Ambassador & Roli Books celebrate the publication of Calcutta Then, Kolkata Now
H.E. Mr Alexandre Ziegler, Ambassador of France to India and Roli Books celebrate the publication of Calcutta Then, Kolkata Now by Sunanda K. Datta-Ray, Pramod Kapoor, Indrajit Hazra, Anshika Varma.
New Delhi, 1 November 2018
The Ambassador of France to India, H.E. Mr Alexandre Ziegler, and Roli Books were pleased to celebrate the publication of Calcutta Then, Kolkata Now, by Sunanda K. Datta-Ray, Pramod Kapoor, Indrajit Hazra, and Anshika Varma. The book, which comes in the year marking the 40th anniversary of the publishers, was formally unveiled at a reception at the Residence of France on Thursday, 1st November 2018.
The evening, hosted by Ambassador Ziegler and Roli Books, started with a video of rare images from the book accompanied by music composed by Soumyajit Das and Sourendra Mullick.
Speaking of the work, Pramod Kapoor, founder-publisher of Roli Books and photo editor of Calcutta Then, Kolkata Now, said, “I have an umbilical connection to the city. I was born in Jorasanko and have very fond memories of the time spent there. I visited Calcutta many times since my birth, but it wasn’t until late last year when I was researching for this book that I realized how inerasable those memories are.”
On this occasion, Ambassador Alexandre Ziegler remarked, “For long an opening to the outside world, the port city of Calcutta retains remarkable traces of the ancient co-existing with the modern. The authors and photo editors have given us an outstanding work documenting the past and the contemporary, where image is not only illustrative but constitutes historical archive material. It is an honour for me to celebrate Roli Books’ publication of Calcutta Then, Kolkata Now and glean the insights of its creators on this singular city.”
About the book
Calcutta Then: Calcutta is where it all began. The city symbolized India’s transformation from medievalism to modernity. The British created the framework. The prophets and pioneers who operated within it were Indian. Raja Rammohan Roy linked past and present. After him came the poets, patriots and politicians. They made banian, boxwallah, bhadralok and biplab – trader, company executive, gentleman and revolutionary – the four props of the new metropolitan culture that inspired Gopal Krishna Gokhale’s memorable comment, ‘What Bengal thinks today, India thinks tomorrow.’
Much water has flown down the Hooghly since then. But the lifestyle that evolved in the city is still the hallmark of success throughout the country. Calcutta was modern India’s first capital, from 1772 to 1931. Announcing the shift to Delhi during his visit to Calcutta, King George V declared, ‘Calcutta must always remain the premier city of India. Its population, its importance as a commercial centre and great emporium of trade, its splendid historical traditions, all continue to invest Calcutta with a unique character which should preserve to it a pre-eminent position.’
Kolkata Now: Love it, endure it, call it what you will, Kolkata is Life as ‘kháos’ as no other city is. Once a bubble, holding out the rest of Bengal – and, indeed, India – it is today a city that contains a multitude of cities: Kolkata, Calcutta, Kalkatta…. Its cosmopolitanism and liberal values are clichés because they are true, even as they stand witness to its past insurrections and present anomalies as much as to its genius to enjoy life – through pujo, mishti, Culture (always with a capital ‘C’), neighbourhood addas, fajlami (innocent naughtiness), football and fish. For visitors and those who once left the city, it can be a walk through time, a ride on a tram, or a constant return to the scene of old happy crimes on Park Street, in its colonial-style clubs, or its sprawling mansions that exist cheek-by-jowl with malls and multiplexes. For the Kolkatan, Kolkata Now keeps its own beat and time, where everyday struggles and quibbles unerringly give way to the ability to live Life – both peripatetic and sedentary, bustling and empty, noisy and gone-quiet, Technicolor and Noir – in the 21st-century mahanagar as it moves, always pretending to succumb, to the future.