus of clients ready to pay for public performances had already been formed in the city. He compiled a small Bengali dictionary, wrote a book on arithmetic in Bengali and translated part of Annadamangal into Russian. His dictionary was published in 1801. He wrote to the Russian ambassador in London about publishing Bharatchandra Ray's works in Russia. However, the British administration was not supportive of Lebedev's activities and was annoyed by his sympathetic stance towards the Indians. He also lost a court case against an employee, theatre decorator Joseph Batsh and was broken financially. Finally, the British authorities expelled him from India in 1797. Lebedev stopped in London on his way back to Russia. In London he published Grammar of the Pure and Mixed East Indian Languages which was based on his studies of the character of some of the Indian languages, their sources of origin and affinity with Asian and European languages. On his return to Russia he was employed by the Foreign Ministry. He established in St. Petersburg a printing house equipped with Devanagari and Bengali scripts, the first of its kind in Europe. He published his second book Unbiased observations on Brahmincustoms ("Bespristrastnoe sozertsanie bragmenskikh obychaev..."), and prepared two other books but could not finish those due to illness. Lebedev died in his printing house on 15 July (O.S.; 27 July [N.S.]) 1817 and was interred in the Gergiev Cemetery of Bolshaya Okhta in Saint Petersburg. - Source Wikipedia

Market place, very congested but everything is available in wholesale rates.

Great thought's. ..need to be maintained

Very nice of you start feeling

A real historic landmark

Goood

Poorly maintained