Seventeenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

From ancient time, seaports have played a vital role in the field of development of any society at a given time. In many ways, a seaport supported contemporary political, ideological, and cultural changes. This paper focuses on the port of Hugli, and discusses the social, political, and economic factors of Bengal. Basically, this study explores three main areas in relation to the fall and rise of such seaports. It examines the geographical location of the port of Hugli, together with its prevailing weather condition and relationship to the thriving commercial hinterland. Secondly the social, political and economic features of Bengal: against the continuing fragile relationship between the Mughal empire and European colonialist particularly in that era. This paper consists the story of rising and decline of Satgaon port. Through the Satgaon port relation between Mughal and Europeans will be discussed. Apart from this economic importance, the role of merchant, weavers, and moneylender’s political aspect, monsoon and trade wind will be addressed in the context of Satgaon port. This is natural phenomena that one port took over another port and that caused the decline of the former. Behind this there were several reasons such as geographical features, silting process, interference of local rulers, interest of trading community, etc. This study discusses the decline of Satgaon and rise of Hugli together because Hugli port played a vital role in the fall of Satgaon.