Bombay Island

Abstract

THE president of the Section of Geology and Geography at the thirty-first session of the Indian Science Congress at Delhi last January was Dr. A. S. Kalapesi, of St. Xavier's College, Bombay. Appropriately, Dr. Kalapesi chose as the subject of his presidential address a review of the geographical and geological features of Bombay Island. His discourse on its geographical aspects is of much interest to those who know Bombay, especially because in describing the evolution of the present unitary island from the earlier seven separate islands (the Heptanesia of Ptolemy) Dr. Kalapesi mentions also the derivation of many of the well-known place names. The word Bombay itself, for example, is now generally accepted as derived from the name, 'Mumba Devi', of the tutelary goddess of the first known inhabitants of these islands, the Kolis.