Photographs from the Book "The Desire of India" by Surendra Kumar Datta - 1909

Read the full book online or download the PDF
Click on every photograph to view the larger version.

A Plague Camp

 A children's Feast

(Top) A Christian Family
(Bottom) Santal Biblewomen

A christian family and their offering

(Left) A Group of orphans
(Right) Orphan girl gathering wood

(Top) A mission hospital
(Bottom) Patients and their friends

(Top) A village school
(Bottom) Biblewomen at work

(Top) Ploughing
(Bottom) Winnowing

 Bathing at Sivaratri festival

(Left) The well of salvation, Benares
(Right) The burning ghat at Benares

Benares Ghat

(Top) Tope marking spot where Buddha first preached
(Bottom) Buddhist rock-cut temples

(Top) Church in Santalia
(Bottom) Church in Gond country

(Top) Preaching by the wayside
(Bottom) Group of Catechists

(Top) A north Indian village
(Bottom) A shanan village in Tinnevelly

(Top) Village Street
(Bottom) Village well

Industrial training school

Rice Culture

The Maharajah of Travancore

The rock at Trichinopoly

(Left) A convert and her son
(Right) A Christian Baptism

(Top) The Himalayas
(Bottom) View from the walls of Delhi

(Top) A roadside scene
(Bottom) A stretch of southern coast

(Top) The great Indian desert
(Bottom) A roadside scene in the south

(Top) Winnowing the corn
(Bottom) Grinding the corn

(Left) Famine Animal
(Right) Famine Children

(Left) Brahman
(Right) Jat (North India)

(Top) An ascetic
(Bottom) A hillside Idol

(Top) Worship of the snake god
(Bottom) Asetic before image of Ganesa

(Top) Railway Station
(Bottom) Mouth of the Ganges

(Top) On the way to church
(Bottom) A Christian home

 The tomb of Akbar the Great

(Left) Toda Men
(Right) Toda Women

Village Preaching