West Bengal is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of 88,752 km2 (34,267 sq mi) as of 2011. The population estimate as of 2023 is 102,552,787. West Bengal is the fourth-most populous and thirteenth-largest state by area in India, as well as the eighth-most populous country subdivision of the world. As a part of the Bengal region of the Indian subcontinent, it borders Bangladesh in the east, and Nepal and Bhutan in the north. It also borders the Indian states of Jharkhand, Odisha, Bihar, Sikkim and Assam. The state capital is Kolkata, the third-largest metropolis, and seventh largest city by population in India. West Bengal includes the Darjeeling Himalayan hill region, the Ganges delta, the Rarh region, the coastal Sundarbans and the Bay of Bengal. The state's main ethnic group are the Bengalis, with the Bengali Hindus forming the demographic majority.
Kolkata, also known as Calcutta, is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, 80 km (50 mi) west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary financial and commercial centre of eastern and northeastern India. Kolkata is the seventh most populous city in India with an estimated city proper population of 4.5 million (0.45 crore) while its metropolitan region Kolkata Metropolitan Area is third most populous metropolitan region of India with a metro population of over 15 million. Kolkata is regarded by many sources as the cultural capital of India and a historically and culturally significant city in the historic region of Bengal.
Syama Prasad Mookerjee was an Indian politician and academician. Noted for his opposition to Quit India movement within the independence movement in India, he later served as India's first Minister for Industry and Supply in Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru's cabinet after breaking up with the Hindu Mahasabha. After falling out with Nehru, protesting against the Liaquat–Nehru Pact, Mukherjee resigned from Nehru's cabinet. With the help of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, he founded the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, the predecessor to the Bharatiya Janata Party, in 1951.
Prasar Bharati is an Indian state-owned public broadcaster, headquartered in New Delhi, India. It is a statutory autonomous body set up by an Act of Parliament and comprises the Doordarshan television broadcasting and Akashvani, which were earlier media units of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The Parliament of India passed the Prasar Bharati Act to grant this autonomy in 1990, but it was not enacted until 15 September 1997.
All India Radio (AIR), also known as Akashvani, is an Indian state-owned public radio broadcaster founded by the Government of India, owned by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and one of Prasar Bharati's two divisions. It was established in 1936. It is the sister service of Prasar Bharati's Doordarshan, an Indian television broadcaster. Headquartered in the Akashvani Bhavan building in New Delhi, it houses the Drama Section, the FM Section, and the National Service, and is also home to the Indian television station Doordarshan Kendra, (Delhi).
The television industry in India is very diverse and produces thousands of programmes in many Indian languages. Nearly 87% Indian households own a television. As of 2016, the country had over 900 channels of which 184 were pay channels. National channels operate in Hindi and English, in addition to channels in several other languages including Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Odia, Punjabi, Assamese, Gujarati, Urdu, Bhojpuri, Kashmiri, Konkani and Haryanvi, among others. The Hindi, Telugu and Tamil language television industries are by far the largest television industries in India.
Bengali Brahmos are those who adhere to Brahmoism, the philosophy of Brahmo Samaj which was founded by Raja Rammohan Roy. A recent publication describes the disproportionate influence of Brahmos on India's development post-19th Century as unparalleled in recent times.
Bengali Christians are adherents of Christianity among the Bengali people. Christianity took root in Bengal after the arrival of Portuguese voyagers in the 16th century. It witnessed further conversions among the Bengali upper-caste elite during the 19th century Bengali Renaissance.
Diptendu Pramanick was a Bengali film personality from Calcutta. He was the founder secretary of the Eastern India Motion Pictures Association in Calcutta, India, a fraternity of film personnel which is an interface between the entertainment industry of eastern India and the Government. During his multifarious career he came in contact with eminent personalities and saw the evolution of this organization from its initial days to being a regionwide entity.
Calcutta Club is an elite gentlemen's club located on Lower Circular Road in Kolkata, India. It was established in 1907 and the first president of the club was the Maharajah of Cooch Behar, Sir Nripendra Narayan. The Prince of Wales, later King Edward VIII of Great Britain, was among the first royal guests to visit the club when he was invited to a lunch on 28 December 1921. First prime minister of India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru visited the club in 1961. The club has always maintained distinguished members from every community - from Maharaja of Coochbehar to Maharaja of Burdwan, Maharaja of Darbhanga, Nawab Sir KGM Faroqui of Ratanpur to Bhupendra Nath Bose, President of the Indian National Congress to Indian economist and philosopher Amartya Sen. Internationally acclaimed artists like Gaganendranath Tagore and Abanindranath Tagore were regular visitors to the club, as was Oscar award-winning legendary film-maker Satyajit Ray, longest-serving chief minister of West Bengal Jyoti Basu. In 2007, 11th president of India Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam visited the club to launch the centenary scholarship fund. Other notable visitors to the club include prominent Indian artists and celebrities such as Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bhaduri. Today Calcutta Club stands as an iconic landmark in Kolkata and represents the elite Bengal with rich history and culture, and also referred as "The Grand Duke of all Clubs".
Sudhindra Sircar, also known as Badal Sarkar, was an influential Indian dramatist and theatre director, most known for his anti-establishment plays during the Naxalite movement in the 1970s and taking theatre out of the proscenium and into public arena, when he transformed his own theatre company, Shatabdi as a third theatre group. He wrote more than fifty plays of which Ebong Indrajit, Basi Khabar, and Saari Raat are well known literary pieces. A pioneering figure in street theatre as well as in experimental and contemporary Bengali theatre with his egalitarian "Third Theatre", he prolifically wrote scripts for his Aanganmanch performances, and remains one of the most translated Indian playwrights. Though his early comedies were popular, it was his angst-ridden Evam Indrajit that became a landmark play in Indian theatre. Today, his rise as a prominent playwright in 1960s is seen as the coming of age of Modern Indian playwriting in Bengali, just as Vijay Tendulkar did it in Marathi, Mohan Rakesh in Hindi, and Girish Karnad in Kannada.
Mahendralal Sarkar CIE was a Bengali medical doctor (MD), the second MD graduated from the Calcutta Medical College, social reformer, and propagator of scientific studies in nineteenth-century India. He was the founder of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science.
Bazaar-e-Husn or Seva Sadan is a Hindustani novel by Munshi Premchand.
Christianity in West Bengal, India, is a minority religion. According to the 2011 census of India, there were 658,618 Christians in West Bengal, or 0.72% of the population. Although Mother Teresa worked in Kolkata (Calcutta), Christianity is a minority religion in Kolkata as well. West Bengal has the highest number of Bengali Christians. Bengali Christians have been established since the 16th century with the advent of the Portuguese in Bengal. Later in the 19th and 20th centuries, many upper-class Bengalis converted to Christianity during the Bengali Renaissance under British rule, including Krishna Mohan Banerjee, Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Anil Kumar Gain, and Gnanendramohan Tagore. Aurobindo Nath Mukherjee was the first Indian to be Anglican Bishop of Calcutta.
Anwar Jamal is an Indian documentary filmmaker, based in New Delhi. He has been awarded the National Film Award on several occasions and had made critically acclaimed feature, short and documentary films a wide array of social, political and cultural themes. He has served as jury in many international film festivals including National Film Award Jury.
Arun Bhatnagar is a former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the 1966 batch of the Madhya Pradesh cadre who has served in various capacities in the State and with the Government of India. Bhatnagar retired from the IAS in June, 2004 as Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training and worked, thereafter, as Secretary, National Advisory Council (2004–08) and Chairman, Prasar Bharati (2008–09) at New Delhi.
Biman Bihari Das is an Indian sculptor and former Principal of the Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata. He was honoured by the Government of India, in 2014, by bestowing on him the Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award, for his services to the field of Fine Arts.
Meeta Pandit is a Hindustani Classical vocalist and a leading exponent of the Gwalior Gharana. She is the granddaughter and disciple of Krishnarao Shankar Pandit and daughter of Laxman Krishnarao Pandit. She is the sixth in the unbroken lineage and the first woman in the family to have taken up music as a profession.
DAG, previously known as Delhi Art Gallery, is an art house having galleries in India and New York. Started in 1993 in Hauz Khas by Rama Anand, DAG showcases modern Indian artists like Raja Ravi Verma, Jamini Roy, Amrita Sher-Gil, SH Raza among others.
