The Diocese of Calcutta,

Church of North India The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a province of the worldwide Anglica ...

was established in 1813 as part of the

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. It is led by the

Bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

and the first bishop was

Thomas Middleton Thomas Middleton (baptised 18 April 1580 – July 1627; also spelt ''Midleton'') was an English Jacobean playwright and poet. He, with John Fletcher and Ben Jonson, was among the most successful and prolific of playwrights at work in the Jac ...

(1814–1822) and the second

Reginald Heber Reginald Heber (21 April 1783 – 3 April 1826) was an English Anglican bishop, man of letters and hymn-writer. After 16 years as a country parson, he served as Bishop of Calcutta until his death at the age of 42. The son of a rich lando ...

(1823–1826). Under the sixth bishop Daniel Wilson (1832–1858), the see was made Metropolitan (though not made an Archbishopric) when two more dioceses in India came into being (Madras, 1835, and Bombay, 1837). Calcutta was made a

metropolitan see Metropolitan may refer to: * Metropolitan area, a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories * Metropolitan borough, a form of local government district in England * Metropolitan county, a t ...

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on 10 October 1835 and in 1930 was included in the Church of India, Burma and Ceylon (from 1948 the

Church of India, Pakistan, Burma, and Ceylon The Church of India, Burma and Ceylon (CIBC) was the autonomous ecclesiastical province of the Anglican Communion in British India. The first Anglican diocese in India was established in 1813, the Diocese of Calcutta of the Church of North Indi ...

) until 1970. In 1970, the

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and the

Church of Pakistan The Church of Pakistan is a united Protestant Church in Pakistan, which is part of the Anglican Communion and a member of the World Communion of Reformed ChurchesDatabase (9 February 2006)"Sialkot Diocese of the Church of Pakistan" Reformed Onl ...

were separated from the province. The Anglican dioceses in Northern India merged with the United Church of Northern India (Congregationalist and Presbyterian), the

Methodist Church (British and Australian Conferences) The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a province of the worldwide Anglica ...

, the Council of Baptist Churches in Northern India, the

Church of the Brethren in India The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a province of the worldwide Anglic ...

, and the

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to form the Church of North India in the same year. In 1842 (after Madras and Bombay dioceses had been erected), her jurisdiction was described as "

Presidency of Bengal The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and ...

". The diocese currently has jurisdiction over the corporation limits of

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

and the Districts of Hooghly &

Howrah Howrah (, , alternatively spelled as Haora) is a city in the Indian state of West Bengal. Howrah is located on the western bank of the Hooghly River opposite its twin city of Kolkata. Administratively it lies within Howrah district, and is th ...

in the state of

West Bengal West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) 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 . West Bengal is the fourt ...

. The bishop's seat (

cathedra A ''cathedra'' is the raised throne of a bishop in the early Christian basilica. When used with this meaning, it may also be called the bishop's throne. With time, the related term ''cathedral'' became synonymous with the "seat", or principa ...

) is located in the city of

at St. Paul's Cathedral. The current bishop is

Paritosh Canning Paritosh is an Indian first name and may be: * Paritosh Pandya, Indian computer scientist * Paritosh Sen Paritosh Sen ( bn, পরিতোষ সেন) (26 September 1918 – 22 October 2008) was a leading Indian artist. He was born in D ...

List of Bishops of Calcutta

Assistant bishops

John Richardson was appointed assistant bishop for, and Commissary for the Metropolitan, in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in 1950, and remained an assistant bishop of Calcutta until the Diocese of Andaman and Nicobar was erected from Calcutta diocese in 1966. At that point, he became an assistant bishop of the new diocese, where he served until 1977. William Arthur Partridge (12 February 191218 December 1992; called Arthur) was assistant Bishop in Nandyal from 1953 until the erection of the Diocese of Nandyal in 1963. He returned to the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

and served as an Assistant Bishop of Hereford. M. D. (Manonmani David) Srinivasan was appointed an assistant bishop of the Anglican diocese in 1964 and consecrated a bishop in January 1985. John Banerjee was appointed assistant bishop of Lahore in 1931. He travelled to Australia in 1936 and was presented as Metropolitan of India.

References

CNI Diocese of Calcutta – Bishops
*Cross, F. L. (ed.; 1957) ''The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church''. Oxford U. P.; pp. 686–88: "India, Christianity in"

External links

– A History of the Church of England in India, SPCK, 1924
Diocese of Kolkata, CNI – Official WebsiteArchived
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bishop of Calcutta *

1813 establishments in British India Church of North India Anglican dioceses in Asia Christianity in Kolkata Church of India, Burma and Ceylon

List of Bishops of Calcutta

Assistant bishops

See also

References

External links