Tale of Two Cities of South Asia: Consequences of Changes in the nature of Manufacturing on Dhaka and Kolkata

Abstract

In the present article, the author is narrating the tale of two cities located in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent: Dhaka and Kolkata. These two cities have shared a common historical time since the beginning of the Mughal Empire and experienced the consequences of the three different political regimes: (a) Mughal Empire, (b) rules of the East India Company and (c) British Raj. The symbiotic relationship that emerged between these two cities depended on the changes in the nature of manufacturing. The existence of traditional flexible manufacturing resulted in the prosperity of Dhaka and the origin of modern manufacturing shifted prosperity from Dhaka to Kolkata. In the article, an attempt has been made to describe how different political regimes impacted the nature of manufacturing to explain how forces of development and prosperity kept changing their location.