New Town, formerly known as Rajarhat, is a neighbourhood of Kolkata (earlier, Calcutta), located in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, is a fast-growing planned satellite city. This new information technology and residential hub is being developed on the north-eastern fringes of Kolkata. It consists of the two erstwhile villages Rajarhat and Gopalpur, which is now a statutory planned development area. The area mainly consisted of huge acres of cultivable lands and water bodies, which has been acquired and developed in a planned manner. The process of investing for residential and industrial facilities and infrastructural development of the area has mainly started under the leadership of the then Chief Minister of West Bengal Buddhadeb Bhattacharya in the late 1990s. The master plan envisions a township which is at least three times bigger than the neighbouring planned Salt Lake City
