Look like West Bengal now has a 'Goa' of its own. With peppy night music and restaurants that serve drinks and fresh sea food, the idyllic coastal belt of Digha is slowly transforming to give a feel of the beaches of Goa.
Rows of restaurants have sprung up along the Digha beaches, mostly at Shankarpur. Some of these restaurants provide hookah pipes, too. Wading through the waters of the Bay of Bengal, tourists mostly rush to these restaurants after bath for a can of beer or a few sips of white rum or vodka.
Fresh, delectable food is a highlight of the region. You can order your drink and wait for the food to be served on the table—steaming rice, dal with crispy potato fry to begin with, followed by fish, crab, lobster or tiger prawns. Rohu and local fishes like pershe and morula are generally served as starters.
Swapan Debnath, a restaurant owner who hails from Contai, said, “We always try to give best food to customers who are all tourists. They spent lot of money to come here. We cannot cheat them.” Debnath, however, said that he had never been to Goa but has heard that the ambience of Goa was similar.
“Since the chief minister wants to transform our Digha to Goa we also brought the same flavour of Goa to Digha,” he said.
Shankarpur comes alive at night, too. Night revelry goes on till midnight with music and local orchestra. All said, there is one factor that hampers Sankarpur—poor road connectivity. Though a road is being constructed, it is not wide enough to let many cars. Shankarpur also lacks good hotels where tourists can stay on. People mostly travel from Digha to Shankarpur and spend good time there till late evening.
With lush green jhau forests and relatively cleaner beaches than other parts of Bengal coasts, Shankarpur has the potential to become a hot tourist destination. The recent travel survey published in THE WEEK magazine terms Digha as one of the hot coastal tourist destination in India.
However, many of such restaurants are selling liquor or hookah without the approval of local Digha-Shankarpur development authorities. Ananda Debnath, another owner, said, “Please don’t make it an issue. We trying to turn it as a hot destination for tourists. Nothing was there till five years back. We will do the needful soon.”
Akhil Giri, vice chairman of the local development authority, said, “I will see whether they have taken license or not. If not, we will slap heavy fine on them.”
What is, however, needed are not fines but infrastructural development for Bengal's Goa.
