Kolkata, Bengali Kalikata, formerly Calcutta, city, capital of West Bengal state, and former capital (1772–1911) of British India. It is one of India’s largest cities and one of its major ports. The city is centred on the east bank of the Hugli (Hooghly) River, once the main channel of the Ganges (Ganga) River, about 96 miles (154 km) upstream from the head of the Bay of Bengal; there the port city developed as a point of transshipment from water to land and from river to sea. A city of commerce, transport, and manufacture, Kolkata is the dominant urban centre of eastern India.

Character Of The City
Fashioned by the colonial British in the manner of a grand European capital—yet now set in one of the poorest and most overpopulated regions of India—Kolkata has grown into a city of sharp contrasts and contradictions. Kolkata has had to assimilate strong European influences and overcome the limitations of its colonial legacy in order to find its own unique identity. In the process it created an amalgam of East and West that found its expression in the life and works of the 19th-century Bengali elite and its most noteworthy figure, the poet and mystic Rabindranath Tagore.
This large and vibrant Indian city thrives amid seemingly insurmountable economic, social, and political problems. Its citizens exhibit a great joie de vivre that is demonstrated in a penchant for art and culture and a high level of intellectual vitality and political awareness. Crowds throng to Kolkata’s book fairs, art exhibitions, and concerts, and there is a lively trading of polemics on walls, which has led to Kolkata being dubbed the “city of posters.”
Yet for all of Kolkata’s vitality, many of the city’s residents live in some of the worst conditions, far removed from the cultural milieu. The city’s energy nevertheless penetrates even to the poorest areas, as a large number of Kolkatans sincerely support the efforts of those who minister to the underprivileged. In short, Kolkata remains an enigma to many Indians as well as to foreigners. It continues to puzzle newcomers and to arouse an abiding nostalgia in the minds of those who have lived there.

Landscape
City site
The location of the city appears to have been originally selected partly because of its easily defensible position and partly because of its favourable trading location. The low, swampy, hot, and humid riverbank otherwise has little to recommend it. Its maximum elevation is about 30 feet (9 metres) above sea level. Eastward from the river the land slopes away to marshes and swamplands. Similar topography on the west bank of the river has confined the metropolitan area largely to a strip 3 to 5 miles (5 to 8 km) wide on either bank of the river. Reclamation of the Salt Lake area on the northeastern fringe of the city, however, demonstrated that the spatial expansion of the city is feasible, and further reclamation projects have been undertaken to the east, south, and west of the central area.
Suburbs of Kolkata include Haora (Howrah) on the west bank, Baranagar to the north, South Dum Dum to the northeast, Behala to the south, and Garden Reach in the southwest. The whole urban complex is held together by close socioeconomic ties.

Climate
Kolkata has a subtropical climate with a seasonal regime of monsoons (rain-bearing winds). It is warm year-round, with average high temperatures ranging from about 80 °F (27 °C) in December and January to nearly 100 °F (38 °C) in April and May. The average annual rainfall is about 64 inches (1,625 mm). Most of this falls from June to September, the period of the monsoon. These months are very humid and sometimes sultry. During October and November the rainfall dwindles. The winter months, from about the end of November to the end of February, are pleasant and rainless; fogs and mists occasionally reduce visibility in the early morning hours at this season, as also do thick blankets of smog in the evenings. The atmospheric pollution has greatly increased since the early 1950s. Factories, motor vehicles, and thermal-generating stations, which burn coal, are primary causes of this pollution, but monsoon winds act as cleansing agents by bringing in fresh air masses and also hastening the removal of water pollution.

City layout
The most striking aspect of the layout of Kolkata is its rectangular north-south orientation. With the exception of the central areas where Europeans formerly lived, the city has grown haphazardly. This haphazard development is most noticeable in the fringe areas around the central core formed by the city of Kolkata and the suburb of Haora. The bulk of the city’s administrative and commercial activity is concentrated in the Barabazar district, a small area north of the Maidan (the park containing Fort William and many of the city’s cultural and recreational facilities). The layout has encouraged the development of a pattern of daily commuting that has overburdened Kolkata’s transportation system, utilities, and other municipal facilities.
Kolkata’s system of streets and roads reflects the city’s historical development. An express highway, Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue, stretches from Kolkata to Dum Dum, though most local streets are narrow. The main roads form a grid pattern primarily in the old European sector, but elsewhere road planning has a random character. Part of the reason for this has been the difficulty of providing enough river crossings; it is for the same reason that most streets and highways run from north to south. Nullahs (watercourses) and canals that require bridging also have been important factors in influencing the road pattern.

Housing
The city has an acute housing shortage. Of the persons living in institutional shelters in the Kolkata metropolitan area, more than two-thirds live in the city itself. About three-fourths of the housing units in the city are used for dwelling purposes only. There are hundreds of urban settlements called bastis, where about one-third of the city’s population lives. A basti (also spelled busti or bustee) is officially defined as “a collection of huts standing on a plot of land of at least one-sixth of an acre.” There also are bastis built on less than one-sixth of an acre (one-fifteenth of a hectare). The majority of basti dwellings are tiny, unventilated, single-story rooms, often dilapidated. They have few sanitary facilities, and there is very little open space. The government has sponsored basti improvement and resettlement programs.

People
More than four-fifths of the population is city: other than Indians, groups present include a variety of peoples from elsewhere in Asia (notably Bangladeshis and Chinese), Europeans, North Americans, and Australians. Kolkata was segregated under British rule, the Europeans living in the city centre and Indians living to the north and south. The pattern of segregation has continued in the modern city, although the distribution is now based on religious, linguistic, educational, and economic criteria. Shantytowns and low-income residential areas, however, exist side-by-side with more affluent areas.
The density of population is extremely high, and overcrowding has reached virtually intolerable proportions in many sections of the city. Kolkata experienced a high rate of population growth for more than a century, and events such as the partitioning of Bengal in 1947 and warfare in Bangladesh in the early 1970s precipitated massive population influxes. Large refugee colonies also have sprung up in the northern and southern suburbs. In addition, a great number of migrants from other states—mostly from neighbouring Bihar and Orissa and eastern Uttar Pradesh—have come to Kolkata in search of employment.

Economy
Kolkata’s position as one of India’s preeminent economic centres is rooted in its manufacturing industries, its financial and trade activities, and its role as a major port; it is also a major centre for printing, publishing, and newspaper circulation, as well as for recreation and entertainment. Among the products of Kolkata’s hinterland have been coal, iron, manganese, mica, petroleum, tea, and jute. Unemployment, however, has been a continuing and growing problem since the 1950s.

Manufacturing
Kolkata is the centre of India’s large jute-processing industry. The jute industry was established in the 1870s, and mills now extend north and south of the city centre on both banks of the Hugli River. Engineering constitutes the city’s other major industry. In addition, city factories produce and distribute a variety of consumer goods—notably foodstuffs, beverages, tobacco, and textiles—other light manufactures, and chemicals. Kolkata’s industries have been in a general decline since Indian independence in 1947. Major factors contributing to this decline have been the loss of the eastern part of Bengal at independence, an overall decline in Kolkata’s industrial productivity, and the lack of industrial diversification in the city.

Finance, trade, and other services
The Kolkata stock exchange plays an important part in the organized financial market of the country. Foreign banks also have a significant business base in Kolkata, although the city’s importance as an international banking centre has declined. In addition, coal mines, jute mills, and large-scale engineering industries are controlled from offices in the city. State and national chambers of commerce are based in Kolkata as well.
The mercantile nature of the city’s economy is reflected in the fact that about two-fifths of the workers are employed in trade and commerce. Other important occupations include public-sector service in government departments, financial institutions, and medical and educational institutions. Private-sector services include the stock exchange, medical and educational services, legal services, accountancy and credit firms, and various utility services.

Cultural Life
Kolkata is perhaps the most important cultural centre of India. The city is the birthplace of modern Indian literary and artistic thought and of Indian nationalism, and its citizens have made great efforts to preserve Indian culture and civilization. The blending of Eastern and Western cultural influences over the centuries has stimulated the creation of numerous and diverse organizations that contribute to Kolkata’s cultural life. In addition to the universities, these include the Asiatic Society of Bengal, the Bengal Literary Society (Bangiya Sahitya Parishad), the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, the Academy of Fine Arts, the Birla Academy of Art and Culture, and the Maha Bodhi Society.

Museums and libraries
Greater Kolkata has more than 30 museums, which cover a wide variety of fields. The Indian Museum, founded in 1814, is the oldest in India; the archaeology and numismatic sections contain valuable collections. The exhibits at Victoria Memorial Hall trace Britain’s relations with India. The Asutosh Museum of Indian Art in the University of Calcutta has exhibits of the folk art of Bengal among its collections. Science City, a large science museum and entertainment complex, was among the first of its kind in Asia. Valuable library collections are to be found in the Asiatic Society of Bengal, the Bengal Literary Society, and the University of Calcutta; the National Library is the largest in India and contains a fine collection of rare books and manuscripts.