Kolkata district

 ( Districts Of West Bengal ) 

After the Treaty of Allahabad, the East India Company was granted Diwani rights (the right to collect taxes), in 1765, in the eastern province of Bengal-Bihar-Odisha. In 1772, Kolkata became the capital of East India Company's territories, and in 1793, the English took full control of the city and the province. Development of Kolkata's infrastructure started and in the early 19th century, the marshes surrounding the city were drained. In the 19th century, Kolkata was the epicentre of the epoch-changing socio-cultural movement, the Bengal Renaissance. The 20th century unfolded historical events in Kolkata – the Swadeshi movement, the first partition of Bengal along communal lines, shifting of the national capital from Kolkata to Delhi in 1911 – and Kolkata emerged as an important hub of the independence movement. With the experience and memories of the Bengal famine of 1943, the Great Calcutta Killings, the final partition of Bengal, and independence of the country, Kolkata moved on to a new era of challenges, with millions of refugees pouring in from neighbouring East Pakistan (later Bangladesh).

Before partition of Bengal, Kolkata had offered education and job opportunities to the people from East Bengal. Kolkata had taken in about a quarter of a million East Bengali migrants long before partition. After partition of Bengal, the number of refugees moving in from East Bengal were so high that large stretches of rural or semi urban habitation were transformed into towns, the density of population, particularly in areas with high refugee population, jumped by leaps. The outer limits of Kolkata were extended. The entire process of urbanisation was hastened. In the fifties 25% of the population of Metropolitan Kolkata were refugees. In 1975, a CMDA report suggested that there were 1,104 squatter colonies in West Bengal, out of which 510 were in Calcutta Metropolitan District. In 1981, a refugee rehabilitation committee set up by the state government put the figures for refugees in the state at 8 million. The break up for Kolkata is not available. The central government had decided that 25 March 1971 was the cut off date for entry of refugees from former East Pakistan into India and so, all those coming in after that date are either immigrants or infiltrators – there were no more refugees, at least officially/legally.

The socio-economic conditions that led to the growth of Kolkata, were urbanising a much larger territory. Right form the 16th century, a number of townships, based on trade and commerce, had sprung up along both banks of the Hooghly. None of these townships withered away as Kolkata gained supremacy, rather they got integrated with the core of the city. In 1951, census operations in West Bengal first recognised a continuous industrial area stretching from Bansberia to Uluberia on the west bank of the Hooghly River, and from Kalyani to Budge Budge on the east bank. It was ultimately recognised as the Kolkata urban agglomeration, with the city as its core.Chakraborty, Satyesh C., "The Growth of Calcutta in the Twentieth Century", in “Calcutta, The Living City” Vol II, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Pages 4–6, First published 1990, 2005 edition,

Kolkata has always been a city of migrants. They are the people who have made the city so large. In the first half of the 20th century the largest group of migrants were the working-class people from Bihar. After 1947, they were overtaken in numbers by the refugees from East Pakistan. A comparatively lesser number of people from the surrounding areas have migrated to the city, because a huge population commutes to the city for work and returns to their villages. They are not counted in the census data for Kolkata. The promise of a better quality of life may have been an initial attraction for the migrants, but bulk of the poorer sections soon realized that poverty in Kolkata was as severe and dehumanising as in the villages they left behind. However, many of them found opportunities of income in the urban economy. Some of them managed a place in industry, because of the preferential treatment they got as a result of people in their community vouching for them. A 1976 survey revealed that the proportion of workers from outside West Bengal were 71% in the jute industry, 58% in textile mills and 73% in iron and steel units. The Chamars from the Hindi heartland, many of whom work in the leather industry, have been here for more than a century. As per the 1951 census, only 33.2% of Kolkata's inhabitants were city-born. The rest, including a small group of foreigners, were migrants. 12.3% came from elsewhere in West Bengal, 26.3% from other states in India and 29.6% were refugees from East Pakistan.Chatterjee, Partha, "Political Culture of Calutta", in “Calcutta, The Living City” Vol II, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Page 29, First published 1990, 2005 edition, Bandyopadhyay, Raghab, "The Inheritors: Slum and Pavement Life in Calcutta", in “Calcutta, The Living City” Vol II, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Page 79, First published 1990, 2005 edition, Chatterjee, Nilanjana, "The East Bengal Refugees: A Lesson in Survival", in “Calcutta, The Living City” Vol II, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Page 70, First published 1990, 2005 edition,

This brings us on to another aspect of the city. The slum population has grown at a much faster rate than the total city population, thereby indicating a growing ratio of the impoverished working population of the city. "Geographically, Calcutta is in a unique position vis-à-vis the whole of eastern India. The growth and prosperity of the region must involve Calcutta. How it will grow… is the great question to be answered."Ghosh, Ambikaprasad Ghosh, assisted by Chatterjee, Kaushik, The Demography of Calcutta, in “Calcutta, The Living City” Vol II, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Page 57, First published 1990, 2005 edition,

P. Thankappan Nair writes, “The six square miles within the Maratha Ditch (the original core of Calcutta) thus came to have the world’s highest density of population in that age. It was a heterogeneous population, sinking differences of caste, creed and colour under the sheer compulsion to interact and survive together. The compulsion has grown stronger ever since, as has the spirit it fostered. Hence Calcutta did not disintegrate when the capital was shifted to New Delhi in 1912. It has kept growing and living by the ever-renewed confidence and vitality of its inherent human forces.”Nair, P.Thankappan, The Growth and Development of Old Calcutta, in Calcutta, the Living City, Vol. I, p. 23, Edited by Sukanta Chaudhuri, Oxford University Press, 1995 edition.

Kolkata district is bounded by the North 24 Parganas district on the north and on the east, South 24 Parganas district on the south and Howrah district, across the Hooghly, on the west.

In terms of area, it is the smallest amongst all the districts of West Bengal but has the highest density of population. It is the only district in the state with cent percent urban population. It has the lowest Scheduled Caste (5.38%) and Scheduled Tribe (0.24%) population in the state. Kolkata district is the only district in the state with a negative growth rate (−1.7%) for the 2001–2011 decade. Kolkata district has the second highest literacy rate (86.3%) in the state.

Kolkata metropolitan area, extending over an area of 1851.41 km², is one of the six metropolitan areas in India. It includes the entire Kolkata Municipal Corporation area.

The Kolkata district collector is responsible for several citizen centric services which are neither being provided by the KMC nor Kolkata Police.