Kolkata city (regional capital), economy - - Pictures
As the capital of British India and home to the fertile agricultural and mineral-rich land of eastern India, Kolkata was one of the first areas of India to develop industrially. The first jute and paper mills of India were started in the Kolkata area in the 1800s. By 1921 nearly 35 percent of India's industrial workers were located in Kolkata. However, Kolkata began to lose its industrial leadership after India gained its independence in 1947. One cause was the loss of Kolkata's raw jute supply when Bengal was divided into Bangla and East Bengal, with East Bengal becoming part of Pakistan. Competition in jute manufacturing from East Bengal (later East Pakistan, now Bangladesh) further hurt Kolkata's jute industry. Competition and slow growth also hit other traditional manufacturing areas, such as heavy engineering, rubber, and paper.
Other factors that have hurt metropolitan Kolkata's industrialization include a 1977 ban imposed by the Indian government on new licenses of large-scale industrial units in the large metropolises; labor troubles since the end of 1960s; pro-union attitude of the state government; severe power shortages; limitations on raw materials; and shortage of capital. Moreover, a slow depletion of water volume in the Hugli River limited the size of ships at Kolkata's docks, causing Kolkata to lose its status as the premier port city of India. The water supply problem has been resolved to some extent by diverting water from the Ganges River to the Hugli, and by constructing a diversion canal and the Farakka barrage, which increased the depth of the channel, in 1976. A deep port at Haldia, about 65 km (about 40 mi) south of the Kolkata, has also been established. Ships arriving at Kolkata from the Bay of Bengal travel only when the river is in high tide, escorted by specially trained Hugli pilots; additionally, the river channel is constantly dredged. Few new major industries came into the CMD in the 1970s and 1980s, but in the mid-1990s the state attracted some large-scale capital investments both from native and foreign sources because it relaxed its anti-capitalist stance.
