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Only about 35 still in the city, 5,000 in India
By Sam Dolnick
The Associated Press
CALCUTTA, India — The stooped man in the yarmulke fights his way through this chaotic city, the weight of generations heavy upon his shoulders.
He squeezes past tea stalls and sidewalk electricians, past idle rickshaws and honking cars. He edges through rows of vendors selling sparkly hair clips and, finally, pushes open a rusty gate hidden from the street.
Today is the Sabbath, and Shalom Israel, one of the last Jews of Calcutta, has reached a cobwebbed synagogue, a once-grand building with imposing doors that nearly always stay shuttered, and spires that soar up toward the monsoon clouds.
Israel comes every Friday to light a candle, say a prayer and check on the three synagogues still standing. Most weeks, he is the only visitor.
There were once 5,000 Jews living in this teeming port city, but today, as the Jewish New Year approaches, there are fewer than 35. Israel, 38, is the youngest by nearly 25 years.
Israel lives inside the only place left where Jews aren't a minority — the Jewish cemetery. He cares for 2,000 Jewish tombs. He also tends to the Jewish elders still living, handles last rites when they die, and, to stay kosher, butchers his own meat.
It's not easy being the last of your people.
"It's only a matter of time before people die or leave," Israel said. "There is no future."
Repopulating the community would be tough. There aren't many unmarried Jewish women in Calcutta — Israel is single and doesn't know any women younger than 60. His sister married a Hindu, for which the elders shunned her. The last Jewish wedding anyone can remember was in 1982.
He's well aware that the centuries-old community will likely die with him, but he sees nothing to do but tend to its remnants and blow on the fading embers.
"I've seen what the community was. To see the way it is now …" He trails off.
In this country of 1.1 billion people, there are believed to be roughly 5,000 Jews — not enough to be counted as a distinct group in the Indian census. Jews first came to India as traders 250 years ago. Today, their largest community is in Mumbai.
Calcutta's first Jews are thought to have come in the late 18th century, descendants of the Baghdad Jews who came from Syria, Iran and Iraq. They thrived as diamond traders, real estate dealers, exporters, spice wholesalers, and bakers — one Jewish bakery famous for its plum cakes still stands, run by the founder's octogenarian grandson. Rickshaws and taxis still ply Synagogue Street and roads named for prominent Jews.
The Jewish community built at least five synagogues and two schools. Today, there are 700 students at the Elias Meyer Free School and Talmud Torah. Not one is Jewish.
The birth of independent India in 1947, and the creation of Israel the following year, marked the beginning of the end for Calcutta's Jews. Many left for the new Jewish state; others moved to Europe or the United States in search of better business opportunities.
Shalom Israel remains. He ticks off his to-do list: take several elders to the doctor, take others to the dentist, take another to a hearing test; check on the temples, trim the cemetery foliage, visit the infirm living alone.
He gets paid by the community for all this, but he says the work is important not because of the money but because "it gives me meaning, a matter of belonging."