page_title: Hooghly River
section_title: Economics
hierarchical_section_title: Hooghly River / Economics
caption_attribution_description: English: A ferry operating beteen Howrah and Kolkata with Howrah Bridge (Rabindra Setu) in background
context_page_description: The Hooghly River or the Bhāgirathi-Hooghly, originally and in local tongues the 'Ganga', and also called Kati-Ganga, is an approximately 260-kilometre-long distributary of the Ganges River in West Bengal, India. The Ganges splits into the Padma and the Hooghly near Giria, Murshidabad. Today there is a further man-made bifurcation of the river upstream at Farakka. The Padma flows eastward into Bangladesh, whereas the Hooghly flows south through West Bengal. The river flows through the Rarh region, the lower deltaic districts of West Bengal, and eventually into the Bay of Bengal. The upper riparian zone of the river is called Bhagirathi while the lower riparian zone is called Hooghly. Major rivers that drain into the Bhagirathi-Hooghly include Mayurakshi, Jalangi, Ajay, Damodar, Rupnarayan and Haldi rivers other than the Ganges. Kolkata and Hugli-Chinsura, the headquarters of Hooghly, are located on the banks of this river.
context_section_description: The Bhāgirathi-Hooghly river system is an essential lifeline for the people of West Bengal. It was through this river that the East India company sailed into Bengal and established their trade settlement, Calcutta, the capital of British India. People from other countries such as the French, Dutch, Portuguese, etc. all had their trade settlements by the banks of this river.
  The river provides a perennial supply of water to the plain of West Bengal for irrigation and human & industry consumption. The river is navigable and a major transport system in the region with a large traffic flow. For a long time, the Calcutta Port was the biggest port of India. Although in the past its significance had gone down, recently it has reached the 3rd position in the list of Indian Ports. The modern container port of Haldia, on the intersection of lower Hooghly and Haldi River, now carries much of the region's maritime trade. One new port will be built in the deep sea to reduce the load on Calcutta port.
  
  Despite being polluted, the fish from the river are important to the local economy.
  The Hooghly river valley was the most important industrial area of the state of Bengal. Due to declining jute industry, the prime industry of this region, but it is still one of the biggest industrial areas of India. It has number of small cities which forms the Greater Kolkata agglomeration, the second biggest Indian city and former capital.
  In September 2015, the Government of West Bengal announced that renovation of the Hooghly riverfront in Kolkata will be completed with the help of World Bank funding under the National Ganga River Basin Project Scheme.
caption: A ferry operating between Howrah and Kolkata with Howrah Bridge (Rabindra Setu) in background
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