Husainabad Clock Tower is a clock tower located in the

Lucknow Lucknow (, ) is the capital and the largest city of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and it is also the second largest urban agglomeration in Uttar Pradesh. Lucknow is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous district and division ...

city of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. It was constructed in 1881 by Hussainabad Trust to mark the arrival of Sir

George Couper Sir George Ebenezer Wilson Couper, 2nd Baronet, (29 April 1824 – 5 March 1908) was a British civil servant in India. Biography Couper was the eldest son of Colonel Sir George Couper, Chief Equerry and Comptroller of the Household of Prin ...

, the first lieutenant governor of the United Province of Avadh. It was built at a cost of Rs. 1.75 lakhs.

History

It is located adjacent to the

Rumi Darwaza The Rumi Darwaza (Hindi: रूमी दरवाज़ा, Urdu: , and sometimes known as the Turkish Gate), in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India, is an imposing gateway which was built by Nawab Asaf-Ud-Daula in 1784. It is an example of Awadh ...

, near to

Bara Imambara Bara Imambara, also known as Asfi Imambara is an imambara complex in Lucknow, India built by Asaf-ud-Daula, Nawab of Awadh in 1784. ''Bara'' means ''big''. This imambara is the second largest after the Nizamat Imambara. Building composition ...

and

Teele Wali Masjid Teele is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Arthur Teele (1946–2005), American lawyer and politician * Jack Teele (1930–2017), American football executive and sportswriter * Stanley F. Teele (1906–1967), American academic ...

. Built in the year 1881, Husainabad Clock Tower is adjudged as the tallest among all the clock towers in India. it was built as a replica of the Big Ben clock tower of London. Richard Roskell Bayne designed this structure, in height, and it reflects Victorian and

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

style structural designs.

Gunmetal Gun metal, also known as red brass in the United States, is a type of bronze; an alloy of copper, tin and zinc. Proportions vary but 88% copper, 8–10% tin, and 2–4% zinc is an approximation. Originally used chiefly for making guns, it has ...

is used for building the clock parts. Its gigantic pendulum has a length of 14 feet, and the dial of the clock is designed in the shape of a 12-fully gold flower and bells around it.

Clock tower

In 2010, the district administration decided to replace the clock. But then two samaritans Captain Paritosh Chauhan and Akhilesh Agarwal approached the administration to allow them to repair it so that the mechanical clock is not replaced with an electronic one. It was Captain Chauhan's passion and love for his city that he requested the then DM, Amit Ghosh to give him a chance to repair it. They worked on it for three years and reconstructed the entire clock on a pro bono basis. On 13 April 2010, they began working and were able to make the defunct clock functional by 28 October 2010. Finally, on 13 September 2011, they made the giant clock tower chime, after a silence of 27 long years.

References

{{Lucknow Clock towers in India Buildings and structures in Lucknow Tourist attractions in Lucknow 1881 establishments in India