Gobindapur, Kolkata - Revision history

>Sdkb: /* The foundations */removed erroneous space, replaced: ".
2021-05-16T04:55:06Z

The foundations: removed erroneous space, replaced: ". <ref → ".<ref

New page
{{Other uses|Gobindapur (disambiguation){{!}}Gobindapur}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2018}}
{{Use Indian English|date=June 2018}}
'''Gobindapur''' was one of the three villages which were merged to form the city of [[Kolkata]] (formerly Calcutta) in [[India]]. The other two villages were [[Kalikata (village)|Kalikata]] and [[Sutanuti]]. [[Job Charnock]], an administrator with the [[British East India Company]] is traditionally credited with the honour of founding the city. While Kalikata and Sutanuti lost their identity as the city grew, Gobindapur was demolished to make room for the construction of new [[Fort William, India|Fort William]].
[[File:Kolkata Map 1690.jpg|270px|thumb|Gobindapur in the Map of Calcutta (1690)]]

==The foundations==
When the Portuguese first started to frequent Bengal, around the year 1530, the two great centres of trade were [[Chittagong]], which the Portuguese called Porto Grande or Great Haven, in the east and [[Saptagram|Satgaon]], which the Portuguese called Porto Piqueno or Little Haven in the west. Tolly’s Nallah or Adi Ganga was then the outlet to the sea and ocean-going ships came up to around where Garden Reach is now, then the anchoring place for ships. Only country boats operated further up the river.<ref name = "Cotton1">{{citation|last=Cotton |first=H.E.A. |title=Calcutta Old and New |orig-date=1909 |date=1980 |pages=1–4 |publisher=General Printers and Publishers Pvt. Ltd.}}</ref> Possibly the Saraswati river was another watery life line. It started drying up from the middle of the 16th century. The Portuguese built a new port at [[Hugli-Chuchura|Hugli]] in 1580.<ref>{{citation|last=Patree |first=Purnendu |title=Purano Kolkatar Kathachitra |lang=bn |orig-date=1979 |date=1995 |page=71 |publisher=Dey’s Publishing |isbn=81-7079-751-9}}</ref>

Towards the beginning of the 16th century, there was a person name Gobindasharan Dutta Chaudhury, <ref> https://archive.org/stream/dcc_20210214_202102#page/98/mode/2up </ref> who belonged to a [[kayastha]] [[zamindar]] of [[Andul Dutta Chaudhury Family]] was returning by boat from a pilgrimage. He dreamt of goddess [[Kali]] asking him to dig the barren land on the bank. He did so and discovered enormous qualities of wealth hidden underground. He stayed back and founded the place. It is said that the name of the place ''Gobindapur'' was named after him. His descendants later moved to the Hatkhola area of Kolkata, and became known as the illustrious "Hatkhola Dutta Family".<ref> https://archive.org/stream/dcc_20210214_202102#page/119/mode/2up </ref>

There is another story regarding the foundation and naming of the village. Towards the end of the 16th century, the Indian merchant-princes of Port Piqueno were forced to seek another market for their trade. Most of them settled down in Hugli but [[Sutanuti#Sheths and Basaks|four families of Basaks and one of Sheths]], determined to profit by the growing prosperity of [[Betor]], founded the village of Gobindapur, on the east bank of the river.''<ref name="Cotton1" /> Gobindaji'' was the family deity of the Sheths and Basaks, and so they named the village Gobindapur.<ref name="Patree">{{harvnb|Patree|1995|pp=160-1}}</ref>

{{quote box|width=300px|quote= Beyond the purely European buildings lying around the Fort where four villages of mud and bamboo, all of which were included in the zemindary limits of the original settlement. These villages were the original three with the addition of Chowringhee, which was in 1717 a hamlet of isolated hovels, surrounded by water-logged paddy fields and bamboo-groves and separated from Govindpore by a tiger-haunted jungle where expands the grassy level of the [[Maidan (Kolkata)|maidan]]. The [[Esplanade, Calcutta|Esplanade]] was a jungle not yet cleared, interspersed with a few huts and small plots of grazing and arable lands. Beyond the [[Chitpur#Chitpur Road|Chitpore Road]] which formed the eastern boundary of the settlement, lay more pools, swamps and rice fields, dotted here and there with the struggling huts of fishermen, falconers, wood-cutters, weavers and cultivators.<ref>{{harvnb|Cotton|1980|p=19}}</ref>|source= [[H.E.A.Cotton]]}}

In 1596, the place is mentioned as a district of the Sirkar (or government) of Satgaon, in the book ''[[Ain-e-Akbari]]'' by [[Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak|Abul Fazal]], the prime minister of [[Akbar]]. As traders, the Portuguese were succeeded by the Dutch and finally the British.<ref name="Cotton1" />

==English arrival==
Job Charnock favoured Sutanuti as a settlement because of the security of the location. It was protected by the river on the west and by impassable marshes on the south and the east. Only the north-east had to be guarded.<ref name = "Sengupta">{{citation|last=Sengupta |first=Nitish |title=History of the Bengali-speaking People |orig-year=2001 |year=2002 |pages=123–124 |publisher=UBS Publishers’ Distributors Pvt. Ltd. |isbn=81-7476-355-4}}</ref>

The three villages were part of the khas mahal or imperial jagir (an estate belonging to the [[Mughal Empire|Mughal emperor]] himself), whose [[Zamindar|zemindari]] rights were held by the [[Sabarna Roy Choudhury]] family of [[Barisha, India|Barisha]]. On 10 November 1698, Job Charnock’s successor and son-in-law, Charles Eyere, acquired the land holding rights for the three villages from the Sabarna Roychoudhuris. The company paid regular rent to the Mughals for these villages till 1757.<ref>{{citation|last=Nair |first=P. Thankappan |title=The Growth and Development of Old Calcutta |work=Calcutta, the Living City |year=1995 |volume=I |pages=10–12 |editor=Sukanta Chaudhuri |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=0-19-563696-1}}</ref> Within a short period Kolkata grew considerably.

==New Fort William==

[[Siraj ud-Daulah]], the Nawab of Bengal, was alarmed by the growing prosperity and enhanced fortifications of Kolkata. In 1756, he decided to attack Kolkata and captured it. Gobindapur was fired by the English themselves. The English evacuees set up temporary quarters at Falta, {{Convert|40|mi|km|abbr=}} downstream. What followed was a series of skirmishes finally leading to the [[Battle of Plassey]] on 23 June 1757 and the establishment of British power in Bengal.<ref>{{citation|last=Sinha |first=Pradip |title=Siraj's Calcutta |work=Calcutta, the Living City |volume=I |pages=8–9}}</ref>

{{quote box|width=300px|quote=On the riverside to the south of the settlement was the village of Govindpore, founded two centuries earlier by the Setts and Bysacks, the Hindu Fathers of Calcutta: and surrounding it was a thick tiger-infested jungle that could be easily cut down. The whole colony, with their tutelary deity Gobindjee, migrated to the north of Calcutta, and liberal compensation in money and in grants of lands were made to them for their dispossession.<ref>{{harvnb|Cotton|1980|p=688}}</ref>|source= H.E.A.Cotton}}

One of the first things that the English embarked upon on their return to Kolkata was the construction of new Fort William. It commenced in 1758 and completed in 1773. The site chosen was in the heart of ‘populous flourishing’ village of Gobindapur. A portion of the ‘restitution money’ was spent in compensating the inhabitants who were given lands in other parts of the town notably in [[Taltala]], [[Kumortuli]] and [[Shobhabazar]].<ref>{{harvnb|Cotton|1980|p=72}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==See also==
{{Non-extant Bengal places}}
{{Kolkata topics}}

{{coord missing|West Bengal}}

[[Category:History of Kolkata]]
[[Category:Villages in Kolkata district]]