Why is the Ping Yuen river in Hong Kong called River Ganges?

score:11

Accepted answer

The wikipedia article you cite has a Chinese equivalent which explains the origin of the surname.

平原河昔日的英文名稱（River Ganges）與印度的恆河相同，這是英國在租借新界後派遣印度籍的測量師所命名的。

Which translates roughly as

The former English name of the Ping Yuen River (River Ganges) came from the river Ganges in India, because Indian surveyors were sent there after the British lease of the New territories.

The New Territories (新界) were leased to the British in 1898 as a huge extension to the original 1841 (Hong Kong) and following 1860 (Kowloon) leases.
The British authorities immediately set out to plot the land and drew up the so called Block Crown Lease (and its associated Block Crown Lease Schedule representing how much annual rent was payable for each lot).

To complete this survey of the new Territories, the British authorities used Indian surveyors. They produced cadastral plans (1899-1904) - first at the scale of 16 inches to the mile then at a larger scale of 32 inches to the mile.
It is a well documented fact that Indian surveyors, engineers, medical practitioners and civil servants were dispatched all around the British Colonies not only in South Asia but also in Africa (Kenya, RSA...) to assist in the administration of Queen Victoria's Empire.

So settlers, probably not. But surveyors surely. As to whether they were originally from Bengal and compared the Ping Yuan River to the Ganges is not said.
Yet surveyors are also map makers and it is not too much of a stretch to imagine that they could have used a name they knew to shorten the local name "平原河".

Upvote:-4

In my point of view, the name might be given by south indian kings who were invaded south east asia like Rajendra Chola - 1. We could find many hindu temples and other landmarks allover south east asia (i.e Khmer Empire, Anghor wat hindu temple very near to hongkong,Ayuthya in thailand named after indian historical city ayodhya , Many Hindu temples in Indonesia, and etc).

So probably the holy name of river goddess Ganges might be given to Ping Yuen by South indian.

Upvote:0

I was told by my father, who worked as a civil engineer in Hong Kong in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, that the New Territories were surveyed by a unit from the British Indian Army. Hence they chose to name some rivers after the more famous ones at home, eg Indus, Ganges, etc.

More post

Search Posts

Related post