Landmarks

Sites & Landmarks

From Arikamedu's Roman-era ruins to the French Consulate on the seafront, Pondicherry's landmarks span more than two thousand years of history.

Promenade Beach

A 1.5 km seafront walk where fishermen cast nets at dawn and three centuries of history line the boulevard.…

Sri Aurobindo Ashram

A political refugee who became a philosopher of human transformation. Sri Aurobindo arrived in Pondicherry in…

Sacred Heart Basilica

France shipped 28 stained-glass windows from a factory in France to a tropical Indian city, not because it…

Lok Nivas

The same building. Three sovereignties. Dupleix used it to run a protectorate over half of south India. The…

Pondicherry Museum

The most undervisited museum in Pondicherry. ₹10 gets you Roman pottery from Italy, Chola bronzes of…

Bharathi Park

The ceremonial heart of French Pondicherry, and its oldest public garden. Eight acres of shaded lawns,…

Notre-Dame des Anges

On this seafront site since 1687: four churches, same spot. The twin cream towers are the first French…

Botanical Garden

1,500 plant varieties across 30 sections, including fossil plants and giant trees that have been growing since…

White Town (Ville Blanche)

A grid of ochre-yellow coral-stone mansions, bougainvillea walls, and streets named Rue Dupleix, Rue Suffren,…

French Consulate

You are looking at the French Consulate, one of the rarest buildings in the world: a colonial power's active…

French War Memorial

You are standing in front of the Monument aux Combattants, the French War Memorial on Goubert Avenue. It…

Customs Building

A circular colonial building on Goubert Avenue that has stood at the edge of Pondicherry's seafront since the…

Dupleix Statue

He won half of India for France, then his own company fired him. Standing on the seafront of what is now an…

Gandhi Statue

You are looking at the Gandhi statue on Goubert Avenue, unveiled on Republic Day, 26 January 1965, and…

Joan of Arc Statue

You are looking at a white marble statue of Joan of Arc in the small garden opposite Notre-Dame des Anges,…

Victor Schoelcher Bust

You are looking at a bust of Victor Schoelcher (1804–1893), the French politician who abolished slavery…

Old Lighthouse

Built in 1836 by colonial engineer Louis Guerre and standing 29 metres tall, the Old Lighthouse guided ships…

European Cemetery

You are standing at the European Cemetery on Rue Victor Simonel, in use since around 1700 and one of the…

Walking Tour of White Town

A two-kilometre loop through the only French colonial town in India that survived decolonisation intact.…

Golconde

India's first reinforced, cast-in-place concrete building, completed in 1942 by a Japanese-American architect…

Romain Rolland Library

Welcome to the Romain Rolland Library, founded in 1827 as the Bibliothèque Publique de Pondichéry, one of the…

La Mairie (Town Hall)

You are looking at La Mairie de Pondichéry, the Town Hall built in 1870 on Goubert Avenue facing the sea. Its…

Manakula Vinayagar Temple

One of the oldest continuously active Hindu temples in Puducherry, established before the arrival of the…