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You know I read somewhere, you can take a person out of Calcutta, but you can't take Calcutta out of a person. I find this very true.

I was born and brought up in Calcutta. I had to accept the city as it was. The face of this city has changed through decades. As a pedestrian I find marks of decay very vivid. When I was a child, I often went with my father to the Maidan, we returned by rickshaw. The well scrubbed streets reflected the rickshaw pullers silhouette. Today, layers of dust coat every street. This city has nothing to boast of by way of physical beauty but it is enriched by its cultural heritage.

Calcutta with all its good and bad is a part of my memory and a part of my present existence.

This city is wrapped in contradictions -- the nouveau riche and the nouveau poor all belong here and there is a new class which is indifferent to everything. But there's also a group which has a burning passion for humanity. Like the lady I saw one afternoon -- jumping off a moving tram as she had noticed a newborn baby lying on the side of the pavement. The grubby sheet that had been carelessly draped over him had shifted and covered his face. The lady was angry with the mother and explained how the child could have been suffocated. And then moved on to wait for another tram. That's Calcutta for you.

The true love of Calcuttans is literature and all the other art forms. Calcuttas see life through the values of literature.

Recently a foreign dignitary commented that he was observing a radical change in the faces of Calcuttans. Perhaps, Calcuttans are finally seeing a silver lining. Things are changing. The state government's new economic policy has brought about a positive attitude towards Calcutta. Investments from abroad are awaited, the long-prevailing unemployment problem will hopefully fade away.

Outsiders feel Calcutta is a dying city... but I believe Calcutta is determined not to die. The city has an enigmatic blend of the rural and urban. Today, Calcutta has reason to hope for a better future. This city saw the first awakening of the spirit of nationalism. It is a truly cosmopolitan city where people from all over co-exist peacefully. Calcuttans have always been obsessed with politics. But now they realise politics should be for betterment.

Today, after almost four decades of deterioration, Calcutta is looking forward to better times.

Ganesh Pyne is one of the finest painters of India.