Lauding the city for producing some of the greatest intelligent brains, he specifically mentioned Nobel laureates poet-philosopher Rabindranath Tagore and economist Amartya Sen, as also eminent physicist Satyendra Nath Bose, after whom the sub-atomic particle Higgs boson has been partially named.
"Obviously in Kolkata, we think of the ties of the past, the ties of language, and the ties of culture. But mostly I think of the future," he said.
Cameron's visit coincided with West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's promise to improve facilities in the city at par with London and her efforts to beautify the Ganga river front.