KRISHNAGAR, Diocese of. - The mission of K. was begun in the middle of the last century, in the year 1855, through the work of the missionaries of the Lombard Seminary (now the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions of Milan). The apostolic prefecture of Central Bengal having been erected on 28 June 1870, by detachment from the apostolic vicariate of Western and Eastern Bengal, it was then elevated to a diocese on 1 Sept. 1886 and made a suffragan, under the name of K., of the archdiocese of Calcutta on 7 June 1887. Divided in half by the Ganges, with the Santals to the north and the Bengalis to the south, its southern part was evangelized first, then the missionaries concentrated their efforts on the northern part, which was detached on 25 May 1927 to erect the diocese of Dinajpur, entrusted to the aforementioned Institute. The remaining territory of the diocese of K. was held for a short time in administration by the bishop of Dinajpur until the Salesians took over the mission in 1928.
It is situated partly in India and partly in East Pakistan. It has an area of 34,490 sq. km. and borders on the archdiocese of Calcutta, of which it is a suffragan, and on the dioceses of Dinajpur, Dacca and Chittagong. The population reaches almost 8,000,000 souls, of whom 4,500,000 are Mohammedans, 3,382,000 Hindus, 48,000 animists, 12,000 Protestants. Catholics number 8,000; in addition to 480 catechumens, they are almost all natives, farmers or laborers. A good half of them are converts or children of converts from Mohammedanism, the others come from Hinduism.
The diocesan territory is ecclesiastically divided into 6 parishes, 1 primary station and 14 secondary ones; there are 5 churches and 42 chapels. Twenty priests work there, all Salesians and for the most part Italian, along with 6 brothers. About fifty nuns, more than half of them Indian, 25 catechists and 40 baptizers assist the missionaries in their particularly arduous apostolate. Instruction is given in 3 elementary schools with 420 pupils, 3 middle schools with 527 students, 2 higher schools with 687 pupils and 2 vocational schools with 81 apprentices. The charitable works are represented by 5 orphanages with 451 orphans, 3 dispensaries, 2 homes for widows with 42 women, 2 foundling homes with 32 children. There is no seminary properly so called, yet 2 seminarians and 3 native students are being trained for the priesthood. The mission has a few pious associations and about ten confraternities.
The stretch of territory belonging politically to East Pakistan, and provisionally still included in the diocese of K., will help to form the diocese of Jessore to be erected, a suffragan of Dacca, while the diocese of K. will continue to be part of the ecclesiastical province of Calcutta.