Pondicherry Lighthouse

Pondicherry is the headquarters of former French settlements in India-Pondicherry and Karaikal in Tamilnadu,Yaman in Andhra Pradesh and Mahe in Kerala. The city of Pondicherry is the typical cosmopolitan with 55 languages spoken here. Pondicherry is famous for ‘Aurovillo’; the ashram set up by Sri Aurobindo Ghosh, the Revolutionary Saint. It has the reputation of being an international city and is about 3 ½ hours drive from Madras (Chennai). The rail network terminates here.The French East India company established settlement at Pondicherry in 1673. They transformed this obscure village into a flourishing trading centre .The Dutch captured it from French in 1693 but returned it to them in 1699. The French handed over the territory to the Government of independent India in 1954. It was given the status of Union Territory on ist November 1956 so as to retain its specific identity. The early sea-farers to Pondicherry were guided by log fire kept burning on Gorimedu hill 5 km west of the port. A 25 m lighthouse standing on the sea edge near the place Du Government was built by French in 1836 and powerful wick lamp inside 5th order optic was placed on it. The lighthouse was commissioned in to service on 1st July 1836. After 50 years of service the wick lamp was replaced by a PV Burner and 4th order optical apparatus supplied by M/s BBT, Paris in 1886. In the year 1931 modification work was carried out and the fixed light was replaced by the revolving equipment supplied and installed by M/s BBT, Paris.

With the development of city lights, there arose the need to provide more powerful light on a taller tower and also the Direction Finding Radio signal transmitting system. A new Lighthouse was built in 1979.The electrically operated lighting equipment supplied by M/s. J. Stone India & Co., Calcutta and the Radio Beacon equipment, supplied by ‘Nautel’, Canada, were installed at the station. The Radio Beacon went on the Air on 15th May 1979 and the Lighthouse was commissioned on 10th December 1979. A ‘Racon’ of ‘Tide Land’,USA, make was added at the station on 14th July 1996.The Racon emits Morse code ‘D’. The Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS) equipment manufactured by M/s Leica Geo Systems, U.S.A. and supplied by M/s. Elcom Marine, Mumbai was integrated on 10th June 1998 converting the Radio Beacon to DGPS station. The old Transmitters were replaced by SAC, USA make transmitters on 30th June 2003.