The Hornby Vellard was a project to build a

causeway A causeway is a track, road or railway on the upper point of an embankment across "a low, or wet place, or piece of water". It can be constructed of earth, masonry, wood, or concrete. One of the earliest known wooden causeways is the Sweet T ...

uniting all

seven islands of Bombay The Seven Islands of Bombay ( Portuguese: ''Ilhas de Bom Baim'') were 16th-century Portuguese colonial possessions lying off the Konkan region by the mid-west coast of India. History They were partly handed over to England under this tit ...

into a single island with a deep natural harbour. The project was started by the governor William Hornby in 1782 and all islands were linked by 1838. The word ''vellard'' appears to be a local corruption of the Portuguese word ''vallado'' meaning fence or embankment. The seven islets – their anglicised names being Colaba, Old Woman’s Island, Bombay, Mazgaon, Parel, Mahim and Worli – came to the British in 1661 as part of the dowry of Charles II, who married into the Portuguese royal family. Bombay was quickly palmed off to the East India Company for a paltry £10 a year and later the company identified that more land means more money hence got interested in the project. The purpose of this causeway was to block the Worli creek and prevent the low-lying areas of Bombay from being flooded at high tide. The cost was estimated at ₹£100,000. It was completed in 1784 and was one of the first major

civil engineering Civil engineering is a regulation and licensure in engineering, professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads ...

projects that transformed the original seven islands of Bombay into one island. According to some accounts, Hornby ordered the work to be started after the

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

turned down his proposal; and continued as Governor till the end of his term in 1785, ignoring the suspension notice sent to him.

Citations and references

Citations References * * History of Mumbai {{India-struct-stub