ABSTRACT
Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) cannot escape its imperial legacy. In 1990, the city celebrated its 300th birthday on the anniversary of Job Charnock’s creation of the factory for the East India Company. Domes and columns of British architecture dominate the city’s centre. The mostwell-kept among them is a memorial to Queen Victoria, who reigned when India first became the jewel in the imperial crown with Calcutta as its capital. Along with Chennai and Bombay, the imperial and then colonial project set the terms upon which this city would function and define itself. Yet there is another narrative of Kolkata that hearkens to a different past - an indigenous Hindu past that centres around Kalighat, a temple and pilgrimage site located on the southern side of the city. Through writing history, circulating rumours and engaging in urban renewal projects centred on this religious site, prominent Kolkata citizens point to an urban legacy that reaches far beyond the British city. The chapter argues that Kolkata’s imperial past encourages the creation of a counter-legacy and that religious forms like Kalighat are ripe to be taken up in such creations. Thus, religion is not only something that takes place in the urban environment or that refuses to disappear in the postcolonial city, but something that can be levied to work against its raison d’étre.
