ABSTRACT
As the famous Bengali anthropologist Nirmal Kumar Bose liked to point out, Calcutta is not a melting pot. Because there are not enough jobs to go around, he wrote, everyone clings as closely as possible to the occupation with which his caste is identified. Immediate kinsmen, occupational group, and common origin constitute a widening circle of networks which provide the individual with the economic support he needs in the city. Ethnic groups tend to cluster together in their own quarters, and voluntary organizations are ethnically more or less exclusive. In the past, the two main religious communities each favored certain occupations: Hindus became merchants and traders, servants, cow keepers and milk sellers, and dealers in brass and bell metal, precious metals, and stones; Muslims chose to become butchers, masons, boatmen, grooms, and water carriers.
