History
Behala was once a part of the Sunderbans. The history of Barisha dated back to the Pala Era. In the 12th century, Barisha was a small village of farmers, fishermen and honey-gathers when a Kulin Kayastha named Dhananjay Mitra settled here. During the reign of Akbar Barisha came under the lordship of Basanta Roy who set up his capital at modern-day Sarsuna. Roy’s nephew and the king of Jessore Pratapaditya murdered him and incorporated Barisha with his kingdom. After the Mughals defeated Pratapaditya, Laksmikanta Majumdar of the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family was given jagirdari of a vast tract of land by Raja Man Singh in 1608. The three villages of Sutanuti, Govindapur and Kalikata were part of a khasmahal or imperial jagir or an estate belonging to the Mughal emperor himself, whose jagirdari rights were held by the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family. Even the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family was not keen to allow the British to settle or do trading on these villages, but the British had paid a bribe at the Mughal Durbar to ensure that the deal did not fail. Just prior to their move to Barisha, the Roy Choudhury family had to transfer their rights over Kalikata in 1698, to the East India Company much against their wishes and protests.
The stretch of Diamond Harbour Road from Taratala to Thakurpukur is a very old settlement, which divides the Behala into three parts - East Behala, South Behala and West Behala. It is populated mostly by citizens of East-Bengal (Before Partition of India Bangladesh was called East Bengal).
Settlement in the area dates back to the 1797, but its urbanization is relatively recent. Population growth started in Behala after the partition of India.
The Sabarna Roychoudhury's 'Aath-chala' could be regarded as the most prominent historical structure (though mostly ruined presently) of the city of Kolkata. It is the structure, sitting under which the British East India Company signed the rights of the villages- Kalikata, Gobindapur and Sutanuti (which later merged to form the city of Calcutta), under a lease from the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family on the 10th of November,1698.
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