CALCUTTA, INDIA 1883-4
Calcutta International Exhibition

Quick List Info

Dates Open
December 4, 1883 to March 10, 1884. Not open Sundays.

Attendance
817,153 paid visitors. Approximately 200,000 additional season ticket holders, exhibitors, and free visitors.

International Participants
22 nations and colonies.

Total Cost - Buildings cost 355,667 Rupees. Additional 50,000 to 100,000 Rupees spent on provincial exhibits. Total expenditures stated at 460,835 rupees.

Site Acreage - 22 acres, including grounds and building of the Indian Museum and the Maiden.

Sanction and Type - Prior to the Bureau of International Exhibitions. The exhibition would be considered a Special Expo event on specific themes like that on the 2-3 or 7-8 years of a decade cycle.

Ticket Cost - 4 annas (daily), except Wednesday, which had higher price of 1 rupee ($0.325). Children under 12 half price. Season ticket 25 rupees men, 15 rupees women.

Photo top center: Exhibits at the Calcutta International Exhibition, 1883-4. Courtesy Pinterest. Column Top: Indian Museum, 1905, India Illustrated. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons. Column Bottom: Punjab Court at the Exhibition, 1883-4. Courtesy Pinterest.

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History of the Event

There had never been a large scale international exhibition attempted in British India, so when Jules Joubert, a naturalized citizen of South Australia who had previously managed a similar New Zealand exhibition in Christchurch, suggested the idea to the Lt. Governor of Bengal, he forwarded it to the government. They liked it, and plans began for an international exhibition to be held less than one year after the resolution to mount the fair issued on January 16, 1883. Ambitious. Yes. Enough time. Doubtful, although it is reported that most exhibitors and structures were completed at a higher percentage than most past exhibitions. Despite the short timeframe, the exhibition began to take shape. It would open on December 4 and last for three months. The exhibition would be held in part of the Indian Museum with additional annexes built. The additional buildings would house the Indian Court, Machinery Court, military displays, and other provinces. There would be a permanent Art and Jewelry Court Gallery, 180 x 32 feet. In total, exhibition space at the Calcutta International covered eleven acres or three hundred thousand square feet. It wasn't enough.

Opening day was rainy, but the exhibition recieved both the Marquis of Ripon and his wife at the opening ceremony filled with pomp and opera. The exhibition garnered two thousand five hundred exhibitors with one hundred thousand articles on display. At the end of the opening ceremony, thirty-one guns fired from Fort William and electric lights bathed the grounds, although some state that this attempt at lighting actually failed. Those lights would only be turned on during the first month as the later months saw the exhibition grounds open from only 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. only, discontinuing further night hours.



The closing ceremony was held on March 10, 1884. Expo officials touted that the attendance was greater per day than previous exhibitions in Sydney 1879-80 and Melbourne 1880-1, although it did appear small compared to the 250 million population of India. The London Times was not impressed with the closing ceremony, noting that it was tame and unimpressive.

The Calcutta International Exhibition was considered a private enterprise, even though backed by the government with sanction and funds to aid exhibitors and build some structures. This, being a private venture, likely caused a diminishing of the ability to attract official or unofficial foreign exhibitors. In the end, the number of visitors, nearly or just over one million depending on the source, was less in respect to foreign travelers than the expo authority had hoped. There was a lack of early promotion, which caused some of that. Wet weather in the early days was also problematic. The organizers were very pleased, however, with the amount of women who attended.



Top photo. Photo of exterior exhibit at the Calcutta exhibition, 1883. Courtesy Pinterest. Middle: Temporary structures and exhibits, Calcutta 1883-4. Courtesy Pinterest. Bottom: Bronze medal given to James Earnest Caithness at the Calcutta Exhibition. Courtesy Pinterest.

Historian's Perspective

Thomas Prasch - "The fair was quite adversely effected by contemporaneous debate over the Ilbert Bill, which proposed giving native Indian judges jurisdiction over Europeans resident in India. Whites in the colony were hugely upset, and this was reflected in a near-boycott of the exhibition (because of the officials who were behind it). Despite this, the fair's claim to be the first in the colonial sphere other than in settler colonies (like Australia) gives it some weight from the point of view of national pride. Advance publicity was mostly positive but not hugely extensive, limited by Calcutta's distance from the metropoles. But media coverage practically vanishes after opening day (partly pushed off the page by the Ilbert Bill controversy). Public reaction, as noted, was divided on racial lines, with whites not much in attendance; the fair lost money. What accounts there are of opening day are not particularly negative, but not especially enthusiastic either.

Calcutta, as noted, is the first fair in a non-settler colony, and much was made of this in advance. Much said, in particular, about how this showed Indian advances and the development of Indian commercial relations (especially with Australia). That positive response, of course, did not translate into attendance or profit.The fair's strong emphasis on commercial connections between India and its neighbors/the world was suited well to Calcutta. So, too, were the problems attendant on the exhibition: Calcutta was also the site of India's most intense nationalistic and anti-nationalistic feelings. Still, commentators on the fair did get the message about Indian trade. Calcutta was a privately funded enterprise by Joubert, with extensive experience in the matter."

Peter Hoffenberg - "Imperial events in India and Australia are more difficult to measure, since "national" pride included attachments to Britain and the Empire, but, at the same time, perhaps local, anti-colonial nationalist aspirations."

Unsanctioned Expo

International Participants
Nations and Colonies

Nations who officially exhibited - Austria, French Indo-China (Cochin China, Tonquin), Netherlands India (Dutch Colony of Batavia), Indian Empire, Great Britain.

Awards Given to Other Nations (likely non-official participants from those countries) - Belgium, Denmark, Egypt, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Madeira, Spain, Phillipine Islands, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United States, Japan.

British Colonies - British Guiana, Ceylon, Mauritius, Straits Settlements, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, Malta, Western Australia.

Exhibitors from the Indian Empire
Andoman and Nicobar Islands, Assam, Bengal, Bombay, British Burma, Central India, Central Provinces, Haidarabad, Jeypore, Madras and Travancore, Mysore, Northwestern Provinces and Oudh, Punjab, Rajputana, Tanjore, Calcutta.

There may be some differences in the overall list here than were actually exhibiting at the exhibition. Various sources may indicate participation when participation did not occur. Use the above as a guide, not gospel. Above listings were those with exhibits or commissioners at the Calcutta International Exhibition, according to the Official Report.

Expo Tidbits
The government built a temporary hotel for guests, but it was little used. Existing hotel capacity was sufficient.

High attendance day was December 10 with 16,183 visitors.

Two of the exhibitors from the United States were Currier and Ives and Singer Sewing Company.

One of the positive elements of the exhibition is that some historians contend that it introduced many Indians to non-Indian/non-British influences.

Exhibitors paid 2 shillings per foot with 5 shilling surcharge for front space on main avenues of exhibit halls. Unlike most exhibititions, the goods on display were on sale.

There was a ninety thousand square foot reservoir for native boats outside the courtyard of the Museum.

Legacies
The Indian Museum in Calcutta (Kolkata), also known as the Imperial Museum at Calcutta, remains to this day. The building was constructed in 1875 and the Indian Museum itself founded in 1814. Some of the acreage used in the Maiden, the British Parade Ground of Fort William, is now part of the largest urban park in Kolkata.


Those in Charge
Patron of the 1883 Exhibition was the Viceroy and Governor General of India, the Marquis of Ripon. President Augustus Rivers Thompson, Lt.-Governor of Bengal. Vice President Colonel S.T. Trevor, Joint Secretary to the Government of Bengal, Public Works Department. Architect was E.J. Martin.

Sources: Official Report Of The Calcutta International Exhibition, 1883-84 Volume 1 and 2, 1885; London Times; Historical Dictionary of World's Fair by Alfred Heller; Book of the Fair; Thomas Prasch Papers; Fair News.

Photo column top: Montage of buildings at the Calcutta exhibition of 1883-4, unknown original source. Courtesy Pinterest. Middle: George Robinson, the Marquis of Ripon, 1880, Illustrated London News. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons. Bottom: Courtyard of the Indian Museum, 2004, British Library. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons.