The Archdiocese of Calcutta covers the greater part of West Bengal. The First Christian settlements in Bengal appear at the end of the 16th century round the Church of Bandel on the Hooghly. At Calcutta the first Catholic Chapel is dated from 1700. In 1834, at the petition of Calcutta Catholics, the Holy See erected the Vicariate Apostolic of Calcutta and entrusted it to the English Province of the Society of Jesus, and at the end of 1838 to the Diocesan Clergy.

On February 17, 1845, the Holy See divided the Vicariate of Bengal into the Vicariate Apostolic of Calcutta and the Vicariate of Chittagong, the latter to be administered by its own Ordinary under the direction of the Vicar Apostolic of Calcutta. On February 15, 1850, the two Vicariates of Calcutta and Chittagong were constituted as independent Ecclesiastical units to be called West Bengal and East Bengal.

In 1856, at the request of Msgr. Oliffe, the then Vicar Apostolic of West Bengal, the S. Cong. de Propaganda Fide handed over the Vicariate to the Belgian Jesuits with the appointment on August 22, 1874, of Msgr A. Van Heule, sj, as its Vicar Apostolic of West Bengal. In 1886, the Vicariate Apostolic became the Archdiocese of Calcutta.

Name	Designation	Period
His Eminence Lawrence Trevor Cardinal Picachy, SJ	Archbishop	1969-1986
Most Rev. Albert D'Souza	Archbishop	1962-1969
Most Rev. Vivian Dyer	Archbishop	1960-1962
Most Rev. Ferdinand Perier, SJ	Archbishop	1924-1960
Most Rev. Brizio Meuleman, SJ	Archbishop	1902-1924
Most Rev. Paul Goethals, SJ	Archbishop	1886-1901