Just a short update on Santiniketan from me, as the previous two reviewers already have covered it well. The site fails so many of the WHS Commandments at the moment that a visit is a poor investment of time and money. On paper, I can see there is “something” worth acknowledging but in reality, I don’t know what message they are trying to convey to the world. Or whether they care about outside visitors at all. The place is run by a kind of ‘Education Trust’, which already worried ICOMOS, as it plays by its own rules.
The most interesting things to see are the quirky buildings, which could be labelled as ‘modernist vernacular’. Here again, I have to concur with ICOMOS in its evaluation: they aren’t notable from an architectural perspective, you have to consider them as part of the overall idea of an early 20th-century utopian university community in a rural setting.
Some practical things to keep in mind:
As described in detail by Stanislaw, the Visva-Bharati Campus is now firmly closed to outsiders, even with signs “Tourists not allowed”. Thus you will miss out on some of the highlights such as the Kala Bhavan (Art School) with the tarred Kalo Bari, unless you are prepared to go through all the hoops of acquiring permission and are lucky enough to get it.
The foreigners’ entrance fee to the Rabindra Bhavana (Tagore museum) has risen to a ridiculous 1,000 rs (ca. 11.5 EUR). I would almost say: don’t go there (the museum’s content is only interesting to Tagore aficionados anyway), but you’d miss out on the 5 additional buildings in the backyard which are a representative set of the Santiniketan ‘style’. At least you can view those up close and take pictures. They include the mud house Shyamali (pictured).
I took the 10.05 train from Kolkata, with a return at 17.37. This left me with too many (5.5) hours at Santiniketan: I saw all there is to see now, hiked the Santiniketan - Sriniketan road westward for another km to see more buildings, had lunch in a café, walked all the way back to Bolpur Railway Station and still had 1.5 hours to spare before the train arrived. 2-3 hours at the site would be plenty.
Don’t go on a Wednesday or Thursday (museum is closed) or on the weekend (fewer trains from Kolkata & university buildings closed).