Uttarpara - History

History

Uttarpara remains firmly locked with its history through the hymn of Satya-Narayan Puja in Bengali.

"Gangaar Paschim Kul, Varanasi Samatul, Taar Madhya Uttam Uttarpara Gram, Sabarna Choudhury Dwija Narayan Naam..."

(in English, "Uttarpara is located on west bank of the Ganges, just as Varanasi. It was set up by the descendants of Sabarna Choudhury...")

Atul Krishna Ray, in his book Lakshmikanta: A Chapter In The Social History Of Bengal (1928) has written that Ratneshwar Roy Choudhury (1670–1720) belonged to the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family of Barisha-Behala. In 1709 Ratneshwar had purchased Chakbali tract from Sheoraphuli fiefdom of Manohar Roy. Since it was on the north of Chakbali, the place was called Uttarpara. He is the fourth generation in the family of Lakshmikanta, who was awarded the titles of "Roy" and "Choudhury" by Mughal Emperor Jahangir. The entire Kolkata of today and the adjacent Sundarbans belonged to the Sabarna Choudhury family. Lakshmikanta's father, Kamdev Brahmachari, who had become a saint and resided at Varanasi, had expressed that a piece of tract be bought by the family on the same side of the Ganges as that of Varanasi. The Kalighat Kali Temple was installed by Kamdev Brahmachari. Lakhmikanta was the great grandson of Panchanan Gangopadhyay, who had joined Emperor Humayun's Afgan cavalry and raised a haveli for which the place was called Havei Shahar, now Halisahar.

Amarnath Bandyopadhyay, in his book Bangsha Parichay (1911), has detailed all the Brahmin and Kayastha families of the then Uttarpara. It contains genealogy of each and every family. Sabarna Choudhury Paribar Parishad of Barisha-Behala has copies of both the above books. Ootarpara, in those days was marshland — bereft of decent human settlement. Only fishermen of Patni, Malo castes and a few Muslims lived there. Their trade was fishing, marketing fishing equipments, ferry service and dacoity. Ratneshwar cleared the entire area and developed it as a progressive town.

The compulsion of Kaulinya system made Ratneswar, who was a non-Kulin Brahmin, to bring Kulin Brahmin families for matrimony. Gradually, many Brahmin families like Durga Charan Banerjee, Ramtanu Chatterjee, Ramnidhi Chatterjee, Nandaram Mukherjee etc. migrated and settled at Ootarpara through matrimonial relation with descendants of Ratneswar Roychoudhury. Many of these families afterwards took leading role in intellectual and spiritual development of Uttarpara. It is not known how and when 'Ootarpara' became more sober sounding Uttarpara. Jaykrisna Mukherjee, one of the renowned Zamindars of that time belonged to this historic town. He and his family members (Mukhopadhayy Bangso) are said to be one the founder of modern Uttarpara. Jaykrisna Mukherjee a big lover of education and it was he who founded the famous Jaykrisna library (India's largest reference library). He paid a great attention towards female education and founded a school for the women which is still active.

Joykrishna Mukherjee was the first person to sign a mass petition for enactment of a law for widow marriage (Bidhoba Bibaha). A part of the Joykrishna library was opened for the famous poet Michael Madhusudan Dutta during his last few years. Uttarpara is a land of culture.Every year in the month of January a classical concert is organised by the Sangeet Chakra where many famous classical maestros perform.