Abstract
Urban planning has been a subject of significant interest in the field of urban history. Mariam Dossal’s book on the planning of Bombay City was one of the early writings on this subject. Partho Datta’s book belongs to a similar genre and focuses on the planning of Calcutta during the colonial period from c. 1800 to c. 1940. The aim of the study is to investigate the continuity of colonial urban policy and its impact, primarily in terms of the social costs to the displaced population and its implications for understanding the history of planning.
The author argues that epidemics became the prime movers behind the initiative of planning in Calcutta undertaken by the colonial government. The need to control and regulate land was important and planning was also seen as a means to achieve this end. However, the evidence from cities like Bombay suggests that the wider imperial imperative was to develop port cities as the bastions of the Empire. The basic need to extract resources for Britain was underscored but there were broader imperial concerns reflected through the development of infrastructure and architectural edifices to showcase the cities of the Empire.
The book is divided into six chapters. The first five chapters traverse the history of planning in Calcutta in the nineteenth century. The last chapter focuses on the work done by the Calcutta Improvement Trust in the early twentieth century. This book, therefore, complements a study made in the recent work of Prashant Kidambi on the Bombay Improvement Trust of 1898 which was modelled on the Glasgow Improvement Trust. In Bombay, the outbreak of the bubonic plague was the main reason behind the establishment of the Trust. The colonial government felt that clean and affordable housing for the urban poor and widening of roads would prevent the spread of disease since epidemics like plague had major implications for the trade and economic growth of cities.
Datta’s book relies on three sets of documents, namely, the Lottery Committee Reports, the Fever Hospital Committee Reports and the Annual Reports of the Improvement Trust. The author may refer to the study of R.S. Chandavarkar and Mridula Rammanna, who have researched epidemics like plague in the city of Bombay and the consequent responses of the colonial government, for the next edition of his book. This book is rich in bibliographical detail and illustrations.
The book of Partho Datta on urbanisation and reform in Calcutta is a valuable addition to the literature on urban history in India. As cities in India and the world are rapidly transforming themselves, books like this will help policy makers to evolve effective solutions for the development of cities with sensitivity to the ecological dimension.