Indian Museum
Founded in 1814, the oldest museum in Asia — Bharhut stupa railings, a fossil hall and an Egyptian mummy.
Closed Mondays. Start with the Bharhut gallery before the crowds.
2.5 hrs
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Kolkata
A Company trading post of 1690 on three river villages became a colonial capital, a printing and reform powerhouse, and then a city that kept the buildings and changed the argument.
Hooghly
1690
Company post
Job Charnock settles the riverbank.
1772
Capital
Seat of British India for 139 years.
1828
Renaissance
Bengal's reform movement takes hold.
1911
Capital moves
The court departs for Delhi.
Victoria Memorial
Finished in 1921 as imperial monument, now a gallery of Calcutta's own paintings, maps and the record of its revolt.
Galleries closed Mondays; the gardens open early and are good for a morning walk.
2 hrs
Jorasanko Thakur Bari
Built in the 1780s by the Tagore family and birthplace of Rabindranath Tagore in 1861, this mansion now houses Rabindra Bharati Museum tracing the Bengal Renaissance.
Closed Mondays. Shoes off inside; photography restricted.
90 min
Netaji Bhawan
The Bose family home, from which Subhas Chandra Bose escaped house arrest in 1941, kept as a museum with his room and the Wanderer car he fled in.
Closed Mondays; open late morning to late afternoon.
60 min
Gurusaday Museum
Established from the 1930s folk-art collection of civil servant Gurusaday Dutt, this museum preserves over 2,325 rare Bengal folk artefacts including Kalighat paintings and Patachitra.
It is far south of the center; check opening hours before the trip.
75 min
Sabarna Sangrahashala
Founded in 2005 by the Sabarna Roy Choudhury family, it keeps the family's papers, including those on the 1698 transfer of three villages to the East India Company, and argues against crediting Job Charnock with founding Calcutta.
Small and specialist; best combined with a visit to the family's old Barisha temples.
60 min