The road which is about three kms long, passes through a large part of the old Bangalore town area including Cottonpet, Akkipet, Balepet, Chikpet, Nagarthpet. Shopkeepers on the Nagarthpet area prefer to call their stretch of the road as Nagarthpet Main Road and those along the Chickpet stretch like to call it Chickpet Main road.
In reality, the road starts, on the one end, at the Cottonpet Main road, close to the Kempegowda Bus Stand. At the other end, it joins the Narasimharaja Square near the George Oakes building opposite the Corporation Office.
At the beginning of the road, there are lodges, travel agents, pawn brokers, musical instruments and tabla repairs. As the road reaches Balepet Circle, you find a number of shops specialising in bedding, blankets, woollen clothes and sewing machines. It then progresses to Chickpet where you find a number of textile and saree shops and onto Nagarthpet which has a number of electrical shops.
The Dargah Hazarath Tawakkal Mastan is a landmark on this road. It stands testimony to the City’s syncretic cultural legacy. It is associated with the Hindu’s Karaga festival. The Karaga procession annually visits the Dargah of the Sufi saint Tawakkal Mastan, and his tomb attracts both Muslim and non-Muslim pilgrims.
The dargah has been visited by many celebrities. Amitabh Bachchan, after surviving the injury during the filming of Coolie, visited the dargah, offered his thanks and gave charity to the poor. Music director A R Rahman is said to visit the dargah regularly.
Soon after the Dargah, there is a small little shop specialising in the traditional massage. Ustad Kayangadi Papanna Massage Institute has been around since 1860, operating in the same place where it started. This area was famous for wrestlers and garadis (wrestling schools). It was common for wrestlers to suffer bruises, sprains and muscle catch and they got their treatment here. This treatment was extended to the general public. They treat rheumatic pain, dislocated joints, polio, paralysis, slipped disc, stiff necks, simple fractures, sprains, and arthritis. Another old shop on this road is the Lindner and Co, stationery and paper dealers, established in 1909. S G Rao’s Military Hotel is also a vestige from the past.
OTC Road and the surrounding areas are dotted with temples, many of which have been built and patronised by communities like Devanga, Golla, Besta, Uppara, Kshaurika, Nagartha, Ganiga and Vishwakarma, and so on.
Sri Someshwara Swamy Temple, Sri Nimishamba Devi Temple, Sri Adi Shakthi Durga Parameshwari Seva Samithi Temple, Venkataramana Swamy-Gangadhareshwara-Ramadeva, Sri Kanteshwara Swamy Temple, a branch of the Raghavendra Swamy Mutt are some of the places of worship.
Dharmaraya Temple at the end of OTC Road is famous for its Karaga procession connected with Adishakti in the form of Draupadi. Karaga, a five-day festival of Tigalas, who migrated from Tamil Nadu, has many unique features such as intense religious fervour, strict rituals, unchanged traditions over centuries, a fixed route and stops for the procession, welcome and respect shown to all the temples on route. The involvement of all sections of people and the unique communal harmony displayed here is remarkable.
