Information from Wikipedia:
- Area: 126.1 mi²
- Weather: 84°F (29°C), Wind SW at 12 mph (19 km/h), 80% Humidity
- Local time: Wednesday 6:12 PM
- Hotels: 3-star averaging $50, 5-star averaging $100. View hotels
Surat is mentioned in the Sanskrit epic, the Mahābhārata, when Lord Krishna stopped there on his way from Mathura to Dwarka. The Parsis began to settle there in the 8th century.
Local Hindu traditions state that the city was founded in the last years of the fifteenth century B.C.E. by a Brahman named Gopi, who called it Suryapūr (City of the Sun).
In 1512 and again in 1530 Surat was ravaged by the Portuguese Empire. In 1513, the Portuguese traveller Duarte Barbosa described Surat as an important seaport, frequented by many ships from Malabar and various parts of the world. By 1520, the name of the city was Surat.
When the harbour in Cambay began to silt up toward the end of fifteenth century, Surat eclipsed Cambay as the major port of western India. At the end of the 16th century, the Portuguese were undisputed masters of the Surat sea trade. On the banks of the Tapti River, there is still a picturesque fortress that was built in 1540.
In 1608, ships from the English East India Company started docking in Surat, using it as a trade and transit point. In 1615, following the Battle of Swally, Captain Best, followed by Captain Downton, overcame Portuguese naval supremacy and obtained an imperial firman establishing an English factory at Surat. The city was made the seat of a presidency of the East India Company after the success of the embassy God of Wealth.
The prosperity of Surat received a blow when Bombay was ceded to the English as part of the dowry for Catherine of Braganza's wedding to Charles II in 1662. Shortly afterwards, in 1668, the East India Company established a factory in Bombay (Mumbai) and Surat began its decline.
In the 1680s the future prominent architect and dramatist John Vanbrugh, then a young man, was for several years employed by the East India Company at their trading post in Surat - where his uncle, Edward Pearce, was the Governor.
By 1687, the English East India Company moved the presidency to Bombay. At its height, Surat's population reached 800,000, but by the middle of the 19th century the number had fallen to 80,000. The British re-took control of Surat in 1759 and assumed all government powers of the city in 1800
In 1730, Baghdadi Jew Joseph Semah arrived in Surat from Baghdad and founded the Surat synagogue and cemetery. The synagogue is now demolished but the cemetery can still be found on the Katargam-Amroli main road.
A fire and a flood in 1837 destroyed many of the buildings of Surat. Among the interesting monuments that survived the destruction are the tombs of English and Dutch merchants and their families, dating to the 17th century, including those of the Oxenden brothers.
By the early 20th century, the city's population had climbed to 119,000, and Surat was again a center of trade and manufacturing although some of its former industries, such as shipbuilding, no longer existed. There were cotton mills, factories for ginning and pressing cotton, rice-cleaning mills, and paper mills. Fine cotton goods were woven on hand looms, and there were manufactures of silk brocade and gold embroidery (known as Jari). The chief trades were organised in guilds.
In 1994, a combination of heavy rains and blocked drains led to flooding in the city. Dead street animals and public waste were not removed in time and a plague epidemicspread through the city, which caused a number of countries to impose travel restrictions on people travelling from India, especially those heading to the Persian Gulf. The municipal commissioner during that time, S. R. Rao, and the people of Surat worked hard in the late 1990s to clean up the city.
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