Balasore

Balasore was a port and trading town on the Budhabalanga, near the northern Odisha coast. Cotton cloth and yarn from the surrounding country, together with silk and other goods from Bengal, passed through its warehouses. Ships anchored off Balasore Road while smaller craft linked the coast with the river and the interior.

In the seventeenth century European companies established factories here. The English opened a trading post in 1633, followed by the Danes and later the Dutch and French. Balasore grew into an important outlet for textiles, saltpetre, silk and turmeric. Competition between European merchants and disputes with Mughal officials could interrupt business: in the 1670s English warehouses held unsold cloth and the threat of Dutch ships hindered traffic. Nevertheless the port remained a busy meeting place for traders from the Indian Ocean and the inland markets of Bengal and Odisha.