villagesSutanuti

Sutanuti is a historic locality in present-day Kolkata, West Bengal, India. It was one of the three villages—Sutanuti, Kalikata, and Gobindapur—that formed the early settlement which later developed into the city of Calcutta (now Kolkata) under British colonial rule. The area is part of the old town and lies along the eastern bank of the Hooghly River.

Historical background reveals that in the 17th century the British East India Company began expanding from a trading post in Sutanuti after acquiring rights to the villages from local landholders. Fort William and related urban development followed, and by the 1690s the trio of villages were unified as Calcutta, establishing a growing administrative and commercial center for Bengal and the Company’s operations in the region.

Geography and toponymy indicate that Sutanuti lay across the Hooghly from the port area and formed a core part of early Calcutta’s footprint. In the modern city, the exact boundaries of the old village have largely been subsumed into the sprawling urban fabric of North Kolkata, though the area remains associated with the city’s colonial-era core and historic street layouts.

Name and etymology remain unclear, with references to Sutanuti appearing in 17th- and 18th-century records. The term is generally treated as an indigenous toponym that designated one of the original settlements that contributed to Calcutta’s emergence as a major port and administrative hub.

Cultural and historical significance lies in Sutanuti’s role as part of Kolkata’s founding landscape. It reflects early European-Bengali interaction and the urban transformation that culminated in Calcutta’s status as a key city in colonial India.