Serampore
Encyclopedia
Serampore (also called Serampur, Srirampur, Srirampore, Shreerampur, Shreerampore, Shrirampur, Shrirampore) is a city and a municipality
Municipality
A municipality is essentially an urban administrative division having corporate status and usually powers of self-government. It can also be used to mean the governing body of a municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district...

 in Hooghly district
Hooghly District
Hooghly district is one of the districts of the state of West Bengal in India. It can alternatively be spelt Hoogli or Hugli. The district is named after the Hooghly River.The headquarters of the district are at Chinsura...

 in the India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

n state
States and territories of India
India is a federal union of states comprising twenty-eight states and seven union territories. The states and territories are further subdivided into districts and so on.-List of states and territories:...

 of West Bengal
West Bengal
West Bengal is a state in the eastern region of India and is the nation's fourth-most populous. It is also the seventh-most populous sub-national entity in the world, with over 91 million inhabitants. A major agricultural producer, West Bengal is the sixth-largest contributor to India's GDP...

. It is a part of the area covered by Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority
Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority
Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority is the statutory planning and development authority for the Kolkata Metropolitan Area in the state of West Bengal, India. The organisation was previously known as Calcutta Metropolitan Development Authority and still retains the previous logo...

. It is a pre-colonial town on the right bank of the Hoogli River. It was part of Danish India
Danish India
Danish India is a term for the former colonies of Denmark, and until 1814 Denmark–Norway, in India. The colonies included the town of Tranquebar in present-day Tamil Nadu state, Serampore in present-day West Bengal, and the Nicobar Islands, currently part of India's union territory of the Andaman...

 under the name Frederiksnagore from 1755 to 1845.It's current Municipality Chairman is Pinton.

History

The town is several centuries old and has witnessed both the growth and decline of the feudal system, the coming of the Danes and their settlement and then a cultural renaissance (known as the Bengal Renaissance
Bengal Renaissance
The Bengal Renaissance refers to a social reform movement during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the region of Bengal in Undivided India during the period of British rule...

) initiated by the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 following the construction of the east Indian railway, along with subsequent industrial development.

Growth

There were three main phases in the process of urbanisation of Serampore:
  1. The Pre-urbanisation phase (the period before 1755);
  2. The Urbanisation phase (from 1755 to 1854); and
  3. The Industrialisation phase (1854 to 1947).


Before the Mughal era
Mughal era
The Mughal era is a historic period of the Mughal Empire in South Asia . It ran from the early 15th century to a point in the early 18th century when the Mughal Emperors' power had dwindled...

, the region between the Saraswati
Saraswati River (Bengal)
Saraswati River refers to a river, that was a distributary of the Bhagirathi and is now no more there but was active till around the 16th century AD. The course and condition of the Saraswati has played an important role in the development and decline of river port towns in Bengal...

 and Hoogli rivers was a thriving local community. Various ruins of Hindu temples are still found in Serampore, such as:
  • Henry Martin's Pagoda
    Pagoda
    A pagoda is the general term in the English language for a tiered tower with multiple eaves common in Nepal, India, China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam and other parts of Asia. Some pagodas are used as Taoist houses of worship. Most pagodas were built to have a religious function, most commonly Buddhist,...

    ,
  • The temple of Radhaballabhjeu in Ballabhpur (18th century),
  • The Ram-Sita temple in Sripur and
  • The temple of Gauranga in Chatra dating back to the 16th century.
  • Hari Sabha (Buttala)
  • Sashan Kali Mandir.


The Jagannath
Jagannath
Jagannath is a transcendental non-anthropotheistic Hindu god worshiped primarily by the people of Indian state of Orissa, and, to a great extent, West Bengal...

 temple of Mahesh is dated to 1755. When Bengal came under the command of Sri Chaitanya's Vaisnavism in the fifteenth century, these places became pre-eminent as a Hindu pilgrim centre.

Raja Manohar Roy Zaminder of Sheoraphuli
Sheoraphuli
Sheoraphuli is a small town in Hooghly district in the Indian state of West Bengal. It is a part of the area covered by Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority.- History :...

 built the temple of Ram-Sita in Sripur in 1753, and his son Ram Chandra Roy then later dedicated the villages of Sripur, Gopinathpur and Manoharpur as devottara land in the service of the deity. Since then the temple was taken care by Raja Nirmal Chandra Ghosh and the 'Saraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate'.In present times, the temple and it's premises falls under the surveillance of the 'Sheoraphuli Rajbari'.

It is probable that the name 'Srirampur' originated either from 'Sripur', 'Sri Ram' or both, or it could originate from 'Seetarampore' as there was a very famous 'Ram-Seeta' temple. Here some aristocratic localities came up, namely Goswamipara, Lahiripara, Mukherjeepara, Bhattacharyapara, Chakravartipara etc., whose inhabitants were Brahmins of different groups and sects.

After this there arose the need for local artisana along with "service class" people who came from the neighbouring villages and settled on granted land. In this way, several colonies such as Patuapara, Kumarpara, Dhulipara, Goalpara, Dutta Bagan, Khash Bagan etc. were formed. This along with the fact that Sheoraphuli was a collecting centre for local marketable goods produced in different parts of Hughli, induced many families - the Barujibis, Duttas, Deys, Das etc. - to come to settle here before 1755.

The cultivating classes settled in such places as Sadgoppara, Mannapara, Lankabaganpara. The Jele-Kaibarta and 'Sani' Muchi, were already in the locality from the beginning, and had their own areasa. The local Sunni Muslims, descendants of Mughal
Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire ,‎ or Mogul Empire in traditional English usage, was an imperial power from the Indian Subcontinent. The Mughal emperors were descendants of the Timurids...

 soldiers ,traders and artisans , lived in Mullickpara, Mussalman Para and here a mosque still bears witness to their existence.

During the Mughal
Mughal era
The Mughal era is a historic period of the Mughal Empire in South Asia . It ran from the early 15th century to a point in the early 18th century when the Mughal Emperors' power had dwindled...

 period, Akna [Now called Akra Bati Lane] and Mahesh were heavily populated. The hot humid climate of the area was congenial for the textile industry and the local land was well known for its cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....

 and silk
Silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The best-known type of silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori reared in captivity...

 weaving. The Hindu weavers used to manufacture fine cotton pieces, while the Muslim weavers monopolised silk manufacture. In the fertile land, paddy
Rice
Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...

, jute
Jute
Jute is a long, soft, shiny vegetable fibre that can be spun into coarse, strong threads. It is produced from plants in the genus Corchorus, which has been classified in the family Tiliaceae, or more recently in Malvaceae....

 and betel-leaf were grown in abundance. The Kaibartta
Kaibartta
Kaibarta — The Kaibartas are found to be one of the aboriginal ethnic groups that inhabited in Orrisa, Bengal and Assam from unknown past. The most established theory is that the Kaibartas are Dravidians or they belong to Dravidian stalk...

 used the marshy land for fishing.

In pre-urbanisation age, communication was mainly by way of the river. Besides this, there was the 'Badshahi Sadak' or the grand trunk road. Before Danes arrived in this region, the Sheoraphuli Hat was the main internal trade centre and had close commercial links with Barisal, Khulna, Dhaka, Mymensingh, Rajshahi and other districts of East Bengal (now Bangladesh).

Between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, many foreign merchants, such as the French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Portuguese
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 and Dutch
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 - established their trading outposts, or "Kuthis" here and were involved in trade and commerce.

During the Muslim period, the villagers on the bank of the Hooghly and Saraswati
Saraswati River (Bengal)
Saraswati River refers to a river, that was a distributary of the Bhagirathi and is now no more there but was active till around the 16th century AD. The course and condition of the Saraswati has played an important role in the development and decline of river port towns in Bengal...

 were included in the zamindaries of Sheoraphuli; these feudal lords not only collected rent but also dispensed justice.

Danish rule

For the following hundred years, the urbanization
Urbanization
Urbanization, urbanisation or urban drift is the physical growth of urban areas as a result of global change. The United Nations projected that half of the world's population would live in urban areas at the end of 2008....

 phase began with the arrival of the Danes and their acquisition of land in the area, as part of the Danish colonial empire. Later, in the mid-eighteenth century, the Danish East India Company
Danish East India Company
The Danish East India Company was a Danish chartered company.-History:It was founded in 1616, following a privilege of Danish King Christian IV....

 sent Soetman to the Nawab of Bengal
Nawab of Bengal
The Nawabs of Bengal were the hereditary nazims or subadars of the subah of Bengal during the Mughal rule and the de-facto rulers of the province.-History:...

. Their intention was to secure a Parwana (district jurisdiction) allowing them the right to do business in Bengal. Soetman obtained the parwana by paying fifty thousand Rupees in cash to Nawab Alivardi Khan
Alivardi Khan
Ali Vardi Khan was the Nawab of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa during 1740 - 1756. He toppled the Nasiri Dynasty of Bengal and took power as Nawab.-Early life:...

, along with many gifts.

In 1755 Soetman purchased three bighas of land at Sripur on the riverfront and then another fifty-seven bighas at Akna for the building of a new factory and port, which the Danes governed from Tranquebar
Tranquebar
Tharangambadi is a panchayat town in Nagapattinam district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, 15 km north of Karaikal, near the mouth of a distributary of the Kaveri River. Its name means "place of the singing waves"...

 as part of Danish India
Danish India
Danish India is a term for the former colonies of Denmark, and until 1814 Denmark–Norway, in India. The colonies included the town of Tranquebar in present-day Tamil Nadu state, Serampore in present-day West Bengal, and the Nicobar Islands, currently part of India's union territory of the Andaman...

. Subsequently the Danes acquired the Serampore, Akna and Pearapur mahals by paying an annual rent of Sicca Rs 1601/- to the zamindar
Zamindar
A Zamindar or zemindar , was an aristocrat, typically hereditary, who held enormous tracts of land and ruled over and taxed the bhikaaris who lived on batavaslam. Over time, they took princely and royal titles such as Maharaja , Raja , Nawab , and Mirza , Chowdhury , among others...

 (tax farmer) of Sheoraphuli
Sheoraphuli
Sheoraphuli is a small town in Hooghly district in the Indian state of West Bengal. It is a part of the area covered by Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority.- History :...

.

During the first ten to fifteen years of their settlement, the Danish merchants faced various problems and after 1770 they started making significant progress in trade and commerce and in town area. Thereafter, Danish laws were promulgated.

The Danes worked hard for the success of their trade; their prosperity from trade came by way of:
  1. Exporting the merchandise of other European merchants and remitting the accumulated wealth earned by surreptitious and personal trade by English civilians to their homes through bills drawn on the Danish company, and
  2. The able administrative performance of Colonel Ole Bie, who had been appointed the first Crown regent of Serampore in 1776. His farsightedness, administrative acumen and diplomatic qualities were a boon to the Danes and their settlement.


The Danes also established a bazaar
Bazaar
A bazaar , Cypriot Greek: pantopoula) is a permanent merchandising area, marketplace, or street of shops where goods and services are exchanged or sold. The term is sometimes also used to refer to the "network of merchants, bankers and craftsmen" who work that area...

 (the present Tin Bazaar) and allowed private godowns, or warehouses to be maintained. Gradually, the town developed and became elegant and prosperous and merchants of both foreign and indigenous origin began to arrive and live here.

Initially, the Danish merchants used to buy their merchandise from the Sheoraphuli Hat and exported them to European markets via Tranquebar
Tranquebar
Tharangambadi is a panchayat town in Nagapattinam district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, 15 km north of Karaikal, near the mouth of a distributary of the Kaveri River. Its name means "place of the singing waves"...

. Later on, they started to collect the commodities directly from the producers. They also created a class of trading middlemen, such as:
  • agents,
  • bania
    Bania (caste)
    Bania is an occupational caste of bankers, money-lenders, dealers in grains, spices and in modern times numerous commercial enterprises. Baniya is a distinct caste mostly coming from Western India and Central India but spread now all over India...

    s,
  • mutsuddis and
  • stevedore
    Stevedore
    Stevedore, dockworker, docker, dock labourer, wharfie and longshoreman can have various waterfront-related meanings concerning loading and unloading ships, according to place and country....

    s.


Sobharan Basak and Anandaram Dhoba, the two local textile businessmen, were appointed as the first 'factors
Factor (agent)
A factor, from the Latin "he who does" , is a person who professionally acts as the representative of another individual or other legal entity, historically with his seat at a factory , notably in the following contexts:-Mercantile factor:In a relatively large company, there could be a hierarchy,...

' for the Danes. Nandalal Chakravarty was their first agent, and subsequently he was promoted to "Dewan". Another agent, Patita Paban Roy, who came from Katulpur in Bankura. Saphali Ram Dey, a famous merchant, were appointed agents for the supplying of saltpetre.

In the seventeenth century, two brothers, Raghuram and Raghavram Goswami, came to Serampore from their home village of Patuli, to seek their fortune. Raghuram secured a job at the commissariat of the Danish Governor, while Raghavram became the official moneylender to the factory.

Between them, they amassed a huge fortune acquired vast lands and founded an aristocratic
Aristocracy (class)
The aristocracy are people considered to be in the highest social class in a society which has or once had a political system of Aristocracy. Aristocrats possess hereditary titles granted by a monarch, which once granted them feudal or legal privileges, or deriving, as in Ancient Greece and India,...

 colony on the western side of Serampore with their family. Their descendants still live in Serampore today.

Initially the Danes were dependent on their factors for obtaining commodities (primarily silk
Silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The best-known type of silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori reared in captivity...

 and cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....

 fabrics), they later got involved in direct collection of these merchandise from the producers and would offer incentives to the artisans in the form of earnest money for making high quality products.

As a sop to the weavers of Akna and Mohanpur villages, they used to give advances for both cotton and fine silk products. The Danish merchants established their own factory to produce fine cloths. Besides, they collected 'Hammer' and 'Luckline' ropes for ships, various other kinds of ropes and agricultural produce. They inspired the cultivators of Pearapur to cultivate indigo in addition to paddy rice. Mr. Princep was their indigo agent.

Another notable source of their income was the Hoondi business. Colonel Ole Bie was also interested in making Serampore a charming, elegant, attractive tourist resort. It became a well-protected town and the maintenance of law and order was well developed. To facilitate municipal administrative and judicial work, a new Court House was built and a metalled road was laid on the river bank and magnificent palatial buildings.

The local civil administration, however was carried out by a prototype of a municipality known as the 'Village Committee', with Ole Bie was its Governor.

Marshman and Carey

The beginning of the nineteenth century can be considered the most significant period in the history of Serampore, with the arrival of four English missionaries - Joshua Marshman, Hannah Marshman
Hannah Marshman
Hannah Marshman was a missionary.She was the daughter of John Shepherd, a farmer, and his wife Rachel, and the granddaughter of John Clark, pastor of the Baptist church at Crockerton, Wiltshire....

, William Carey, and Willam Ward
William Ward (missionary)
William Ward was an English pioneer Baptist missionary, author, printer and translator. On 10 May 1802 he was married at Serampore to the widow of John Fountain, another missionary, by whom he left two daughters.-Early life:...

 - who between them were the architects of the Serampore renaissance. Although they came chiefly for the purpose of preaching Christianity, they dedicated themselves to the service of ailing and distressed people in and around the town, spreading education, social reforms and social reconstruction.

They established more than a hundred 'monitorial' schools in the region. Hannah Marshman
Hannah Marshman
Hannah Marshman was a missionary.She was the daughter of John Shepherd, a farmer, and his wife Rachel, and the granddaughter of John Clark, pastor of the Baptist church at Crockerton, Wiltshire....

 established the first Girls' School at Serampore, which received much public approval. Carey made an outstanding contribution by founding the Serampore Mission Press in 1800 where the wooden Bangla types made by Panchanan Karmakar were installed.

Perhaps the crowning work of Carey and his two associates was the establishment of the Serampore College
Serampore College
Serampore College is located in Serampore Town, in Hooghly District, West Bengal, India.The college consists of two entities:*The theological faculty*A separate college with faculties of arts, science, commerce...

 in 1818 which acts both as a university through the Senate of Serampore College (University)
Senate of Serampore College (University)
The Senate of Serampore College is located in Serampore Town, in Hooghly District, West Bengal, India.Serampore was granted the status of university in 1829, making it India's first institution to have the status of a university....

 and as an individual college, Serampore College. The founders had to spend their last farthing on the construction of its magnificent buildings. It was also the first college in Asia to award a degree.

Carey became famous as the father of Bangla prose. The Mission Press published three books - the Bangla translation of the Bible, Hitopadesh and Kathopakathan. Munshi
Munshi
Munshi was the Hindi-Urdu name of a contractor, writer or secretary, used in Mughal Empire and later British India of the native language teachers or secretaries employed by Europeans....

 Ramram Basu
Ramram Basu
Ramram Basu was a notable early scholar and translator of the Bengali language , and credited with writing the first original work of Bangla prose written by a Bengali....

, the pundit appointed by Carey, brought out Pratapaditya Charit and the Bangla versions of the Ramayana
Ramayana
The Ramayana is an ancient Sanskrit epic. It is ascribed to the Hindu sage Valmiki and forms an important part of the Hindu canon , considered to be itihāsa. The Ramayana is one of the two great epics of India and Nepal, the other being the Mahabharata...

 and the Mahabharata
Mahabharata
The Mahabharata is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India and Nepal, the other being the Ramayana. The epic is part of itihasa....

. The first issue of the second Bangla daily, Samachar Darpan came out in 1818 under the editorship of Carey.

At the same time, the Serampore Mission Press
Serampore Mission Press
The Serampore Mission Press was established in Serampore in 1800 by William Carey, William Ward and other British Baptist missionaries as an auxiliary of the Serampore Mission. The press produced 212,000 books between 1800 and 1832. The British government highly suspicious of missionaries...

 brought out the English daily, A Friend of India (precursor to The Statesman
The Statesman
The Statesman is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper founded in 1875 and published simultaneously in Kolkata, New Delhi, Siliguri and Bhubaneswar. The Statesman is owned by The Statesman Ltd., its headquarters at Statesman House, Chowringhee Square, Calcutta and its national...

). Another outstanding contribution of the missionaries was the installation of India's first paper mill, set up by John Clark Marshman
John Clark Marshman
John Clark Marshman, Indian scholar and philanthropist.Marshman was the first child of Joshua Marshman and Hannah Marshman and was born in August 1794 at Bristol, England where his father was at that time a schoolmaster, before later emigrating to India as a missionary...

 (the son of Joshua and Hannah Marshman) which was powered by a steam engine.

Between 1801 and 1832 the Serampore Mission Press printed 212,000 copies of books in 40 different languages. In this cultural development, the local inhabitants had only a passive role. Only a few among the affluent, comprising absentee landlords and businessmen, seized the opportunity for higher education by sending their children to the academic institutions of the missionaries. On the other hand, people belonging to the lower economic stratum sent their children to the monitorial schools, which provided a basic education. In the process, there emerged a class of local gentry, who had a favourable attitude towards the missionaries.

Later years

Between 1801 and 1839 Danish trade and commerce as well as the civic life of Serampore experienced a severe decline. While in 1803, 113 European ships were loaded and unloaded at Serampore port, there was only 1 in 1815. The aggressive attitude of the British merchants located in Calcutta and their continuous harassment of the Danes in Serampore hit the company severely. The situation became so critical that the Danish Governor, Pater Hansen, was constrained to sell off the entire property to the English for a paltry sum of 1.2 million rupees on 11 October 1845.

During the last days of Danish rule in Serampore, the entire civic administration was completely disrupted.

British rule

On 11 October 1845, it was sold to Britain, which integrated it in British India and officially restored the Bengali name.

After taking possession of the town, the British began to look after its civic amenities and the earlier 'Village Committee' was transformed into the Serampore Municipality in 1865. Rishra and Konnagar were also included in it.

At that time, the affluent high caste section of the Serampore population displayed no sign of modernisation, nor did they subscribe to an urban ethos. The Indian economy during the period was passing through a severe recession. There was continuous migration of rural people to the urban centres. Landless labourers from Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Orissa came to Serampore in search of employment. When the second Jute Mill was opened in 1866 in Serampore (the first one was set up in Rishra in 1855) the town began to grow as an industrial town. Along with the Jute mills, many other subsidiary factories came up in the erstwhile rural areas within or on the fringes of the town.

Thus, with the capital investment of the British the commercial town of Serampore was transformed into an industrial one. The deciding force behind the process was the laying of the railway line from Howrah to Burdwan in 1854. It ushered in a great change in the social composition of the town. Between 1866 and 1915, six more jute mills were established in Rishra, Serampore and Gondolpara. The local landlords, thikadars and mill-owners made arrangements for the habitation of the labour force around the factories. Thus at Mahesh, Akna, and Tarapukur mouzas adjacent to the Ganges, workers' colonies like Oriyabasti, Gayaparabasti, Chhapra basti and Telengipara basti were established. Because of the arrival of these migrant workers, the population in Serampore increased from 24,440 to 44,451 between 1872 and 1901. These habitations of labourers were mere unhygienic, overcrowded slums full of stench. There was no provision for even a minimum of civic amenities in their dwellings.

In 1914, an arrangement was made to supply filtered potable water from the Municipality. The Town Hall was established in memory of Kishori Lal Goswami in 1927. At the initiative of the Government, the weaving school was founded during the thirties, and later on it was raised to the status of a Textile College. The municipality began to provide electricity in 1938. After fifty years of British possession, Serampore was swept by the waves of a Bengali
Bengali people
The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...

 cultural and nationalist movement. The spirit of nationalism influenced many youths from middle-class families. It resulted in the decline of foreign investment in industries. But there was an increase in indigenous investment. The Bangalakshmi Cotton Mill was founded out of the swadeshi spirit. From the beginning of the twentieth century many primary schools and educational institutions were set up at Serampore. The descendants of some of the older aristocratic families donated their residential buildings for benevolent purposes.

Post 1947

Since 1947, Serampore has become a satellite of Kolkata
Kolkata
Kolkata , formerly known as Calcutta, is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. Located on the east bank of the Hooghly River, it was the commercial capital of East India...

 (formerly Calcutta) and as such its process of urbanisation and change is as yet still incomplete. Now Serampore is one of the most developed towns in the main line region of Howrah.

Demographics

India census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...

, Serampore had a population of 197,955. Males constitute 53% of the population and females 47%. Serampore has an average literacy rate of 77%, higher than the national average of 59.5%: male literacy is 81%, and female literacy is 73%. In Serampore, 8% of the population is under 6 years of age.
.

Famous spots

There are some famous spots in the city.They are-
  • Radhaballav Temple
  • Ganga ghat
  • Maniktala
  • BP Dey street(People from other cities come to purchase items from here).
  • Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate
    Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate
    The Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate was a part of the Zamindari of the Sheoraphuli Rajparivar.- History :Sheoraphuli fell under the Zamindari of Raja Manohar Roy, a Raja in Bengal during the reign of Akbar the Great of the Mughal era . Raja Manohar Chandra Roy, Zamindar of Sheoraphuli built the...


See also

  • Serampore (Lok Sabha constituency)
    Serampore (Lok Sabha constituency)
    Serampore is one of the 543 parliamentary constituencies in India. The constituency centres on Serampore in West Bengal.-Election results:Results of elections held prior to 2009 are summarised below:-Assembly segments:...

  • Serampore College
    Serampore College
    Serampore College is located in Serampore Town, in Hooghly District, West Bengal, India.The college consists of two entities:*The theological faculty*A separate college with faculties of arts, science, commerce...

  • Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate
    Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate
    The Sheoraphuli Raj Debuttar Estate was a part of the Zamindari of the Sheoraphuli Rajparivar.- History :Sheoraphuli fell under the Zamindari of Raja Manohar Roy, a Raja in Bengal during the reign of Akbar the Great of the Mughal era . Raja Manohar Chandra Roy, Zamindar of Sheoraphuli built the...


For more information on the early Serampore missionaries, see:
  • Joshua Marshman
  • Hannah Marshman
    Hannah Marshman
    Hannah Marshman was a missionary.She was the daughter of John Shepherd, a farmer, and his wife Rachel, and the granddaughter of John Clark, pastor of the Baptist church at Crockerton, Wiltshire....

  • William Carey
  • William Ward
    William Ward (missionary)
    William Ward was an English pioneer Baptist missionary, author, printer and translator. On 10 May 1802 he was married at Serampore to the widow of John Fountain, another missionary, by whom he left two daughters.-Early life:...

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