Kolkata

Read its story

• A port that outlived its riverWhy Calcutta was built where it was, and why the water stopped cooperating.4 chapters · about 9 min · 2 sources

Where it is

Kolkata stands on the east bank of the Hooghly, a western distributary of the Ganges, about 150 kilometres inland from the Bay of Bengal in the Bengal delta. It is very flat, very wet in the monsoon, and built on ground the river made. The city's whole existence depends on a channel that has been silting since before it was founded, kept navigable only by a barrage upstream diverting Ganges water into it.

The land and water around it

• The Hooghlyriver

  A distributary, not the main channel. It has been silting for centuries, and the Farakka barrage upstream diverts Ganges flow into it specifically to keep it moving — an entire city's port sustained by an engineering decision that its downstream neighbour objects to.

• The delta plaindelta

  Flat, low, and among the most densely populated rural landscapes on earth. Kolkata sits a few metres above sea level on it.

• The East Kolkata Wetlandslagoon

  A system of shallow ponds east of the city where sewage is treated by fish farming and vegetable growing rather than by plant. It is a working wastewater system that is also a livelihood, and it is under continuous pressure from building.

Its history, in short

The East India Company established a trading post here in the 1690s, on a site chosen because ocean-going ships could then reach it. It became the capital of British India and, for a century and a half, the largest city and principal port of the colonial economy — jute, tea, coal and opium moving out through it. It was the intellectual centre of the Bengal Renaissance and of early Indian nationalism, which is part of why the capital was moved to Delhi in 1911. Partition in 1947 cut the city from its hinterland and brought millions of refugees; the 1971 war brought millions more. Its industrial base declined through the later twentieth century, and it has been governed and argued over ever since as a city whose importance is historical and whose population is not.

Timeline

Dates are shown on a timeline rather than as changing shapes on the map. The globe draws modern boundaries only, and tinting a modern outline to stand for a historical one would state something we cannot source.

Places that carry meaning

• The Maidan18th century onward

  A vast open field cleared to give the Fort's guns a field of fire, now the city's park. Its origin is military and its use is football, cricket and grazing.

• The East Kolkata Wetlands20th century onward

  Designated under the Ramsar Convention. The ponds treat a large share of the city's sewage and produce fish and vegetables for its markets, which makes them infrastructure that pays for itself and land that developers want.

• College Street19th century onward

  A street of bookshops beside the university, and the physical centre of the print culture that carried the Bengal Renaissance — publishing, pamphleteering and argument in Bengali.

Learn the language here

1. 1Understand which languages are spoken hereKolkata is multilingual. Start with which languages are used, by whom, and for what — the phrase list only covers one of them.Written by Globe Quest
2. 2Learn 11 phrasesCurated everyday phrases for Kolkata, with audio and a written form.Written by Globe Quest
3. 3Say them out loudSpeaking practice with pronunciation feedback, one phrase at a time.Globe Quest material, your own additions
4. 4Come back to themSpaced review, so what you learned this week is still there next month.Written by Globe Quest
5. 5Read why the language is what it isThe quest for this place covers how its languages got here and who speaks them.Written by Globe Quest

Check yourself

• Why does the Hooghly need the Farakka barrage?

  To divert Ganges flow into a silting channel and keep the port navigable

  The founding advantage — a channel deep enough for ocean ships — expired, and the barrage is the engineering answer. Bangladesh objects to the diversion.

• Why did the Raj move its capital to Delhi in 1911?

  Partly to move the government away from Bengal's political agitation

  The 1905 partition of Bengal and the protest it produced were part of the reason. The city kept the industry and lost the state.

Worth arguing about

• A city founded on a channel that then silted up. How long should engineering hold a place where geography has moved on?
• A wetland that treats sewage, feeds a city and occupies land developers want. How should that be valued?

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