Handpulled Rickshaw : A Heritage of Calcutta

These handrickshaws are pollution free, cheapest transport and the only means of transport in the waterlogged streets and lanes of Calcutta where neither a three wheeler nor a four wheeler can enter.

Handpulled rickshaw is an important and significant part of Calcutta ''s heritage, culture and transport system. Calcutta, a city of contradictions, is today one of the few cities in the world where hand rickshaws are still plying on a regular basis in the lanes, by-lanes and streets of the city as a public mode of cheap transport. The hand rickshaw pullers are mostly migrant workers from Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, U.P., the vulnerable city dwellers and the rural people of West Bengal, who are poor, illiterate, unskilled and unemployed. The handrickshaw was first introduced in Calcutta in 1914 by the Chinese people living in this city as a private transport for carrying goods and also for the passenger transport. The first handrickshaws in Calcutta were not only owned by the Chinese residents but they were also pulled by the Chinese immigrants.