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Calcutta Then | Kolkata Now

Sunanda K Datta-Ray and Indrajit Hazra
Photographer: Pramod Kapoor

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Description

Calcutta Then: Calcutta is where it all began. The city symbolized India's transformation from medievalism to modernity. The British created the framework. The prophets and pioneers who operated within it were Indian. Raja Rammohan Roy linked past and present. After him came the poets, patriots and politicians. They made banian, boxwallah, bhadr...alok and biplab trader, company executive, gentleman and revolutionary the four props of the new metropolitan culture that inspired Gopal Krishna Gokhale's memorable comment, What Bengal thinks today, India thinks tomorrow.'

Much water has flown down the Hooghly since then. But the lifestyle that evolved in the city is still the hallmark of success throughout the country. Calcutta was modern India's first capital, from 1772 to 1931. Announcing the shift to Delhi during his visit to Calcutta, King George V declared, Calcutta must always remain the premier city of India. Its population, its importance as a commercial centre and great emporium of trade, its splendid historical traditions, all continue to invest Calcutta with a unique character which should preserve to it a pre-eminent position.'

Kolkata Now: Love it, endure it, call it what you will, Kolkata is Life as kh?os' as no other city is. Once a bubble, holding out the rest of Bengal and, indeed, India it is today a city that contains a multitude of cities: Kolkata, Calcutta, Kalkatta?. Its cosmopolitanism and liberal values are clich?s because they are true, even as they stand witness to its past insurrections and present anomalies as much as to its genius to enjoy life through pujo, mishti, Culture (always with a capital C'), neighbourhood addas, fajlami (innocent naughtiness), football and fish. For visitors and those who once left the city, it can be a walk through time, a ride on a tram, or a constant return to the scene of old happy crimes on Park Street, in its colonial-style clubs, or its sprawling mansions that exist cheek-by-jowl with malls and multiplexes. For the Kolkatan, Kolkata Now keeps its own beat and time, where everyday struggles and quibbles unerringly give way to the ability to live Life both peripatetic and sedentary, bustling and empty, noisy and gone-quiet, Technicolor and Noir in the 21st-century mahanagar as it moves, always pretending to succumb, to the future.

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Authors

  • Sunanda K. Datta-Ray’s first essay on Calcutta appeared in the Observer magazine, London, in October 1970. He was editor of the Statesman, Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and editorin-residence at the East-West Centre, Honolulu, before moving to Singapore, where he spent more than a decade in journalistic research and academic positions. His books include Smash and Grab: Annexation of Sikkim, Waiting for America: India and the US in the New Millennium, Bihar Shows the Way, and Looking East to Look West: Lee Kuan Yew’s Mission India.

  • Indrajit Hazra is a novelist and journalist. His novels The Burnt Forehead of Max Saul (2000), The Garden of Earthly Delights (2003) and The Bioscope Man (2008) have been described by critics as "stamped by trenchant black humour" and "[original prose with] mad images hyperlinked to other mad images", one reviewer stating that "few (Bengali) writers writing in English are able to capture that sense of decay and temper it with that quintessential Bengali humour the way Hazra can". He is also the author of Grand Delusions: A Short Biography of Kolkata (2012). He is a columnist for The Economic Times where he writes 'Red Herring' every alternate Mondays. He lives in New Delhi and has been at it trying to finish his latest book that involves missing children and (a sort of) time travel. He blogs on http://blogs.economictimes.indiatimes.com/author/indrajithazra/

  • Photographer:

    Pramod Kapoor, the founder and publisher of Roli Books (established in 1978), has over the course of his illustrious career, conceived and produced award-winning books that have proven to be game-changers in the world of publishing. Be it the hit ‘Then and Now’ series and the seminal Made for Maharajas, or even the internationally acclaimed Gandhi: An Illustrated Biography, which is published in eleven editions in most major languages worldwide. In 2016, he was conferred with the prestigious Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour), the highest civil and military award in France, for his contribution towards producing books that have changed the landscape of Indian publishing. He is also a recipient of the prestigious Mahatma Award 2021 (an Aditya Birla Group initiative) for Lifetime Achievement for his contribution to publishing and literature in India.

ISBN
9788193750193
Binding
Hardback
Page Extent
256
Weight (kg)
3.7
Height (in)
11.25
Width (in)
11.25
Subject
Photography
Published Date
21/09/18
Publisher
Roli Books

Authors

  • Sunanda K. Datta-Ray’s first essay on Calcutta appeared in the Observer magazine, London, in October 1970. He was editor of the Statesman, Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and editorin-residence at the East-West Centre, Honolulu, before moving to Singapore, where he spent more than a decade in journalistic research and academic positions. His books include Smash and Grab: Annexation of Sikkim, Waiting for America: India and the US in the New Millennium, Bihar Shows the Way, and Looking East to Look West: Lee Kuan Yew’s Mission India.

  • Indrajit Hazra is a novelist and journalist. His novels The Burnt Forehead of Max Saul (2000), The Garden of Earthly Delights (2003) and The Bioscope Man (2008) have been described by critics as "stamped by trenchant black humour" and "[original prose with] mad images hyperlinked to other mad images", one reviewer stating that "few (Bengali) writers writing in English are able to capture that sense of decay and temper it with that quintessential Bengali humour the way Hazra can". He is also the author of Grand Delusions: A Short Biography of Kolkata (2012). He is a columnist for The Economic Times where he writes 'Red Herring' every alternate Mondays. He lives in New Delhi and has been at it trying to finish his latest book that involves missing children and (a sort of) time travel. He blogs on http://blogs.economictimes.indiatimes.com/author/indrajithazra/

  • Photographer:

    Pramod Kapoor, the founder and publisher of Roli Books (established in 1978), has over the course of his illustrious career, conceived and produced award-winning books that have proven to be game-changers in the world of publishing. Be it the hit ‘Then and Now’ series and the seminal Made for Maharajas, or even the internationally acclaimed Gandhi: An Illustrated Biography, which is published in eleven editions in most major languages worldwide. In 2016, he was conferred with the prestigious Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour), the highest civil and military award in France, for his contribution towards producing books that have changed the landscape of Indian publishing. He is also a recipient of the prestigious Mahatma Award 2021 (an Aditya Birla Group initiative) for Lifetime Achievement for his contribution to publishing and literature in India.

ISBN
9788193750193
Binding
Hardback
Page Extent
256
Weight (kg)
3.7
Height (in)
11.25
Width (in)
11.25
Subject
Photography
Published Date
21/09/18
Publisher
Roli Books

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