Dagshai

Dagshai, also known as Daagh-e-Shahi, is one of the oldest cantonment towns in the Solan district of Himachal Pradesh, India.

It is situated on top of a 5,689-foot (1,734-m) high hillock that stands sphinx-like astride the Kalka-Shimla Highway at a point about 11 km from Solan.

During the Moghul times a Daagh-e-Shahi (royal mark) was put on the forehead of the criminals and sent packing to the then Dagshai village.

It is on the same height as Lawrence School Sanawar near Kasauli, and is a short drive from Dharampur on the Chandigarh Shimla highway.

There is a railway station on the Kalka Simla line at Kumar Hatti, from where Dagshai is about 1.5 kilometers uphill.

Following a mutiny by Irish soldiers in 1920, in support of the independence struggle then unfolding in Ireland, dozens of mutineers were incarcerated at Dagshai Prison.

Dagshai army barracks and parade ground circa 1918; now schools and playing fields