The following extract is taken from 'Shaping Singapore - a pictorial journey'.
"Unlike Chinatown and Kampong Glam which were areas designated by Raffles as ethnic enclaves for the Chinese and Malay-Arab communities respectively, Little India sprang spontaneously to become the commercial centre of Singapore’s mainly Southern Indian community.
Little India centres around Serangoon Road, which began life as “The Road Leading Across the Island” in Lt Jackson’s map of 1822. It cut across an agricultural hinterland of rice, “sireh” (a leaf consumed in betel-nut culture) and vegetable gardens. These were replaced in the early 20th century with the cattle trade on which the area’s prosperity was built.
By the 1940’s, however, health and sanitation problems of the cattle trade led to its gradual replacement with commercial activities as the local engine of growth. The supply of water, so essential to the cattle trade, dried up as nearby swamps were drained. In its place, the historic urban fabric of Little India, as we know it today, began to be built intensively.
Despite urbanisation, vestiges of its cattle-rearing past survive in place names such as Buffalo Road, Kerbau Road and the Kandang Kerbau Children’s and Women’s Hospital (“kerbau” means “buffalo” and “kandang” means “cage or pen” in Malay).
With its vibrant street life and wealth of historic urban fabric, Little India was gazetted as a conservation area in 1989. As in Chinatown, the URA undertook a pilot project involving 16 shophouses at Kerbau Road to demonstrate how conservation makes for good economic sense. These restoration works were completed in 1995.
Following this pilot project, private owners of the shophouses in the area began restoring and adapting the uses of their historic properties. Successful private sector conservation projects include Little India Arcade situated strategically at the “entrance” to the historic district down Serangoon Road. Meanwhile, spontaneity continues to reign in the streets of Little India."
