Kolkata Map

• Kolkata is located in the eastern part India at 22°33′N 88°20′E / 22.55°N 88.333°E / 22.55; 88.333 in the Ganges Delta at an elevation ranging between 1.5 m to 9 m (30 ft). It is spread linearly along the banks of the River Hooghly in a north-south direction. Much of the city was originally a vast wetland, reclaimed over the decades to accommodate the city's burgeoning population. The remaining wetland, known as East Calcutta Wetlands has been designated a "wetland of international importance" under the Ramsar Convention.

• The most followed sports in Kolkata are football and cricket. Kolkata, a major centre of football activity in India and home of top national football clubs such as Mohun Bagan AC, East Bengal, Chirag United S.C., and Mohammedan Sporting Club is known as Mecca of Indian Football. Calcutta Football League, which started in 1898, is the oldest football league in Asia. Mohun Bagan AC, one of the oldest football clubs in Asia, is the only club to be entitled 'National Club of India'. Kolkata is also home to Kolkata Knight Riders IPL cricket team franchise.

• As in the rest of India, cricket is extremely popular and is played throughout the city in its grounds and streets. Tournaments, especially those involving outdoor games like cricket, football, and badminton or indoor games like carrom are regularly organized on an inter-locality or inter-club basis. The maidan area hosts several minor football and cricket clubs and coaching institutes.

• Notable sports stars from Kolkata include former Indian national cricket captains Sourav Ganguly and Pankaj Roy, as well as current cricketers Ashok Dinda, Wriddhiman Saha, Laxmi Ratan Shukla and Manoj Tiwary, Olympic tennis bronze medallist Leander Paes. Former football stars include Sailen Manna, Chuni Goswami, P.K. Banerjee, and Subrata Bhattacharya.

• The city is known for its large stadia. The Eden Gardens is one of only two 100,000-seat cricket stadiums in the world. It hosted final of 1987 Cricket World Cup. It is home to Bengal cricket team and Kolkata Knight Riders in IPL. Salt Lake Stadium (also known as Yuva Bharati Krirangan)—a multi-use stadium—is the world's second largest capacity football stadium. Calcutta Cricket and Football Club is the second-oldest cricket club in the world. Kolkata has three 18-hole golf courses at the Royal Calcutta Golf Club (the first golf club in the world outside Britain), Tollygunge Club and Fort William. The Royal Calcutta Turf Club (RCTC) holds regular equestrian races and polo matches. The Calcutta Polo Club is now considered as the oldest polo club of the world. The Calcutta South Club is the venue for some national and international tennis tournaments. From 2005, Sunfeast Open, a Tier-III tournament of Women's Tennis Association Tour, takes place in Netaji Indoor Stadium. The Calcutta Rowing Club hosts regular rowing races and training. Although it is a minor sport, Kolkata is considered the "capital" of rugby union in India. The city also gives its name to the name of the oldest international tournament in rugby union, the Calcutta Cup, which is of Indian workmanship.

• Kolkata's schools are either run by the state government or by private (many of which are religious) organisations. Schools mainly use Bengali or English as the medium of instruction, though Urdu is also used, especially in Central Kolkata. The schools are affiliated with the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education, the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE), the Central Board for Secondary Education (CBSE), the National Institute of Open School (NIOS) and the A-Level (British Curriculum). Under the 10+2+3 plan, after completing their secondary education, students typically enroll in a 2 year junior college (also known as a pre-university) or in schools with a higher secondary facility affiliated with West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, ICSE or CBSE. Students usually choose from one of three streams — liberal arts, commerce, or science, though vocational streams are also available. Upon completing the required coursework, students may enrol in general or professional degree programmes.

• Kolkata houses twelve universities and numerous colleges affiliated to them or to other universities located outside. The University of Calcutta (founded in 1857) has 153 affiliated colleges. The Calcutta Madrasa College, which was founded in 1781 by Warren Hastings, the first Governor-General of India, has been recently upgraded as a university. The Jadavpur University is a notable engineering university. Calcutta Medical College is the first institution teaching modern medicine in Asia. Other notable institutions are Presidency College, St. Xavier's College, Bethune College (the first women's college in India), and Scottish Church College. Some institutions of national importance are the Asiatic Society, Bose Institute, S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, the Indian Statistical Institute, the Indian Institute of Management, the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, the Marine Engineering and Research Institute, the Rabindra Bharati University, the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, the Calcutta Mathematical Society, the Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management, the West Bengal University of Animal and Fishery Sciences, the West Bengal University of Technology and the National Institute of Fashion Technology. IIM Calcutta was inaugural IIM of country and has produced leading business minds in the nation. It is one of the toughest business exams in the world.

• Kolkata has also produced the likes of physicists Satyendra Nath Bose and Jagadish Chandra Bose,statistician Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis also mathematician Raj Chandra Bose. All were famed members of Calcutta University, leading university in India.

• The east-to-west dimension of the city is narrow, stretching from the Hooghly River in the west to roughly the Eastern Metropolitan Bypass in the east, a span of barely 5 km (3.1 mi)–6 km (3.7 mi). The north-south expansion is roughly divided into North, Central and South Kolkata. North Kolkata locality is the oldest part of the city, with 19th century architecture and narrow alleyways. South Kolkata grew mostly after independence of India and consists of localities such as Ballygunge, Tollygunge, Alipore, and New Alipore. Ballygunge is an upmarket middle-class area where many classy shops and famous creative minds and artistic personalities congregate. Same applies to Alipore, which was a favorite for British colonial elites in 19th century.

• Two recently-developed (and planned) areas of Calcutta are: Salt Lake City (Bidhannagar) to the northeast and Rajarhat, also called New Town, to the north of Bidhannagar. The former was developed between 1958 and 1965 to accommodate the burgeoning population of Kolkata. It is now hub of economic and social expansion and is famous as centre for IT in the city. Many high-profile industrialists of national and international standing are investing in Rajarhat. The place is an impressive information technology and computer engineering hub and is close to infrastructure like the airport. The Sarsuna satellite township has also been developing rapidly. It was once a slum for refugees from East Pakistan in 1970s.

• Central Kolkata houses the central business district around the B. B. D. Bagh area. The government secretariat, General Post Office, High Court, Lalbazar Police HQs and several other government and private offices are located here. The Maidan is a large open field in the heart of the city where several sporting events and public meetings are held. It is army property. Due to the freshness and greenery it provides to the metropolis, it has been referred to as the "lungs of Kolkata". It is a focal point of the city and many important buildings cluster around Maidan. It is also a center of statues of Britisher colonial officials and Indian freedom fighters and martyrs. Legally also, the fort and the Maidan were excluded from the city as per Act 16 of 1847. Central Park in Bidhanagar is another large park. Millenium Park was built besides the Hooghly to spruce up dirty area with amusement park and greenage. Several companies have set up their offices around the area south of Park Street which has become a secondary central business district.

• Kolkata has long been known for its literary, artistic and revolutionary heritage. As the former capital of India, Kolkata was the birthplace of modern Indian literary and artistic thought. Kolkatans tend to have a special appreciation for art and literature; its tradition of welcoming new talent has made it a City of Furious Creative Energy. For these reasons, Kolkata has often been dubbed as the Cultural Capital of India or the Literary Capital of India.

• A characteristic feature of Kolkata is the para or neighbourhoods having a strong sense of community. Typically, every para has its own community club with a clubroom and often, a playing field. People here habitually indulge in adda or leisurely chat, and these adda sessions are often a form of freestyle intellectual conversation. The city has a tradition of political graffiti depicting everything from outrageous slander to witty banter and limericks, caricatures to propaganda.

• Kolkata has many buildings adorned with Gothic, Baroque, Roman, Oriental and Indo-Islamic (including Mughal) motifs. Several major buildings of the Colonial period are well maintained and have been declared "heritage structures", while others are in various stages of decay. Established in 1814, the Indian Museum is the oldest museum in Asia and houses vast collections of Indian natural history and Indian art. Marble Palace is classic example of European mansion in the city. Netaji Bhawan is museum and shrine dedicated for honor of Netaji, Indian freedom fighter of World War II. The Victoria Memorial, one of the major tourist attractions in Kolkata, has a museum documenting the city's history. The National Library of India is India's leading public library. Academy of Fine Arts and other art galleries hold regular art exhibitions.

• The city has a tradition of dramas in the form of jatra (a kind of folk-theatre), theatres and Group Theaters. Kolkata is the home of the Bengali cinema industry, dubbed "Tollywood" after Tollygunj, the location of Bengali movie studios. Its long tradition of Art-Film making includes globally acclaimed directors such as Academy Award winning director Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Mrinal Sen, Tapan Sinha and contemporary directors such as Aparna Sen, Buddhadeb Dasgupta and Rituparno Ghosh.

• Key elements of Kolkata's cuisine include rice and Machher jhol (fish curry), with roshogolla, sandesh and mishti dohi (sweet yoghurt) as dessert. Bengal's vast repertoire of fish-based dishes includes various eelish preparations (a favorite among Bengalis). Street foods such as beguni (fried battered eggplant slices), kati roll (flatbread roll with vegetable or chicken, mutton, or egg stuffing), phuchka (deep fried crêpe with tamarind and lentil sauce) and Indian Chinese cuisine from China Town in the eastern parts of the city are quite popular. Sweets occupy an important place in the diet of Kolkatans and at their social ceremonies.

• Bengali women commonly wear the shaŗi as per tradition and global/western outfits. Among men, western dressing has greater acceptance, though the traditional dhoti and panjabi/kurta comes to life on festivals.

• Durga Puja, in the autumn, is the most important festival and the most glamorous event in Kolkata. Other notable festivals include Jagaddhatri Puja, Diwali, Saraswati puja, Eid, Holi, Christmas, poila boishak (new year), Rath Yatra and Poush parbon (harvest festival). Some of the cultural festivals are Kolkata Book Fair, Dover Lane music festival, Kolkata Film Festival and National Theatre Festival.

• In the nineteenth and twentieth century, Bengali literature was modernized in the works of authors such as Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Rabindranath Tagore, Kazi Nazrul Islam and Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay. This literary modernization, coupled with the social reforms led by reformers like Ram Mohan Roy, Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar, Swami Vivekananda and others, constituted a major part of the Bengal Renaissance . The rich literary tradition set by these authors has been carried forward in the works of Jibanananda Das, Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay, Tarashankar Bandopadhyay, Manik Bandopadhyay, Ashapurna Devi, Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay, Buddhadeb Guha, Mahashweta Devi, Samaresh Majumdar, Sanjeev Chattopadhyay and Sunil Gangopadhyay among others.

• The city is also noted for its appreciation of Rabindrasangeet and Indian classical music as well as Bengali folk music such as baul and kirtans and gajan, and modern songs including Bengali adhunik songs. From the early 1990s, there has been an emergence of new genres of music, including the emergence of what has been called Bengali Jeebonmukhi Gaan (a modern genre based on realism) by artists like Anjan Dutta, Kabir Suman, Nachiketa and folk/ alternative/ rock bands like Moheener Ghoraguli, Chandrabindoo, Bhoomi, Cactus, and Fossils.