Population of Kolkata

According to the 2001 census, the Kolkata metropolitan area had a population of 13,216,546, with a very high population density of 10,607 persons per sq km (27,477 persons per sq mi).

The growth rate of the metropolitan area population was 19.9 percent between 1991 and 2001, up from the 1981 to 1991 growth rate of 18.7 percent.

The population of the city of Kolkata grew more slowly than the metropolitan district.

Since India’s first census in 1872, Kolkata has generally been India’s largest city, although in 1991 it lost that status to Mumbai.

About one-third of the total population of Kolkata’s metropolitan area lives in slums.

Many other Kolkata residents are so-called pavement dwellers (homeless). Mother

Teresa, a Roman Catholic nun who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950 to help the poorest of the poor in Kolkata and all over the world.