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THE
IMPERIAL GAZETTEER
OF INDIA
VOL. XVII
MAHBUBABAD to MORAdABAD
NEW EDITION
PUBLISHED UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF HIS MAJESTY S
SECRETAk1! OF STATE FOR INDIA IN COUNCIL
MICROFC U BY
PREScRV. .^
nATC MAR 0 3 1987
DATE.,
OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
iqo8
HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
LONDON, EDINBURGH
NEW YORK AND TORONTO
INTRODUCTORY NOTES
Notes on Transliteration
Vowel-Sounds
a has the sound of a in 'woman.'
a has the sound of a in 'father.'
e has the vowel-sound in 'grey.'
i has the sound of/ in 'pin.'
I has the sound of i in ' police.'
o has the sound of o in ' bone."
u has the sound of ;/ in ' bull.'
ti has the sound of u in ' flute.'
ai has the vowel-sound in ' mine.'
au has the vowel-sound in ' house.'
It should be stated that no attempt has been made to distinguish
between the long and short sounds of e and o in the Dravidian
languages, which possess the vowel-sounds in ' bet ' and ' hot ' in
addition to those given above. Nor has it been thought necessary
to mark vowels as long in cases where mistakes in pronunciation
were not likely to be made.
Cofisonatits
Most Indian languages have different forms for a number of con-
sonants, such as d, t, r, &c, marked in scientific works by the use
of dots or italics. As the European ear distinguishes these with
difficulty in ordinary pronunciation, it has been considered undesir-
able to embarrass the reader with them ; and only two notes are
required. In the first place, the Arabic k, a strong guttural, has
been represented by k instead of^, which is often used. Secondly,
it should be remarked that aspirated consonants are common ; and,
in particular, dh and th (except in Burma) never have the sound of
th in ' this' or 'thin,' but should be pronounced as in ' woodhouse '
and ' boathook,'
iv INTRODUCTORY NOTES
Burmese Words
Burmese and some of the languages on the frontier of China have
the following special sounds : —
aw has the vowel-sound in ' law.'
6 and ii are pronounced as in German,
gy is pronounced almost like j in ' jewel.'
ky is pronounced almost like ch in ' church.'
th is pronounced in some cases as in ' this,' in some cases as in
« thin.'
w after a consonant has the force of uw. Thus, ywa and pwe
are disyllables, pronounced as if written yiava and puwe.
It should also be noted that, whereas in Indian words the accent
or stress is distributed almost equally on each syllable, in Burmese
there is a tendency to throw special stress on the last syllable.
General
The names of some places — e.g. Calcutta, Bombay, Lucknow,
( "awnpore — have obtained a popular fixity of spelling, while special
forms have been officially prescribed for others. Names of persons
are often spelt and pronounced differently in different parts of India ;
but the variations have been made as few as possible by assimilating
forms almost alike, especially where a particular spelling has been
generally adopted in English books.
Notes on Money, Prices, Weights and Measures
As the currency of India is based upon the rupee, all statements
with regard to money throughout the Gazetteer have necessarily been
expressed in rupees, nor has it been found possible to add generally
a conversion into sterling. Down to about 1873 the gold value of
the rupee (containing 165 grains of pure silver) was approximately
equal to 2S., or one-tenth of a £ ; and for that period it is easy to
convert rupees into sterling by striking off the final cipher (Rs. 1,000
= £100). But after 1873, owing to the depreciation of silver as
compared with gold throughout the world, there came a serious and
progressive fall in the exchange, until at one time the gold value of
the rupee dropped as low as is. In order to provide a remedy for
the heavy loss caused to the Government of India in respect of its
gold payments to be made in England, and also to relieve foreign
trade and finance from the inconvenience due to constant and
unforeseen fluctuations in exchange, it was resolved in 1893 to close
the mints to the free coinage of silver, and thus force up the value of
the rupee by restricting the circulation. The intention was to raise
INTRODUCTORY NOTES v
the exchange value of the rupee to is. $d., and then introduce a gold
standard (though not necessarily a gold currency) at the rate of Rs. J 5
= £1. This policy has been completely successful. From 1899 on-
wards the value of the rupee has been maintained, with insignificant
fluctuations, at the proposed rate of is. 4^. ; and consequently since
that date three rupees have been equivalent to two rupees before 1873.
For the intermediate period, between 1873 and 1899, it is manifestly
impossible to adopt any fixed sterling value for a constantly changing
rupee. But since 1899, if it is desired to convert rupees into sterling,
not only must the final cipher be struck off (as before 1873), but
also one-third must be subtracted from the result. Thus Rs. 1,000
= £100 — ^ = (about) £67.
Another matter in connexion with the expression of money state-
ments in terms of rupees requires to be explained. The method of
numerical notation in India differs from that which prevails through-
out Europe. Large numbers are not punctuated in hundreds of thou-
sands and millions, but in lakhs and crores. A lakh is one hundred
thousand (written out as r, 00,000), and a crore is one hundred lakhs
or ten millions (written out as 1,00,00,000). Consequently, accord-
ing to the exchange value of the rupee, a lakh of rupees (Rs. 1,00,000)
may be read as the equivalent of £10,000 before 1873, and as the
equivalent of (about) £6,667 after 1899 ; while a crore of rupees
(Rs. 1,00,00,000) may similarly be read as the equivalent of
£1,000,000 before 1873, and as the equivalent of (about) £666,667
after 1899.
Finally, it should be mentioned that the rupee is divided into
16 annas, a fraction commonly used for many purposes by both
natives and Europeans. The anna was formerly reckoned as \\d. :
it may now be considered as exactly corresponding to id. The
anna is again subdivided into 12 pies.
The various systems of weights used in India combine uniformity
of scale with immense variations in the weight of units. The scale
used generally throughout Northern India, and less commonly in
Madras and Bombay/ may be thus expressed : one maund = 40 seers ;
one seer =16 chittaks or 80 tolas. The actual weight of a seer
varies greatly from District to District, and even from village to
village ; but in the standard system the tola is 180 grains Troy
(the exact weight of the rupee), and the seer thus weighs 2-057 lb.,
and the maund 82-28 lb. This standard is used in official reports
and throughout the Gazetteer.
For calculating retail prices, the universal custom in India is to
express them in terms of seers to the rupee. Thus, when prices
change, what varies is not the amount of money to be paid for the
vi INTRODUCTORY NOTES
same -quantity, but the quantity to be obtained for the same amount
of money. In other words, prices in India are quantity prices, not
money prices. When the figure of quantity goes up, this of course
means that the price has gone down, which is at first sight perplexing
to an English reader. It may, however, be mentioned that quantity
prices are not altogether unknown in England, especially at small
shops, where pennyworths of many groceries can be bought. Eggs,
likewise, are commonly sold at a varying number for the shilling.
If it be desired to convert quantity prices from Indian into English
denominations without having recourse to money prices (which would
often be misleading), the following scale may be adopted — based
upon the assumptions that a seer is exactly 2 lb., and that the value
of the rupee remains constant at is. $d. : 1 seer per rupee = (about)
3 lb. for 25. ; 2 seers per rupee = (about) 6 lb. for 2s. ; and so on.
The name of the unit for square measurement in India generally
is the bigha, which varies greatly in different parts of the country.
But areas have always been expressed throughout the Gazetteer either
in square miles or in acres.
I MPERIAL GAZETTEER
OF INDIA
VOLUME XVII
Mahbubabad (or Mankota). — Taluk in Warangal District, Hyder-
abad State, with an area of 778 square miles. The population in 1901,
including jdgirs, was 98,552, compared with 80,071 in 1891. Some
villages were transferred from the Warangal taluk in 1905. The taluk
now contains 158 villages, of which 28 are jagir, and Mahbubabad
(population, 2,769) is the head-quarters. The land revenue in 1901
was 2 -3 lakhs. Rice is largely grown and irrigated from tanks. The.
Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway passes through the taluk from
north-west to east. There are 3,817 Koyas (a jungle tribe).
Mahbubnagar District (formerly called Nagar Karnul). — District
in the Medak-Gulshanabad Division, Hyderabad State, lying between
1 6° 2' and 170 14' N. and 77° 12' and 790 10' E., with a total area
of 6,543 square miles, of which 3,586 square miles are kkdlsa, the
rest being jagir1. It is separated from the Madras Districts of Kurnool
and Guntur by the Kistna river, which bounds it to the south ; on the
north lie the Districts of Medak and Atraf-i-balda ; on the east, Nal-
gonda ; on the north-west, Gulbarga: and on the west, Raichur. In the
south-east corner a range of hills extends from the
'6
Phvsi f*3 1
north to the south of the Amrabad taluk, consisting .
' & aspects.
of flat-topped hills, rising one above the other, the
summits forming extensive plateaux. The surface of the District is
highest in the north and west, and the general slope is from north-
west to south-east.
The two principal rivers, which flow along the westernmost part of
the District, are the Kistna and the Bhima. The Dindi, which rises
in the Jedcherla taluk, passes through the Kalvakurti and Amrabad
taluks, and falls into the Kistna about 18 miles east of Chandragiri.
The District is occupied by Archaean gneiss, except along the banks of
the Kistna, where the rocks belong to the Cuddapah and Kurnool series2.
1 The statistics in this article relate to the District as it stood before the rearrange-
ments made in 1905,, see paragraph on Population.
- Memoirs, Geological Survey of India, vol. viii, parts i.and wii.
MAHBUBNAGAR DISTRICT
rhe famous Golconda diamonds were formerly obtained from the
Cuddapahs and Kurnools, particularly the basement-beds of the latter.
The District is well wooded, having a large forest area. The timber
trees are bijasal [Pterocarpus Marsupium), nallamaddi (Terminalia
tomentosa), eppa (Hardwickia binata), ebony, teak, babul (Acacia
arabica), mango, and tamarind. The scrubby jungle consists of brush-
wood, tarvar [Cassia au/iculata), and other plants used for fuel.
Antelope and spotted deer are found in the IbrahTmpatan, Makhtal,
and Narayanpet taluks; tigcr>, leopards, and bears are met with in
the wooded hills of the rest of the District. In the Amrabad taluk,
wild hog, nilgai, sambar, hyenas, porcupines, several species of
monkeys, large red squirrels, and wild dogs are also found. Peafowl,
jungle-fowl, red parrots and red minds, yellow and red bulbuls as large
as pigeons, and many other rare birds are also met with.
Climatically the District may be divided into three portions. The
taluks of Narayanpet, Makhtal, and Jedcherla are hot and dry, but
healthy : Mahbubnagar, Koilkonda, IbrahTmpatan, and Kalvakurti arc
hot and damp, and are not so healthy : while the remaining taluks of
Pargi, Nagar Karnul, and Amrabad are damp, unhealthy, and malarious.
The annual rainfall for the twenty-one years ending 1901 averaged
34 inches.
Little is known of the history of the District. The Rajas of
Warangal at one period held sway over it, but after the Muhammadan
conquest of the Deccan it came into the possession
History. . ? _ . ... _ , .. , . l _ , .
of the Bahmani kings. On the dissolution of their
power, a portion of it was annexed by the Kutb Shahis, and another
portion became part of Bijapur. In 1686, when Sikandar Adil Shah
was defeated by Aurangzeb, Bijapur with its dependencies was annexed
to the empire of Delhi. In 1706 prince Kam Bakhsh was appointed
Siibahdar of Bijapur and Hyderabad ; and on tin- foundation of the
Hyderabad State early in the eighteenth century the District was
included in the Nizam's Dominions.
The fort of Koilkonda was built by Ibrahim Kutb Shah, one of the
( lolconda kings, and contained substantial buildings which arc now
in ruins. In the Amrabad taluk is a fort, now in ruins, called the
I'ratap Rudra Kot, which could shelter a large garrison. The old
ruined city of Chandragupta, 32 miles south of Amrabad on the left
bank of the Kistna, was a very populous place during the reign ol
I'ratap Rudra, Raja of Warangal. Besides these, there are four old
temples, one of which, called the Maheswara temple, is built on a hill
with 900 steps from the foot to the summit. In the Nagar Karnul
tdhth is the hill fort of PANGAL, a mile and a half long and one mile
broad, possessing seven walls with a citadel in the a ntre.
The number of towns and villages in the District, including /iigirs.
POPULATION
is 1,355. The population at each Census in the last twenty years was :
( 1SS1) 547.694, (1891) 674,649, and (1901) 7°5>7^5- popuiation.
The towns are Narayanpet and Mahbubnagar.
More than 9 1 per cent, of its population are Hindus and over 8 per
cent. Musalmans. About S6 per cent, speak Telugu, 6 per cent. Urdu,
and nearly 5 per cent. Kanarese. The following table gives the chief
statistics of population in 1901 : —
Taluk-
3
x i
V
<
250
Number of
5
"5
n
rjj Population per
w square mile.
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1 89 1
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
c
0
H
1
■si
V
>
Mahbubnagar .
59
45.604
+ 3-1
Jedcherla
234
79
38,901
166
+ o-S
Ibrahlmpatan .
194
43
27>H3
139
- 3-3
Kalvakurti
t:/>
7°
41,069
94
+ 4-3
Amrabad
679
37
16,794
24
+ 6.5
Nagar Karnu] .
532
'-1:
67,990
127
+ 5-4
■ a
>
Makhtal .
447
107
64,208
H3
+ 2-2
a
Narayanpet
Koilkonda
315
384
1
72
91
66,579
45>572
211
118
+ 13-9
+ 5-9
0
Pargi
"5
49
21,511
[87
- 42-3
Jagirs, &c.
District total
-'•957
6,543
...
619
270,294
7°5>725
91
107
+ 5-i
2
1,353
+ 4r>
23,688
In 1905 the Ibrahlmpatan taluk was transferred to Medak District,
and 73 villages from Koilkonda, Narayanpet, and Makhtal were made
over to the adjoining taluks of Gulbarga District. Koilkonda and
Jedcherla were merged in adjoining taluks, and Narayanpet in Makhtal.
The Pargi and Amrabad sub-taluks have been raised to the status of
taluks. The District in its present form thus comprises six taluks :
Mahbubnagar, Kalvakurti, Amrabad, Nagar Karnul, Makhtal, and
Pargi.
The most numerous caste is that of the agricultural Kapus,
numbering 132,000, or about 19 per cent, of the total population.
Next come the Chamars or leather-workers, who number 93,000, or
13 per cent. The Brahmans number 87,600, or over 12 per cent.
The Dhangars or shepherds follow with 74,600, or 11 per cent. The
Mahars (village menials) and Komatis (traders) number 44,800 and
21,000, or 6 and 3 per cent, respectively. The Mahars and Chamars
also work as field labourers. The population directly engaged in
agriculture is 205,000, or 29 per cent, of the total.
There is an American Mission at Mahbubnagar town, which has
established a school for low-caste children, the total staff and pupils
numbering 163. The number of Christians in the District in 190 1 was
559, of whom 350 were natives.
4 MAHBUBNAGAR DISTRICT
The northern portion of the District is situated on the border of the
trap region, the remainder being granitic. The soils of the Pargi
taluk and parts of Ibrahimpatan, Mahbubnagar,
and Jedcherla are composed of stiff black regar.
Makhtal, Narayanpet, and Nagar Karntil, ;is well as the remaining
portions of the above-mentioned taluks, consist of granitic or sandy
soils, known as niasab and chalka. The soils of Amrabad are of
granitic origin, but contain a large admixture of organic matter.
Jowdr, gram, linseed, and other rabi crops are raised on the regar
lands, while rice, sesamum, castor, and other kharif or rainy season
crops are grown on the chalka and masab soils.
The tenure of lands is mainly ryotwdri. The area cultivated in
1901 amounted to 1.278 square miles, out of a total klidlsa area of
3,586, while 790 square miles were cultivable waste and fallows,
1,363 forest, and 155 were not available for cultivation.
The staple food-crops are jowar and bctjra, grown on 48 and i2-|
per cent, of the total area cropped. Rice, lachhna, savdn, and kodro
are nc.\t in importance, the areas under these being 120, 87, 57, and
;-,2 square miles respectively. Oilseeds are raised on 116 square
miles, about three-fourths of this area being under castor alone.
No special breed of cattle is characteristic of the District : but
the Amrabad taluk is noted for its swift-trotting bullocks, which
though small are very handsome. These are largely bred, and an
extensive trade in them is carried on with other parts of the State,
and with the Madras Presidency. They resemble the Mysore breed.
Ponies are found everywhere, but are of an inferior class. Sheep and
goats are largely reared, and arc sold at prices varying from Rs. 1-8
to Rs. 3 per head. Extensive pasture lands exist in the taluks
of Pargi, Koilkonda, and Amrabad ; the grazing lands in the last of
these are said to comprise nearly three-fourths of the total area.
The irrigated area in 1901 was 162 square miles. The principal
channels take off from the Nandipalli Vagu in the Narayanpet
taluk, from the Turikunda Vagu in the Mahbubnagar taluk, and from
the Musi river in the Ibrahimpatan taluk. The first two supply 23
large tanks, and the third was constructed at a cost of 14 lakhs to
supply the Ibrahimpatan tank, which irrigates the lands of 13 villages.
Besides these, there are 505 large tanks, 1,863 kuntas or smaller
tanks, and 9,615 wells in good repair.
MahbObnagar District has several large tracts of finest, especially in
the Amrabad, Pargi, and Koilkonda taluks. These contain protected
and 'reserved' forests, the trees attaining a good size. The princi-
pal timbei trees an teak, ebony, eppa (Hardwickia binata), btjasal
(Pteroearpus Marsttpiuni), nallamaddi {Tertninalia tomentosa), and
bamboos, besides mango, tamarind, and babul (Acacia arabica).
ADMINISTRATION 5
Fuel is abundant. Nagar Karnul and Mahbubnagar also contain
smaller areas of forest. The ' reserved ' forests cover 800 square
miles, and the protected and unprotected forests 400 and 163 square
miles respectively.
The District possesses good building stone. In the Pargi taluk
ironstone is smelted to a small extent. In the Narayanpet, Nagar
Karnul, Amrabad, and Mahbubnagar taluks carbonate of soda and
common salt are obtained by lixiviating saline earth. The salt pro-
duced is bitter, owing to an admixture of magnesium sulphate. Six
miles south of Farahabad, a bright brick-red laminated limestone is
found, similar to the Shahabad stone, but much harder. A hard stone
resembling emery, found in Amrabad, is used for making mortars.
Coarse cotton cloth of every description is woven in all parts. In the
Narayanpet taluk, silk saris and dhotis, with gold borders, are made
for export to Poona, Sholapur, Bombay, and Baroda.
Ordinary blankets are made by the Dhangars ; and communications.
leather is cured in a crude way by the Chamars for
water-buckets. A coarse sort of paper used to be largely made in the
Koilkonda and Mahbubnagar taluks, but the trade has died out owing
to the cheapness of imported paper.
The chief exports are food-grains, cotton, and castor-seed, the last
two being sent to Bombay and the grain to Hyderabad city. The
imports consist of cloth and chintzes of sorts, gram, wheat, sugar, salt,
opium, kerosene oil, brass and copper vessels, and silver and gold.
The Great Indian Peninsula Railway passes through the south -western
portion of the Makhtal taluk, with one station. There are 269 miles
of gravelled roads, of which 207 miles are maintained by the Public
Works department and 62 by the local boards. Of the former, one
traverses the District from Hyderabad to Kurnool in British territory
112 miles in length. A branch of this, 63 miles long, called the Kistna
road, proceeds via Mahbubnagar to the railway. Two other roads,
2 1 and 1 1 miles long, run from Narayanpet to the Saidapur station and
from Mahbubnagar to Nawabpet. The local board roads are : Makhtal
to Narayanpet, 18 miles; Mahbubnagar to Koilkonda, ^ 4 miles: and
Mahbubnagar to Nagar Karnul, 30 miles.
In the great famine of 1876-8 thousands of people perished in this
District. Joivar sold at 3 seers per rupee. The
famines of 1897 and 1900, though very severe in
other parts of the State, did not seriously affect Mahbubnagar. and the
total amount spent on relief was only Rs. 2,700.
The District is divided into four subdivisions : one, consisting of the
taluks of Makhtal and Mahbubnagar, is under a . , . .
, „,., , ,. . , • ■ , ,_, , Administration.
•Second lalukdar; the second, comprising the taluks
of Nagar Karnul and Amrabad, is under another Second Talukdar ;
* MAHBUBNAGAR DISTRICT
while the third, consisting of the taluks of Kalvakurti and Pargi, is
under a Third Talukdar. Another Third Talukd?r acts as assistant
i" the First Talukdar, who exercises a general supervision over the
work of all his subordinates. Each taluk is under a falisllddr.
The District civil court is presided over by a Judge, styled the
Xiizim-i-Drwthii, while the tahsildars hold subordinate civil courts.
The First Talukdar is the chief magistrate of the District, and the
Nazim-i-Dlivani or Civil Judge is also a joint-magistrate, who exercises
magisterial powers during the absence of the First Talukdar from head-
quarters. The Second and Third Talukdars and the tahsildars exercise
magisterial powers of the second and third class. Serious crime is not
heavy, except in adverse seasons, when dacoities and cattle-thefts increase.
Hardly anything is known about the revenue history of the District.
Some of the taluks were resumed from time to time from Arab and
Pathan jemadars, who had held them in lieu of payment for troops.
The old system of farming taluks was formerly in force, and the revenue
farmers received two annas in the rupee for collection. But this system
was discontinued in t866, on the introduction of District administration,
when the holdings of the cultivators were roughly measured and a fair
revenue was fixed. Though the whole of the District had been sur-
veyed some years previously, only two taluks (Mahbubnagar and
Narayanpet) were settled in 1900, and the remaining taluks in 1903.
The settlement raised the land revenue by 2-6 lakhs, or 21 per cent.
(from r3-2 lakhs to 15-8 lakhs), and the area of the holdings was found
to be 981,029 acres, compared with 455,461 acres shown in the old
accounts, a difference of 115 per cent. The average assessment on
•dry' land is R. 1 (maximum Rs. 2-2, minimum three annas), and on
'wet' land Rs. 7 (maximum Rs. rS-12, minimum Rs. 3). The 'wet'
lands include baghdt or garden lands.
The land revenue and the total revenue of the District in recent
years are shown below, in thousands of rupees : —
1881.
1891.
igor.
1903.
Land revenue
Total revenue
8,14
17,64
10,77 9>81
20,93 17,26
11,3'
19,96
Owing to the changes in area made in 1905, the revenue demand is
now about 8-3 lakhs.
Local boards were established in 1895, a year a^ter ^ie completion
of the survey. The District board at Mahbubnagar supervises the
working of the taluk boards. Municipal establishments are maintained
.a Mahbubnagar and Narayanpet. The total income derived from the
one anna cess in 1901 amounted to Rs. 34,000; and the expenditure
011 municipal and loeal works and roads was Rs. 45,000.
MAHE 7
The First Talukdar is the head of the District police, with the
Superintendent (Mohtamim) as his executive deputy. Under him are
9 inspectors, 128 subordinate officers, 754 constables, and 25 mounted
police, distributed among 38 thanas and 61 outposts. The District jail
at Mahbubnagar has accommodation for 250 prisoners, but those whose
terms exceed six months are transferred to the Central jail at Nizamabad.
The District occupies a comparatively high position as regards the
literacy of its population, of whom 33 per cent. (5-9 males and 0-65
females) were able to read and write in 1901. The total number of
pupils under instruction in 1881, 1891, 1901, and 1903 was 619, 3,093,
3,292, and 3,208 respectively. In 1903 there were 46 primary and 3
middle schools, with 390 girls under instruction. A small school is
maintained at Makhtal for the depressed castes. The total amount
spent on education in 1901 was Rs. 15,300, of which Rs. 12,200 was
contributed by the State and the rest by the local boards. The total
fee receipts amounted to Rs. 333.
In 1 90 1 there were 7 dispensaries, with accommodation for 22
in-patients. The total number of patients treated during the year was
26,912, of whom 116 were in-patients : and the number of operations
performed was 606. The expenditure was Rs. 20,200.
To every dispensary a vaccinator is attached, but the number ot
persons vaccinated during 1901 was only 2,113, or 299 Per 1,000 of
population.
Mahbubnagar Taluk. — Taluk in Mahbubnagar District, Hyder-
abad State, with an area of 339 square miles. The population in 1901
was 54,563, including ''agirs, compared with 52,88s in 1891. The
taluk contains one town, Mahbubnagar (population, 7,605), the Dis-
trict and taluk head-quarters; and 78 villages, of which 19 are jagir.
The land revenue in 190 1 was Rs. 68,000. In 1905 the taluk
was increased by transfers from Jedcherla and Koilkonda taluks. It
now contains 132 khalsa villages.
Mahbubnagar Town. — Head-quarters of the District and taluk of
the same name, Hyderabad State, situated in i6c 44' N. and 770 59' E.
Population (1901), 7,605. It contains the offices of the First Talukdar,
the District and Irrigation Engineers, the Police Superintendent, as
well as the civil court, mission school and other schools, a District jail,
a post office, and a dispensary. It was formerly called Palmur.
Mahe. — French Settlement within the limits of Malabar District,
Madras Presidency, situated in nc 43' N. and 75° 2>Z E., to the south
of the mouth of the river Mahe, about 4 miles south of Tellicherry.
Area, 26 square miles; population (1901), 10,298. The history of
Mahe resembles in its essentials that of the other French Possessions.
and it is now a decaying place. Most of its chief buildings are pictur-
esquely situated on the bank of the river close to its mouth. The site
8 MAHE
is hilly and covered with a dense mass of coco-nut palms, and it is
noted for the fertility of its soil and the salubrity of its climate. The
Settlement is in charge of a chef de service subordinate to the Governor
at Pondicherry. The place contains a Roman Catholic chapel, three
boys' schools, one girls' school, and a British post office. A long
wooden bridge maintained by the Malabar District board gives access
to British territory on the right bank. The railway line from Calicut
to Cannanore passes close to Mahe.
Maheji (or Chinchkhed). — Village in the Pachora taluka of East
Khandesh District, Bombay, situated in 200 48' N. and 750 24' E., on
the Great Indian Peninsula Railway, 240 miles north-east of Bombay.
Population (1901), 1,591. A municipality was established in 1871, but
abolished in 1903. The village contains a poorly attended boys'
school. The chief Hindu fair of Khandesh is held here annually from
January to March. The fair is held in honour of Maheji, a woman of
the agricultural class who became an ascetic in the seventeenth century.
So great was her sanctity that vows were paid to her during her lifetime.
After a twelve years' stay in the hamlet of Chinchkhed close by the site
of the fair, Maheji buried herself alive. The fair has lately lost much
of its importance.
Mahendragiri. Peak of the Eastern Ghats in Ganjam District,
Madras, situated in 180 58' N. and 840 24' E., 4,923 feet above sea-
level, being the second highest point in the District. This was once
proposed as a site for a sanitarium for Calcutta, but its steepness and
the want of sufficient water rendered it unsuitable. A bungalow near
the summit commands a magnificent view, as the hill is only 16 miles
from the sea and stands in the highest part of this section of the
Eastern Ghats. Two streams called the Mahendratanaya ('children of
Mahendra') rise in the peak. One flows southward into the Parlakimedi
zatm/iddri and joins the Vamsadhara, while the other flows through the
Budarasingi and Mandasa estates and enters the sea near Baruva. On
the top of Mahendragiri are four temples, built of enormous blocks of
stone, one of which has been badly shattered by lightning. They
contain inscriptions in Tamil and Sanskrit, which show that the Choi. a
king Rajendra set up a pillar of victory in this wild spot to com-
memorate his defeat of his brother-in-law Yimaladitya (a.D. 1015-22).
Below the Sanskrit version is cut a tiger, the crest of the Cholas,
and in front of it two fishes, the emblem of their vassal the Paxdva
kin-.
Maheshrekha. Subdivision of Howrah District, Bengal. See
Ui LHAKIA.
Maheshwar.— Town in the Nimar district of Indore State, Central
India, situated in 220 11' \. and 750 36' E., on the north bank of the
Narbadi river. Population (1901), 7,042. It is usually called Choli-
MAHESHWAR 9
Maheshwar, from the town of Choli, 7 miles north of it. Maheshwar
occupies a most picturesque position on the edge of the river. Broad
ghats sweep upwards towards the fort and the numerous temples
which stud the shore, while behind them towers the lofty palace
of Ahalya Bai, the famous princess of the house of Holkar, temples,
ghats, and palaces being reflected in the wide stretch of deep quiet
water at their feet.
Maheshwar is the Mahishmati or Mahissati of early days, the name
being derived from the prevalence of buffaloes (mahisha). It is con-
nected traditionally with the ubiquitous Pandava brothers, and is men-
tioned in the Ramayana and Mahabharata, while the Puranas refer to
Mahishas and Mahishakas, the people of Mahishmati. In Buddhist
literature Mahishmati or Mahissati is mentioned as one of the regular
stages on the route from Paithana (Paithan) in the Deccan to Sravasti ;
these stages being Mahissati, Ujjain, Gonaddha, Bhllsa, Kausambhl,
and Saketa. Cunningham has identified the Mahishmati or Maheshwa-
pura of Hiuen Tsiang with Mandla in the Central Provinces ; but the
Chinese pilgrim states that he went from Jijhoti or Bundelkhand north
or north-east to Maheshwapura, which is a wrong bearing for either
Mandla or Maheshwar, and may be a misstatement for south-west.
Numerous places which the Mahishmati Mahatmya enjoins pilgrims
to visit can be identified in the neighbourhood.
The earliest historical connexion, however, is with the Haihaya chiefs,
the ancestors of the Kalachuris of Chedi, who, from the ninth to the
twelfth century, held much of the eastern part of Central India (see
Baghelkhand). Their reputed ancestor, Kartyavlryarjuna, is sup-
posed to have lived here. The Haihayas were subdued in the seventh
century by Vinayaditya, the Western Chalukya king, and Mahishmati
was incorporated in his kingdom. The Haihaya chiefs then served as
governors under the Chalukyas, and are always designated as hereditary
' lord of Mahishmati, the best of towns.' On the fall of Malwa to the
Paramaras in the ninth century, Maheshwar seems at first to have been
one of their principal cities. It lost its importance later on, and during
the time of the Muhammadan kings of Malwa was regarded merely as
a frontier post on the fords of the Narbada. In 1422 it was captured
by Ahmad I of Gujarat from Hoshang Shah of Malwa. Under Akbar
it was the head-quarters of the Choli-Maheshwar mahal of the Mandu
sarkar in the Siibah of Malwa, Choli being the civil administrative
head-quarters and Maheshwar the military post.
About 1730 it passed into the possession of Malhar Rao Holkar, but
did not become a place of importance until 1767, when Ahalya Bai, on
the death of Malhar Rao, assumed the reins of government and selected
Maheshwar as her capital. Under her auspices it rapidly became a
place of the first importance, politically and commercial!), while its
ro MAHESHWAR
appearance was improved by the erection of numerous temples and
palaces. Tukojl Rao, who succeeded in 1795, maintained Maheshwar
as the capital, but during the confusion which followed his death in
1797 its prosperity rapidly declined. In 1798 Jaswant Rao Holkar
plundered the treasury, and during his stay here lost his eye by the
bursting of his matchlock while sitting on the bank of the Narbada
amusing himself with firing at a lighted torch floating on the river.
Maheshwar continued to decline in importance, as Jaswant Rao on his
accession to power resided chiefly at Rampura and Bhanpura ; and,
after his death in 1 Si 1 and the Treaty of Mandasor in 1818, Indore
finally became the real as well as the nominal capital. From 1819 to
1834 Harl Rao Holkar was confined in the fort. Malcolm states that
in 1820 the town still had 3,500 houses, which would give a popu-
lation of about 17,000 persons.
There are many buildings of interest, though none of any great age.
The fort, as it exists at present, is of Muhammadan foundation, but an
older structure must have stood there in Hindu days. Some mosques
with Muhammadan records, dated in 1563, 1682, and 1712, stand in it.
Among the numerous temples and shrines, the most important is the
cenotaph of Ahalya Bai. A fine flight of steps leads up from the river
to the richly carved shrine, which contains a lingam with a life-size
statue of Ahalya Bai behind it. An inscription records that this shrin.
and ghat to the memory of Ahalya Bai, who resembled the Ahalya of
ancient days (i.e. the wife of Gautama Rishi), and Tukojl, who is
designated the great and generous subahdar, were commenced by
Jaswant Rao Holkar in 1799 and completed in 1833 by Krishna Bai
his wife. Other notable buildings are the shrine of Yithoba or ItojT,
Jaswant Rao's brother, and the palace with the family gods of the
Holkars.
Maheshwar is famous for the manufacture of a .special kind ol
coloured saris and silk-bordered dhotis, which are exported in some
quantity. It contains a school, a hospital, and a State post office.
Mahespur. — Town in the Bangaon subdivision of Jessore District,
Bengal, situated in 230 21' N. and 88° 56' E., on the Kabadak river.
Population (1901), 4,180. Mahespur was constituted a municipality
in 1869. The income during the decade ending 190 1-2 averaged
Ks. 3,600, and the expenditure Rs. 2,700. In 1903-4 the income
was .v4&°' mainly from a tax on persons (or property tax) ; and the
rxpenditure was Rs. 2,600.
Mahi (the Mophh of Ptolemy and Mais of the Periplus). River of
Western India, with a course of from 300 to 350 miles and a drain.,
area estimated at from 15,000 to 17,000 square miles. It rises in the
Amjhera distrii 1 of the Gwalior State, 1,850 feet above sea-level j
52' X. and 75' 5' E.), and flows for about 100 miles through the
mahi i,
south- western corner of the Central India Agency, at first north, next
west, and lastly north-west, passing through the States of Gwalior, Dhar,
Jhabua, Ratlam, and Sailana. It then enters Rajputana and flows in
a northerly direction with a somewhat tortuous course, intersecting the
eastern half of Banswara State, till it reaches the Udaipur frontier, where
it is soon turned by the Mewar hills to the south-west, and for the rest
of its course in Rajputana it forms the boundary between the States of
Dungarpur and Banswara. It now passes on into Gujarat, and during
the first part of its course there flows through the lands of the Mahi
Kantha and Rewa Kantha States. It then enters British territory, and
separates the Bombay District of Kaira on the right from the Panch
Mahals and Baroda on the left. Farther to the west, and for the rest
of its course, its right bank forms the southern boundary of the State of
Cambay, and its left the northern boundary of Broach District. Near
Bungra. too miles from its source, the Mahi is crossed by the old
Baroda-Nimach road: and here the bed is 400 yards wide, with a stream
of roo yards and a depth of one foot. The Kaira section of the river
is about 100 miles in length, the last 45 miles being tidal water. The
limit of the tidal flow is Verakhandi, where the stream is 120 yards
across and the average depth 18 inches. About 30 miles nearer the sea,
close to the village of Dehvan, the river enters Broach District from
the east, and forms an estuary. The distance across its mouth, from
Cambay to Kavi, is 5 miles. The Mahi is crossed by the Bombay,
Baroda, and Central India Railway at YVasad, and by the Godhra-Ratlam
Railway at Pali. During flood time, at spring-tides, a bore is formed
at the estuary, and a wall-like line of foam-topped water rushes up for
20 miles, to break on the Dehvan sands.
The bed of the Mahi lies so much below the level of the land on
either side of its banks that its waters cannot readily be made use of
for irrigation. In fair weather the river is fordable at many places in
the Bombay Presidency — at Dehvan, Gajna, Khanpur, and Umeta, for
instance — and always in its upper course through Rajputana, except in
the rainy season, when its waters rise to a great height.
According to legend, the Mahi is the daughter of the earth and of
the sweat that ran from the body of Indradyumna, king of Ujjain.
Another legend explains the name thus. A young Gujar woman was
churning curds one day. An importunate lover, of whom she had tried
to rid herself, but who would not be denied, found her thus engaged,
and his attentions becoming unbearable, the girl threw herself into the
pot. She was at once turned into water, and a clear stream flowed
from the jar and, wandering down the hill-side, formed the Mahi
or ' curd ' river. A more probable derivation, however, is from the
name of the lake whence it springs. This is often called the Mau or
Mahu, as well as the Menda. It is regarded by the Bhlls and the
VOL. XVII. b
12 MAHI
Kolis a:- their mother, and the latter make pilgrimages to four places on
its waters— Mingradj Kazilpur, Angarh, and Yaspur. The height of
its banks and the fierceness of its floods ; the deep ravines through
which the traveller has to pass on his way to the river ; and perhaps,
above all, the bad name of the tribes who dwell about it, explain
th<= proverb : ' When the Main is crossed, there is comfort.'
It is interesting to note that this river has given rise to the terms
mehwds, a 'hill stronghold,' and mehwdsi, a 'turbulent or thieving
person." The word was MahfvasT, 'a dweller on the Mahi,' and in
Mughal times was imported into Delhi by the army, and is used by
Muhammadan writers as a general term to denote hill chiefs, and those
living in mountain fastnesses. A celebrated temple dedicated to
Mahadeo at Baneshar (Rajputana) stands at the spot where the Som
joins the Mahi, and an important and largely attended fair is held
here yearly.
Mahidpur. — Zila and town in Indore State, Central India. See
Mehidptjr.
Mahi Kantha, The (or 'Banks of trie Mahi'). Group of States
forming a Political Agency under the Government of Bombay, lying
between if 14' and 24° 28' N. and 72° 40' and 74° 5' E., with a total
area of 3.125 square miles. It is bounded on the north-east by the
Rajputana States of Udaipur and Dungarpur ; on the south-east by
Rewa Kantha ; on the south by the British District of Kaira ; and on
the west by the State of Baroda, Ahmadabad District, and the country
under the Palanpur Agency. The Mahi Kantha territory is subject to
a number of chiefs, of whom the Maharaja of Idar is by far the most
important. In May, 1877, the.se chiefs were classified into seven
divisions, according to the extent of their jurisdiction.
The Native State of Idar covers more than half the territory ; eleven
other States are of some importance ; and the remainder are estates
belonging to Rajput or Koli Thakurs, once the lawless feudatories
of Baroda, and still requiring the anxious supervision of the Political
Officer. Statistics for all the States and estates that form the Agency
are shown in the table on the two next pages.
Mahi Kantha includes tracts of land differing widely in character
and appearance. In the north and east the country is rough and wild,
broken by ranges of steep well-wooded hills, of which
aspects3 the most notaole are Ghahuns, Kalaroo, and Roj-
malno in Idar ; Boda Malvalo and Ghahuno in Pol ,
Arasur in Danta ; and Taranga and Amba Vani in Ghodvada. To the
nth and west t Do country is level, well wooded, and most of it culti-
vated. With .i well marked fall from the north east to the south west,
the Agenc) is thoroughly drained. The Saraswati riser, for about 40
miles, passes close to, and almost parallel with, the north west boundary.
MAN/ KANTNA 13
General Statistics of each State in the Mahi Kantha Agency
State.
ist Class Stale.
Idar ....
2nd Class States.
Tol .
Danta
yd Class States.
Malpur
Mania
Mohanpur
4th Class Talukas.
Yarsora .
Pethapur .
Ranasan .
Punadra .
Khadal .
Ghorasar .
Katosan0 .
IIol ....
Amliyara .
$tli Class Talukas.
Valasna .
Dabha
Vilsna
Sudasna .
Magori
Varagam .
Sathamba
Rupalf .
Dadhalia t
tih Class Talukas.
Ramus J .
Bolundra J
Likhi§ .
Hadol§ .
Gabat (7th Class) *
Caste, tribe,
or race of the
ruling chief.
Rajput
Rajput
Rajput
»
Rajput
Roll, converted
to Islam.
KolT
V
•- £
2 «
< 1
—
Rajput .
Roll, converted
to Islam.
Rajput .
Koli
Rajput
Muhainmadan
Rajput .
Roh
1,669
»35
347
97
25
89
3°
1 i
8
16
10
19
60
o .
s =
3-S
C
3
I ft
—
IO
32
23
:8
t6
28
6
6
9
'
10
884 I 168,557
46
168
59
3.959
15,262
8,065
12 15,936
10,040
5
3
'9
1 1
13
15
6
5
32
Revenue (1903-4).
Tribute.
From
land.
Total, '■ Amount.
To whom
payable.
27
'3
3,656
5,753
3,183
2,662
6,219
5,5io
3,806
7,227
2,749
1,307
4,494
5,269
1,527
2,121
3,022
2,619
865
740
959
',66;
604
Rs.
3,36,633
10,300
18,000
12,732
46,337
12,126
15,902
11,064
8,022
11,220
7,900
iS,^2
17,808
i5,3c'5
19,754
4,507
3,871 J
6,621
6,289 i
2,864
4,129
3,36o
3,585
i,7°7
'■ 79
i,94]
1,093
2,088
2,454
Rs.
5,92,5M
17,661
42,727
66,267
--,773
18,871
18,479
0,018
1 5,598
16,440
23,4!5
26,617
20,982
27,672
5,953
4-379
10,631
10,781
5,056
5,841
6,146
7,045
Rs.
30,340 Gaikwar.
5M
-,371
500
43°
280
396
ii,754
f 4,750
( 2,245
1,583
8,632
I 75o
373
3
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Palanpur.
The British.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Idar"
Gaikwar.
Idar."
Gaikwar.
The British.
375 Gaikwar.
( ',75i
I 250
/ 3i5°i
( 488
4,893
I 428
1,863
I 17
3J7
280
f 150
I 53
3.109
1 1,036
1 361
93
~6i
401
127
1,165
362
699
Attarsumba.
Gaikwar.
Kaira.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Ahmad nagar.
Gaikwar.
Gaikwar.
Amliyara.
Gaikwar.
3,u°y
t
6n
:,6 ! :
158
2,499
T,;t
:,5J ■
—
3,983
I
41
2,85i
43
Idar.
Balasinor.
Gaikwar.
Lunaviida.
< Jaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikv .11 .
Idar.
* The villages of Nandasa, Jakasna, Ajabpura, Gamanpura, and Jotana belong to the chief of Katosan. But
their liability for tribute to the Gaikwar is separately fixed, and the respective amounts payable by them are as
follows : Rs. 430-14-0, Rs. 623-4-5, Rs. 96-12-0, Rs. 139-10-9, and Rs. 3,058-1-11.
t These two talukas had jurisdictional powers, of which they were deprived owing to maladministration.
They were then placed under the jurisdiction of Sabar Kantha t liana.
t The talukas of Ramas, Gabat, and Bolundra are under Government management during the minority
"f their chiefs. The first two are in charge of the t 'tanadar of Vatrak Kantha, and Bolundra is under Sabai
Rantha.
§ 'J lie chiefs of LiUhi and Hadol are iion-jurisdiclioiial talukdars. Llkhl is included in Sabar Rantha and
Hadol in Gadhwara ihana.
P. 2
M
MA Hi KANTHA
General Statistics of each State in the Mahi Kantha
Agency (contd)
1 «
HI
1 c~
0 .
1„ «1
c
0
Revenue (1903-4).
Tribute.
Caste, tribe, ■■* £
or race of the ; <u u
I-5
3 CN
State.
ruling chief.
cr
<s.
V
a ~
0 w
a.
From
land.
Total.
Amount.
To whom
payable.
Rs.
Rs.
Rs.
Sabar Kantha Thana : —
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Derol (6th Class)
Kheravada „
K
2
4
837
804
1,560
3.3°2
1,823
3,758
' 5'3
V 47
J 303
1 93
Kadoli „
)
2
93'
2.544
3,782
J 5.3
< 93
5 1,118
( 486
i 187
< 47
J 699
< 74
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Vakhtapur „
Prempur ,.
}
•
• 69
4
5
',744
1,694
5,075
3,512
5,788
3,99i
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Dedhrota ,.
»
1
2
725
1,685
2,203
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Tajpuri „
•
'
7
'■574
3,186
t.096
( 699
) 186
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Hapa „
J
2
838
2,656
3,974
( 1,025
I 219
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Gadhwara T/idiia : —
Satlasna (6th Class)
'
1 /
4,928
2,500
4,918
2,794
Gaikwar.
Bhalusna „
)
9
2,226
1,000
1.277
1,163
Idar.
Timba (7th Class)
)
[ !
5
1.675
700
935
50
,:
Umari „
,
-97-
1
1,021
35o
565
\
Mota Kotarna „
)
I
3
820
400
576
*
Chandapt • • ■
4
588
546
546
J 7i
( 217
Gaikwar.
Idar.
Katosan Thana : —
Maguna (7th Class) Koh
1
5
3.235
11,763
",959
892
Gaikwar.
Tejpura
3
1,034
3.5oo
3.500
308
,,
Virsoda „
3
1
718
',25'
1.326
| 447
( 120
Patan.
Palej
)
1
3
1.033
4,600
4,906
399
Gaikwar.
Deloli
'
800
2,852
3.095
256
»,
Kasalpura ,,
)
3°7
2,39i
2,39i
48
,,
Memadpura „
J
-56-
449
1,800
1,800
175
,.
Rampura „
J
353
1,752
1,901
{ 49
< 50
Patau.
Ijpura „
.
342
3,051
3,051
239
Gaikwar.
Ranipura ..
J
'99
i,935
1,998
—
—
Santhal \
3.356
§
§
1,774
Gaikwar.
Gokalpura}
'
.34
II
II
42
,*
MuljT-na-pura J .
220
1
11
25
,,
Bavisi Thana '*
96
93
28,459
43,033
46,733
29,564
,,
Vatrak Kantha Thana:—
Nirmalitt
Jhertt
,0
12
6
14
J.959
2,705
1,628
2,000
3,062
\ I|«
Gaikwar.
Sidra Bazar ...
1
.,683
3°'.545
i.l 1 !
5,620
—
3. '25 t.729
7,15,797
n.17,826
i,34.4H
' Subordinate to Satlasna and Bhalusna, and included in their tribute.
t Chandap is a matadari village and has no chief.
t These three villages have no separate chief of their own. Santhal belongs to the bhayad of the chief of
Katosan and the shareholders of Deloli, Kasalpura, &c. MuljI-na-pura belongs to the shareholders of Deloli,
and Gokalpura to the shareholders of Tejpura.
§ Co-shared village. II Included in Tejpura. U Included in Deloli.
' L constituted ol .4 chief matadari villages and 72 sub-villages, including Barmuada.
tt Nirmali and Jlicr are shared by the Gaikwar and the Miyan of Mandwa, and are administered by the
Political Agent, Main Kantha.
PHYSICAL ASPECTS 15
The SabarmatI river flows through Mahi Kantha for a distance of
60 miles, crossing the Agency from north-east to south-west for 40 miles,
and skirting its western boundary for 20 miles. The Hathmati river
passes through Mahi Kantha for about 35 miles, and joins the Sabar-
mati below Ahmadnagar. The Khari, the Meshwa, the Majam, the
Vatrak, and other streams also drain the country. Only the waters of
the Hathmati have been used for irrigation on a large scale. Between
1869 and 1873 a weir was built across the Hathmati close above
Ahmadnagar, and so much of its water as was not wanted for the
town and other places on its bank was taken to feed a canal for
irrigating the Parantij taluka of Ahmadabad District. Though it has
no natural lakes, Mahi Kantha is well supplied with ponds and wells.
The Ran! Talao has an area of 94 acres, and a greatest depth of
17 feet; the Karmabawi Talao, area 134 acres, greatest depth 15 feet ;
the Babsur Talao, area 182 acres, greatest depth 15 feet.
With the exception of Idar, which was geologically surveyed in T902,
the Mahi Kantha States have never been visited by any geologist, and
nothing definite can be said about their geological constitution, further
than that it appears to be extremely varied and complex. One of the
finest building stones in India is the calcareous sandstone used in
the mosques, temples, and palaces of Ahmadabad, which is quarried at
Ahmadnagar, Savgarh, and Parbada in the Idar State, and exported to
considerable distances. No details as to its mode of occurrence have
ever been ascertained ; but it is suggested, from its resemblance to
certain rocks of Gujarat and Central India, that its age may be Cre-
taceous. The best lime obtainable in India is made from a limestone
occurring at Betali in the mountainous country about Idar, which
constitutes the material used in preparing the beautiful stucco so
largely used in the buildings at Delhi. Granite, gneiss, and crystal-
line marble are also said to occur.
Of trees, Mahi Kantha has the itia/u/d, the mango, the banyan, the
asopalav, the khahkra, the wood-apple, the mm, and the teak. The
wild animals, many of which are becoming rare, are tiger, leopard, bear,
wolf, wild hog, hyena, jackal, and fox. Deer include the sdmbar,
the spotted deer, the antelope, the Indian gazelle, and the nilgai. The
otter, hare, monkey, and wild cat are common. Snakes, both harmless
and venomous, abound. The chief game-birds are jungle-fowl, wild
duck, snipe, green pigeon, rock grouse, partridge, bustard, and florican.
The rivers are well stocked with fish.
Except in several parts situated in the north and north-east, the
climate of Mahi Kantha is fairly good. The greatest heat is generally
in the beginning of April, and the greatest cold in January. The tem-
perature rises to 1 io° in May and falls to 500 in January. The annual
rainfall at Idar averages 34 inches.
r6 MAHI KANTHA
The earliest settlers, both rulers and ruled, were the tribes now-
known as Bhils and Rolls. The next corners were Rajputs, whose
arrival in Mahi Kantha seems to date from the
establishment of Arab power in Sind and the fall
of Vallabhinagar in the eighth century. In the eleventh century the
Musalman destruction of Nagar Tatta in Sind drove out the Paramara
Rajputs ; and in the next two centuries the farther advance of Musal-
man power forced many other Rajput tribes, such as the Paramaras of
Chandravati, the Rathors of Kanauj, and the Chavadas of Anhilvada,
south into the Mahi Kantha hills. To the Chandravati Parmars belong
the houses of Mohanpur, Ranasan, Rupal, Varagam, and Bolundra ; to
the Kanauj Rathors belong the houses of Pol, Malpur, Valasna, and
Magori : and to the Chavadas of Anhilvada belong the houses of
Mansa and Yarsora. By intermarriage with the KolTs many of these
Rajputs lost caste, keeping only the names of the clans — Makvana,
Dabi, and Bariya — to which their forefathers belonged. In the fifteenth
century came the Vaghela houses of Pethapur and Posina (in Idar).
Jai Chand, the last Rathor Rajput sovereign of Kanauj, is said to
have left two sons : the first founded the present family of Marwar, and
the second in 1257 established himself at Idar. For four centuries the
chiefs of the line bore the title of Rao of Idar: but the last independent
prince, Jagannath, was driven out by the Muhammadans in 1656.
(For further history of Idar, see Idar State.) The family retired into
the hills, fixed their head-quarters at Pol, and were known as the Raos
of that mountainous tract. The present chief is descended from them.
Danta is said to have been established in 809, but its history is mainly
a record of continual struggles with Idar. In the fifteenth century
Mahi Kantha fell under the sway of the Ahmadabad Sultans, and on
their decline under that of the Mughal emperors. The Mughals only
collected occasional tribute by moving a large force into the territory.
The Marathas followed the Mughals, and every two or three years sent
their mulk-giri or 'tribute-collecting army: into the region. In 1811,
when the Maratha power was declining, the British Government stipu-
lated to collect and pay over to the Gaikwar the yearly tribute. In
1820 the British Government finally took over the management of the
Main Kantha territory. They agreed to collect and pay over the
tribute free of expense to Baroda, while Baroda was pledged not to
send troops into the country, or in any way to interfere with the
administration. Since 1820 disturbances have occurred more than
once. From 1833 to 1836 there were local tumults, which required
an armed force for their suppression. In 1S57-8 a display of force
again became necessary, when the registration of arms and the dis-
arming of part of the people took place. A smart engagement was
fought at Taringa hill, and the town of Mondeti was carried by assault.
POPULATION 17
In 1S67 a disturbance arose- at Posina. Peace remained unbroken
until iS8r, when the Bhlls of Pol rose against their chief and extorted
from him a settlement of their claims.
The population of Mahl Kantha at the last four enumerations was :
(1872) 447,056, (1881) 517,485. (1891) 58i,568> and Population
(1901) 361,545. The enormous decrease of 38 per
cent, during the last decade was due to famine. Mahl Kantha con-
tains 6 towns and 1,723 villages, and supports 115 persons to the
square mile. The towns are Mansa, Idar, Pethapur, Vadali,
Ah.madnagar, and Sadra. Hindus form 90 per cent, of the total,
Muhammadans 5 per cent., Jains 3 per cent., and aboriginal tribes
number 6,367. Among the Hindus, Brahmans number 27,000, Raj-
puts 15,000, Varus 9,000, Kunbis (cultivators) 68,000, Kolls (labourers)
92,000, Kumbhars (potters) 9,000 ; and among low castes, Chamars
15,000, and Dhers 14,000. Muhammadans are chiefly Momins (4,000),
formerly weavers but now mostly cultivators, and Ghanchis (3,000) or
oilmen. The aboriginal tribes are chiefly Bhils (18,000), of whom
1 2, coo were entered as Hindus at the recent Census, though probably
not differing in religion from their animistic brethren.
The Bhils are the most remarkable of the Mahl Kantha tribes.
They are hardy and enterprising, and as sagacious in daily conduct
as they are secret and speedy when on one of their robbing expeditions.
They speak a dialect composed of Rajasthani and Gujarat!, which is
extremely difficult to understand ; worship stones covered with red lead
and oil ; believe firmly in witchcraft, and are much addicted to witch-
swinging. Ordinarily among the Mahl Kantha Bhils the woman
chooses her own husband. At the Posina fair in the north, if a Bhll
succeeds in taking the woman he desires to marry across the river
without being discovered, the parents of both agree to the marriage.
If he is found out before he has crossed the river, the man is severely
handled by the father of the girl. The ver or Bhil vendetta usually
takes the form of cattle-lifting. No Bhfl will disregard the kulki or cry
which proclaims that a tribesman is in trouble. Some Bhils, taking the
name of bhagats or ascetics, have become the followers of a Bhil
teacher, Kheradi Surmal. This teacher is a follower of the Hindu god
Rama (the seventh incarnation of Vishnu), and forbids eating the flesh
of domestic animals, the drinking of liquor, and the committing of
offences. Like a high-caste Hindu, the bhagat does not partake of food
without bathing, puts a red mark on the brow, and ties a yellow strip
of cloth round the turban. The Bhils formerly treated these bhagats as
outcastes, and caused them much annoyance. This the authorities put
a stop to. In 1880 the bhagats were estimated at Soo, and not one o(
their number had been accused of any crime. They are now no longer
regarded as outcastes, and are increasing in number.
1 8 MA III KANTHA
The Census of 1901 showed that 59 per cent, of the entire population
are engaged in agriculture ; commercial and professional classes include
4 per cent, and 1 per cent, respectively.
The soil is of two kinds, sandy and black, both of which are rich.
. , The south and west of the Agency are level. Most
Agriculture. r . ... e ,, ., . ~r
of the tillage is for kharij or rainy season crops. Of
the total area of 3,125 square miles, more than 850 square miles, or
27 per cent., are cultivable. The chief crops grown are wheat, rice,
/'djra, gram, cotton, sesamum, rapeseed, and sugar-cane. The Mahi
Kantha bullocks are smaller and weaker than those of North Gujarat ;
the buffaloes are also inferior. In the valley of the Saraswati there is
a large irrigated area. The waters of the Hathmati have been used
for irrigation, and the canal from that river is worked by Government.
Elsewhere irrigation is carried on chiefly from wells and ponds.
Though it contains large tracts of more or less wooded hills, chiefly
covered with bamboos, brushwood, and teak, Mahi Kantha has no
important revenue-yielding forests. The teak is generally uncared for,
and cut down before it grows to any size. The chief products are gum
and honey. At Ahmadnagar, Savgarh, and Parbada in the Idar State
a very superior calcareous sandstone is quarried, which is much used
for ornamenting public buildings.
Weaving is carried on at Ahmadnagar and Pethapur. The finest
weaving is the work of the Musalmans of the Momin sect. The cloth
made by them is woven from silk and cotton yarn,
ra e an ^ ^ country and English. The best dyers are at
communications. } b J
Pethapur and Vasna, who colour and export coarse
English cloth. Since the famine many of the people engaged in local
industries have emigrated to the neighbouring cities to find work in
the mills. Idar, Ahmadnagar, and Pethapur were once famous for their
arms and cutlery. The manufacture of arms is now forbidden, and the
cutlery industry is declining.
Considerable trade was formerly carried on between Gujarat and
Mewar through Idar, Pol, and thence to Marwar. Pethapur and Yasna
export dyed cloth worth over a lakh annually. The chief local trade
centres are Mansa, Pethapur, Sadra, Idar, Ahmadnagar, and Katosan.
The most important fairs are those at Samalji and Brahmakhed.
The Mahi Kantha Agency is traversed by three railways, the Ahmad-
abad-Parantlj, the Gaikwar's Mehsana, and the Vijapur-Kalol-Kadi line.
The first passes by Dabhoda, Rakhial, and Ahmadnagar ; the second
by Jotana and Katosan ; and the third has stations at Limbodra and
Radheja, serving the Mahi Kantha towns of Mansa, Pethapur, and
Sadra. There are 41 miles of metalled and 89 miles of unmetalled
roads in the Agency, the most important being the Idar-Ahmadnagar
road in Idar. the Danta-Ambaji road, the Sadra-Pabhoda road, and the
. / DMIfflS TJRA TIOX 1 9
[halod-Modasa road in Varagam. Avenues of trees are maintained for
3 miles. Post offices are situated at Idar, Ahmadnagar, .Sadra, and
Mansa. Telegraph offices have been recently opened at Sadra, Idar,
and Ahmadnagar.
Severe famines occurred during the last two centuries in 1791, 1813,
and 1899-1900, besides scarcities in 1825 and 1834. The recent famine
of 1 899-1 900 was of an unprecedented nature and
pressed very severely on the people. Relief works
were opened and poorhouses were established. At the height of the
famine there were 37,249 persons on relief works and 6,251 in receipt
of gratuitous relief. Advances and remissions were granted, and the
talukdars were assisted with loans from Government for relief and
other purposes.
At the head of the Agency is the Political Agent, who has three
Assistants. The talukas up to the third class are under his direct
supervision. The other talukas and the five t/nlnas ....
r _ ,. • 1 1 1 1 • Administration,
or groups of petty estates are divided between his
Assistants. The Assistant Political Agent has also the charge of the
Agency police. The Personal Assistant has the charge of all estates
and talukas attached by the British Government during the minority of
the holders or by reason of mismanagement. The Native Assistant has
charge of the Sadra civil station, the treasury, and the jail. Civil and
criminal justice is administered by the chiefs according to the class to
which they belong. The Maharaja of Idar is a first-class chief, exer-
cising full powers of jurisdiction, both civil and criminal (in the case of
capital offences committed by British subjects with the consent of the
Political Agent). The chiefs of the second class exercise jurisdiction in
civil cases up to Rs. 20,000 and full jurisdiction in criminal cases,
subject to confirmation by the Political Agent in capital cases, and with
the same limitation as Idar in regard to British subjects. Chiefs of the
third class exercise jurisdiction in civil cases up to Rs. 5,000, and in
criminal cases up to a penalty of two years' imprisonment and Rs. 1,000
fine, with a limitation in regard to British subjects ; and so on for the
remaining four classes, with gradually decreasing powers. The Political
Agent is vested with the powers both of a Sessions Judge and of a Dis-
trict Magistrate. As far as practicable, the Civil and Criminal Procedure
Codes and the Indian Penal Code are in force, but in the wild Bhll
tracts on the Rajputana frontier all offences are dealt with under rules
based on local customs. In 1838 Captain (afterwards Sir James)
Outram instituted border panchayats for the settlement of the numerous
blood-feuds and disputes between the wild Bhils on the Mahl Kantha
and Rajputana frontiers. The system, which is one of money com-
pensation for crime, has been found very effective in preventing reprisals
and maintaining peace. In 1873 tne ru^es were revised, providing for
20 MAHI KANTHA
the regular assembling of the courts under a British officer as president,
aided by two assessors from each of the States concerned. In 1878
arrangements were concluded for the extradition of all criminals except
Bhlls, and of bhopds or witch-finders among the Bhlls, between Mahi
Kantha and Rajputana. The commonest forms of offence are theft,
robbery, dacoity, cattle-stealing, hurt, and murder.
Formerly the land revenue was farmed, but it is now collected direct
from the cultivators. Except in a portion of the Idar State, no survey
settlement has been introduced. The entire revenues of the States
of Mahi Kantha in 1903-4 were returned at 11^ lakhs, the chief
sources being land revenue, excise, and judicial revenue. Prior to the
famine of 1899-1900 the gross revenues exceeded 12 lakhs. The
expenditure in 1903-4 amounted to ri lakhs. The total tribute pay-
able by different States amounts to nearly \\ lakhs. The Gaikwar, as
superior overlord, receives more thah a lakh ; but of this amount about
a lakh has been credited to Government towards police expenses since
the withdrawal of the contingent maintained by the Gaikwar. The
chief of Idar receives about Rs. 8,600, and other Gujarat States (who
receive tribute from minor allied feudatories in the Agency) Rs. 2,166.
The whole of the tribute is collected by the British Government
and handed over to the superior chiefs entitled to receive it. In
1878-9 measures were taken in most of the Mahi Kantha States
for the suppression of illicit stills, in which mahua liquor is manu-
factured ; but the cheapness of this liquor is still the curse of the Mahi
Kantha States, as the Bhlls and Kolls cannot resist the temptation to
drunkenness.
There are two distinct police forces in the Agency, the Agency police
and the State police. In 1903-4 the strength of the former was 121
mounted and 393 foot, and the latter consisted of r 75 mounted and
915 foot. There are 39 jails and lock-ups, with a daily average of
210 prisoners.
Local funds are collected and placed at the disposal of the Political
Agent. The receipts of the Agency Local funds in 1903-4 amounted
to more than one lakh, and the expenditure was Rs. 96,000. These
funds are known as the (r) Agency general fund, made up of contri-
butions from the States and judicial receipts of the Agency courts, and
expended on education, justice, and vaccination ; (2) Sadra Bazar fund,
composed of taxes and octroi, and expended on education and con-
servancy ; (3) Scott College fund, composed of subscriptions from the
States; and (4) the Jubilee Pauper Patient Endowment fund, com-
posed of subscriptions from the States and private persons for the
benefit of helpless patients in the dispensary.
There is a talukdari school, known as the Scott College, at Sadra,
with 27 boy-, on the rolls, built at a cost of over hall a lakh, for
MAHLAING 21
the sons of the Rajas and the Thakurs who are unable to attend the
Rajkumar College in Kathiawar. The total number of schools in the
Agency in 1903-4 was 117, with an attendance of 6,315 pupils. The
total expenditure was Rs. 30,189. The 4 Bhil schools managed by
the missionaries are attended by over 117 pupils. Of the total popu-
lation, 22,641, or 6 per cent. (12 per cent, males and 0-3 females), were
recorded as literate in 1901.
Nineteen dispensaries were maintained in 1903-4, at which 59,228
patients were treated. The total cost was Rs. 22,605. About 10,000
persons were vaccinated in the same year.
Mahim Taluka. — Western taluka of Thana District, Bombay,
lying between 190 29' and 19° 52' N. and 730 39' and 730 1/ E., with
an area of 409 square miles. It contains one town, Kelve-MahIm
(population, 5,699), the head-quarters : and 187 villages. The population
in 1901 was 82,562, compared with 85,841 in 1891. The density, 202
per square mile, is slightly below the District average. Land revenue
and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to more than 1-9 lakhs. A range of
forest-clad hills divides the taluka from north to south ; and in the
north-east corner are high hills with jagged peaks, of which Asheri is
the chief. In the south-east, Takmak peak rises to 2,000 feet above
sea-level. The land to the west of the central range is low, flat, and
broken by swamps and tidal creeks. The climate is pleasant on the
coast during the hot season ; but during the rest of the year both the
coast and the interior are notoriously malarious. The rainfall (63
inches) is much below the District average. The water-supply is fair.
The Vaitarna river, which flows through the taluka, is navigable by
native craft of about 25 tons. Hot springs, similar to those at Vajrabai
in Bhiwandi, are found at Sativli and are supposed to flow from the
same source.
Mahim.— Town in Thana District, Bombay. See Kelve-Mahim.
Mahim. — Town in the District and tahsll of Rohtak, Punjab. See
Maham.
Mahlaing. — North-western township of Meiktila District, Upper
Burma, lying across the Meiktila-Myingyan railway, between 20° 54'
and 2ic 19' N. and 950 28' and 950 52' E., with an area of 426 square
miles. The population was 55,868 in 1891, and 62,890 in 1901, dis-
tributed in 250 villages, Mahlaing (population, 2,251), a local trade
centre, situated on the railway near the Myingyan border, being the
head-quarters. The township, together with the adjoining Natogyi
township of Myingyan District, constitutes the chief cotton-producing
area in Burma, and consists of typical cotton country, dry and
undulating. In 1903-4 the area cultivated was 143 square miles,
including 31 square miles under cotton : and the land revenue and
thathameda amounted to Rs. 1,23,000.
22
.VA/fLOG
Mahlog. — One of the Simla Hill States, Punjab. See Mailog.
Mahmudabad Estate. — Large talukdari estate in the Districts of
Sltapur, Bara Banki, Kherl, and Lucknow, United Provinces, with a
total area of 397 square miles. The land revenue payable to Govern-
ment amounts to 3-5 lakhs, and cesses to Rs. 55,000, while the rent-
roll is 8-5 lakhs. The tahikddr traces his descent from a Shaikh
named Nasrullah, who was Kazi of Baghdad, but came to India in
the twelfth century. His descendants for three generations held. the
office of Kazi of Delhi ; and about 1345 Kazi Nusrat-ullah, also known
as Shaikh Nathan, was sent by Muhammad bin Tughlak to reduce the
Bhars in Bara Bank!. He was successful and received a large estate.
Another member of the family, named Daud Khan, was a celebrated
soldier who did good service against Himu, the general of the Sun's.
His son, Mahmud Khan, was also a distinguished leader, and founded
the town of Mahmudabad. The family maintained its position through-
out the Mughal period, and their estates were largely extended under
the Oudh rulers. Nawab All Khan received the title of Raja from
the king in 1850. A few years later he took a prominent part in the
Mutiny, but submitted early in 1858. His successor, Muhammad
Amir Hasan Khan, rendered important public services and was
rewarded by the recognition of the title of Raja and the grant of
a K.C.I.E. He was succeeded in May, 1903, by his son, Raja Ali
Muhammad Khan, a member of the Provincial Legislative Council.
The chief town in the estate is Mahmudabad.
Mahmudabad Town. — Town in the Sidhauli tahsll of Sltapur
District, United Provinces, situated in 270 18' N. and 8i° 8' E., on
a metalled road from Sidhauli station on the Lucknow-Bareilly State
Railway. Population (1901), 8,664. It was founded by an ancestor
of the talukdar who owns the Mahmudabad Estate, and contains a
fine mansion, which is the family residence, and also a dispensary. A
large market is held twice a week, and brass vessels are manufactured.
There is a school with 58 pupils.
Mahoba Subdivision. -Subdivision of Hamirpur District, United
Provinces, including the Mahoba and Kulpahar tahslls.
Mahoba Tahsil. — South-eastern tahsll of Hamirpur District, United
Provinces, conterminous with the pargana of the same name, lying
between 250 6' and 250 38' N. and 790 41' and 8oc 9' E., with an area
of 329 square miles. Population fell from 74,200 in 1891 to 61,93s
in 1 90 1, the rate of decrease being the highest in the District. There
are 92 villages and one town, Mahoba (population, 10,074), the
tahsll head-quarters. The demand for land revenue in 1904-5 was
Rs. 75,000, and for cesses Rs. 13,000. The density of population,
188 persons per square mile, is the lowest in the District. In the
north some fairly good black soil is found ; but scattered rocky hills
.UAH RAJ 23
stud the southern portion, and the soil here is inferior and only a thin
layer conceals the underlying rock. Several considerable artificial
lakes made by the Chandels add a charm to the landscape and supply
water for irrigation. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation was 133
square miles, of which only 5 were irrigated. Pan cultivated near
Mahoba has a great reputation, being exported to Calcutta and Bombay.
Mahoba Town. — Ancient town in Hamlrpur District, United Pro-
vinces, and head-quarters of the tahsil of the same name, situated in
25° 18' N. and 790 53' E., on the road from Cawnpore to Saugor and
also on the Great Indian Peninsula Railway. Population (1901), 10,074.
The name is derived from the great sacrifice or Mahotsava, said to have
been performed by Chandra Varmma, the traditional founder of the
Chandel dynasty, which ruled a large tract of country from here {see
Bundelkhand). Mahoba stands on the banks of the Madan Sagar,
a lake constructed by Madan Varmma, the fifteenth king and the
most powerful of all the Chandel rulers. Architectural antiquities of
the period abound throughout the neighbourhood. The Ram Kund,
which is believed to mark the place where Chandra Varmma died,
is a tank of especial sanctity. The fort, now almost entirely in ruins,
commands a beautiful view over the hills and lakes. Several of the
latter, confined by magnificent masonry dams, have greatly silted up ;
but the Kirat Sagar and Madan Sagar still remain deep and clear sheets
of water. The shores of the lakes and the islands in their midst (one
of which in the Madan Sagar is connected with the mainland by a stone
causeway) are thickly covered with pillars and broken sculpture. The
numerous arms of the lakes embrace rocky tongues of land surmounted
by picturesque ruins. Three miles east of the town lies the Bijainagar
Sagar, the largest of all and more than four miles in circuit, while to
the south-west lies the Rahilya Sagar, on the bank of which a large
ruined temple is situated. Mahoba was probably the civil capital of
the Chandels, while their greatest fortress was at Kalinjar, and their
religious capital at Khajraho. After a rule of more than three
centuries Parmal was conquered by Prithwi Raj of Delhi in 1182, and
twenty years later Mahoba fell into the hands of Kutb-ud-din, after
which little is heard of the Chandels. In the seventeenth and eigh-
teenth centuries this part of the country was ruled by the Bundelas.
The Musalman buildings of the town are exclusively constructed from
Hindu materials. A mosque bears an inscription which assigns its
foundation to the year 1322 in the reign of Ghiyas-ud-din Tughlak.
The town contains a small cotton-press, a dispensary, and a mission
orphanage. It is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income
of about Rs. 3,500. There is an increasing trade in local produce.
The tahsili school has 164 pupils.
Mahraj. — A collection of four large villages in the Moga tahsil of
24 M AH RAJ
Ferozepore District, Punjab, situated in 300 19' X. and 750 14' E.
It is the head-quarters of a pargana, held almost entirely by the
Mahrajki section (a/) of the Sidhu Jats, the clan of which the Phulkian
families of Patiala, Nabha, and Jind are another section. A great
excavation, from which was taken earth to build the town, is regarded
as a sacred spot, offerings being made monthly to the guardian priest.
The Mahrajkians, who own the surrounding country as jagirdars, form
a distinct community : physically robust, but litigious, insubordinate,
and addicted to excessive opium-eating. Population (1901), 5,780.
The place possesses a vernacular middle school and a Government
dispensary.
Mahronl. — South-eastern tahsll of Jhansi District, United Provinces,
comprising the parganas of Banpur, Mahronl, and Madaora, and lying
between 240 n' and 240 58' N. and 780 30' and 790 o' E., with an area
of 887 square miles. Population fell from 117,047 in 1891 to 103,851
in 1 90 1. There are 300 villages and one town, Mahronl, the tahsll
head-quarters (population, 2,682). The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 65,000, and for cesses Rs. 12,000. The density of
population, 1 1 7 persons per square mile, is the lowest in the District.
In the south a confused mass of hills marks the commencement of the
Yindhyan plateau. The drainage is carried off by the Dhasan and
Jamni, tributaries of the Betwa, which in turn form part of the eastern
boundary. Below the hills lies a tract of black soil, gradually turning
to red in the north and east. The former has largely deteriorated
owing to the spread of kdns (Sacchariun spontaneuni). Irrigation is
practised in the red soil, especially towards the north. In 1903-4
the area under cultivation was 233 square miles, of which 22 were
irrigated, almost entirely from wells.
Mahsuds. — The country of the Mahsuds lies in the south ot
Waziristan, North-West Frontier Province. It is hemmed in on the
north and west by the Utmanzai Darwesh Khels, on the south-west
by the Ahmadzai of Wana, and on the east by the Bhittannis. On the
south of the Mahsud country a tract on both the north and south side
of the Gomal Pass is devoid of permanent inhabitants. The per-
manent neighbours of the Mahsuds in this direction are the Shiranis,
whose country lies south of the tract referred to. The Mahsud country
hardly comes in contact with British India ; all the passes from it
which debouch on to British territory pass through the country of the
Bhittannis. The Gomal Pass is the sole exception to this rule, and
several routes lead from it to the Mahsud country. This pass has
always been considered as belonging to the Mahsuds, though actually
it is outside the limits of their country. The Mahsuds renounced their
claim to raid in the pass, and undertook to keep it safe in consideration
of the allowances and service granted in the beginning of 1890 at
MAHSUDS 25
Apozai (Fort Sandeman), which were revised after the attack made by
them on the Delimitation Commission at Wana in November, 1894.
The Mahsud country is a tangled mass of mountains and hills of
every size, shape, and bearing, and is intersected in all directions by
ravines generally flanked through their course by high hills. At first
sight the whole region appears to be occupied by hills and mountain 5
running irregularly in all directions ; but there are well defined ranges
which protect the interior of the country by double barriers, and make
penetration into it a matter of extreme difficulty.
The Mahsuds claim descent from Mahsud, son of Mahmud, son of
Khizri, son of ^'azir, and are divided into three main branches: namely,
Alizai, Shaman Khel, and Eahlolzai, each of which is subdivided
into countless sections and sub-sections. The fighting strength of the
three branches is estimated at — Alizai, 4,042 ; Shaman Khel (including
Urmars), 2,466 ; and Bahlolzai, 4,088 : a total of 10,596. Notwith-
standing the differences in their fighting strengths, the three branches
divide the tribal profits and liabilities into three equal shares among
themselves.
The Punjab Government described the Mahsuds in 1881 as
follows : —
' Notorious as the boldest of robbers, they are more worthily admired
for the courage which they show in attack and in hand-to-hand fighting
with the sword. From the early days of British rule in the Punjab few
tribes on the frontier have given greater or more continuous trouble,
and none have been more daring or more persistent in disturbing the
peace of British territory. It is no exaggeration to say that for the first
twenty years after annexation not a month passed without some serious
crime, such as cattle-lifting, robbery accompanied by murder, being
committed by armed bands of marauders from the Mahsud hills.'
The description is still applicable, though the behaviour of the tribe
has been good since the blockade of 1901.
The redistribution of the allowances granted to the tribe in 1895,
after the close of the Mahsud expedition, was made with special
reference to the reorganization of the whole scheme of maliks. The
principle which underlies the new arrangement was that the power and
influence of a limited number of leading maliks in the tribe, and more
particularly in their respective sections, should be enhanced by even
possible means, so as in the first place to enable them to control their
respective sections as effectively as possible, and secondly to enable
Government to deal with a definite number of tribal representatives.
The plan broke down completely, for Government was unable to
protect the ma/iks, and the maliks consequently were reluctant to
exert such authority as they had. The state of the border went from
bad to worse between 1895 and 1900, when the tribe was put under
2 6 UAH SUDS
strict blockade. This resulted in the submission of the Mahsuds in
1 90 1, when a complete redistribution of allowances was made. The
tribe has since restrained its young men from raiding : but fanatical
murders by Mahsuds, which were previously unknown, have given
them an unenviable notoriety.
Mahudha. — Town in the Nadiad taluka of Kaira District, Bombay,
situated in 220 49' N. and 720 56' E. Population (1901), 8,544.
Mahudha is said to have been founded by a Hindu prince named
Mandhata about two thousand years ago. The municipality was
established in 1889, the average income during the decade ending 1901
being Rs. 8,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 8,300. The town
contains a dispensary and four schools (three, including an English
school, for boys and one for girls), attended by 377 male and 70
female pupils respectively.
Mahudi. — Hill in the head-quarters subdivision of Hazaribagh
District, Bengal, situated in 240 12' N. and S50 12' E., about 8 miles
from the southern face of the Hazaribagh plateau. The hill is 2,437
feet above the sea, falling steeply on every side for 800 feet. Four
rock-cut temples are situated on the summit.
Mahul. — North-western tahsll of Azamgarh District, United Pro-
vinces, comprising the parganas of Mahul, Kauria, and Atraulia, and
lying between 250 48' and 260 27' N. and 820 40' and 830 7' E., with
an area of 436 square miles. Population fell from 344,723 in 1891 to
312,234 in 1901. There are 947 villages and two towns, but neither
of them has a population of over 5,000. The demand for land revenue
in 1903-4 was Rs. 3,63,000, and for cesses Rs. 58,000. The density
of population, 716 persons per square mile, is about the District
average. The tahsll is divided into two portions by the Kunwar Nadi.
North of this river the soil is a light loam varying to sand, while the
southern part is chiefly clay and is intersected by swamps and small
channels. The largest river is the Tons. The area under cultivation
in 1898-9 was 251 square miles, of which 149 were irrigated. Wells
supply more than half the irrigated area, and tanks, swamps, and small
streams the remainder.
Mahuva. Town and port in the State of Bhaunagar, Kathiawar,
Bombay, situated in 21° 5' N. and 710 40' E. Population (1901),
17,549. The fort is 2 miles from the mouth of the bay, the east side
of which is formed by an island known on this side as Jegri or Jigi
Bluff, with a 2 fathoms shoal extending for nearly a mile. North of
this shoal the water is deep. The town is 2 miles to the north of the
port and is a large place, having several buildings and a temple. Good
water may be had at a well on Jegri island. In the neighbourhood
is a large swamp extending for several miles to the north-east. The
islands that front this swamp are about 60 feet high and form a
MAIHAR STATE 27
continuous line from the bay to Kutpur Bluff, 12 miles distant from
Jegri. Mahuva, the ancient name of which was Moherak, stands on the
Malan river, 55 miles south-west of Bhaunagar. The town contains
a cotton-press, and is the scene of four annual fairs attended by about
5,000 people. On Jegri Bluff is a lighthouse, 99 feet high, with a fixed
white catadioptric light of the fourth order visible from 13 miles. The
soil of Mahuva is very fruitful and the mangoes grown here rival those
of Bombay. The betel-vine is also cultivated. Coco-nut palms are
plentiful. Mahuva merchants are generally both wealthy and enter-
prising. The principal export trade is in cotton sent to Bombay.
There are good turners, who manufacture cots or dholias, cradles, and
many kinds of wooden toys.
Maibang. — Ruins in the North Cachar subdivision of Cachar Dis-
trict, Eastern Bengal and Assam, situated in 250 17' X. and 930 9' K.,
between two spurs of the Barail Hills on the north side of the water-
shed. When the Kachari Rajas were compelled by the aggressions
of the Ahoms and the Nagas to abandon their capital at Dimapur, and
move farther into the hills, they settled at Maibang : but during the
first half of the eighteenth century they left that place, and after
crossing the Barail, established their court at Khaspur in the plains
of Cachar. In 1882 a man named Sambhudan took up his abode at
Maibang, and announced that he had been commissioned by Heaven
to restore the Kachari kingdom. The Deputy-Commissioner, Major
Boyd, proceeded with a force of armed police to arrest him ; but
Sambhudan evaded him and burnt the subdivisional station at Gun-
jong, which had been left undefended. He then returned and attacked
the Deputy-Commissioner. The attack was easily repulsed, but Major
Boyd received a severe cut in the hand, which caused his death from
tetanus a few days later. Sambhudan was mortally wounded while
endeavouring to escape from the police. Maibang is now a station
on the Assam-Bengal Railway. Groves of bamboos and the remains
of irrigation works show that the place must originally have been
densely peopled, but few masonry ruins are now to be seen.
Maihar State. — A sanad State in Central India, under the Political
Agent in Baghelkhand, lying between 230 59' and 240 24' X. and
8o° 23' and 8i° o' E., with an area of about 407 square miles. It is
bounded on the north by the State of Xagod ; on the east by Nagod
and Rewah ; on the west by Ajaigarh ; and on the south by the
Jubbulpore District of the Central Provinces. Maihar is watered by
the Tons, which traverses it in a north-easterly direction. The tract
is composed mainly of sandstones of the lower Bandair (Bhander)
series, in great part concealed by alluvium. At Jukhehi in the south
of the State, the strike of the Kaimur range is displaced, producing the
only important gap in the whole length of the Vindhyans. Advantage
VOL. XVII. C
28 MAIHAR STATE
was taken of this in constructing the great Deccan road and the branch
of the East Indian Railway between Jubbulpore and Allahabad.
The chiefs of Maihar claim descent from the Kachwaha Rajput clan,
a claim, however, which is not admitted, and has indeed little to
support it. The family apparently migrated from Alwar in the seven-
teenth or eighteenth century, and obtained land from the Orchha chief.
Thakur Bhlm Singh later on entered the service of Chhatarsal of
Panna. His grandson, Beni Singh, the founder of the State, rising
from a low position, finally became minister to Raja Hindupat, who
about 1770 granted him the territory now forming Maihar, which had
originally been a part of Rewah. Beni Singh was killed in 1788. He
has left many monuments of his liberality throughout Bundelkhand in
numerous tanks and buildings. He was succeeded by his son Rajdhar,
who, together with the other chiefs in this region, was conquered by
All Bahadur of Banda early in the nineteenth century. AH Bahadur,
however, restored the State to Durjan Singh, a younger son of Beni
Singh. In 1806 and 1814 Durjan Singh received sanads from the
British Government, confirming him in the possession of his lands.
On his death in 1826 the State was divided between his two sons,
Bishan Singh, the elder, succeeding to Maihar, while Frag Das, the
younger, obtained Bijai-Raghogarh. The latter State was confiscated
in 1858 owing to the rebellion of the chief. The present chief,
Raghublr Singh, succeeded as a minor in 1852, and obtained adminis-
trative powers in 1865. The title of Raja was conferred on him in
1869 as an hereditary distinction, and a personal salute of 9 guns was
granted in 1877 and made hereditary in 1878.
The region in which Maihar lies is of considerable archaeological
interest, but has not as yet been fully investigated. Remains are
numerous throughout the State, especially of temples in the mediaeval
style of the eleventh to the thirteenth century.
The population has been: (1881) 71,709, (1891) 77,546, and (1901)
63,702, giving a density of 156 persons per square mile. Hindus
number 49,740, or 78 per cent.; Animists (chiefly Gonds), 11,876,
or 19 per cent.; and Musalmans, 2,009. The State has-one town,
Maihar (population, 6,802), the capital ; and 210 villages. Baghel-
khandi is spoken by 50 per cent, of the inhabitants, and Bundelkhand!
by 47 per cent. Agriculture supports about 90 per cent, of the total
population.
The soil, except in the hills, is fertile and bears good crops. Of the
total area, no square miles, or 27 per cent., are under cultivation,
of which 70 square miles are irrigable ; 43 square miles are cultivable
but not cultivated ; and the rest consists of forest and waste. The
forests, which cover a large area of the State, are not as yet under
systematic management. Kodon and rice each occupy 20 square miles,
MAIKALA 29
or 36 per cent, of the cropped area ; gram, 12 square miles ; and wheat,
8 square miles.
Formerly a considerable iron-smelting industry existed, but this has
now almost entirely disappeared. Want of good internal communica-
tions has made the development of trade difficult, though a certain
amount of timber is exported.
The chief has full powers in all matters of general administration
and in civil judicial cases. In criminal cases he has power to inflict
sentences of imprisonment not exceeding two years. The total revenue
from all sources is about Rs. 75,000, of which Rs. 55,000 is derived
from land revenue. The principal item of expenditure is Rs. 32,000
on general administration, including the chief's establishment. The
British rupee has been current since 1849. A small force of foot and
horse, amounting to 150 men with 7 serviceable guns, is maintained.
At the Census of 1901, only 1 per cent, of the population were able to
read and write. The State contains eleven schools and one hospital.
Vaccination has made little progress, owing to the strong prejudice
shown by the inhabitants.
Maihar Town. — Capital of the State of the same name in Central
India, situated in 240 16' N. and 8o° 46" E., on the East Indian Rail-
way, at the foot of the Bandair range, 1,980 feet above the level of the
sea. Population (1901), 6,802. It is a well-built place, many of the
houses being constructed of the local sandstone. Outside the present
site is a fort built in the sixteenth century by Raja Blr Singh Deo
of Rewah, mainly from remains of Hindu temples, which is used as
a residence by the chief. A large number of ruined shrines are
scattered round the town, and traces of old foundations exist which
must have belonged to a large place. There are two lakes, one to
the north-west and the other to the south-west of the town. Maihar
contains a British post-office, a school, and a dispensary.
Maikala (or Mekala). — Range of hills in the Central Provinces and
Central India, lying between 210 n' and 220 40' N. and 8o° 46'
and 8i° 46' E. It is the connecting link between the great hill systems
of the Vindhyas and Satpuras, forming respectively the northern and
southern walls of the Narbada valley. Starting in the Khairagarh State
of the Central Provinces, the range runs in a general south-easterly
direction for the first 46 miles in British territory, and then, entering
the Sohagpur pargana of Rewah State, terminates 84 miles farther at
Amarkantak, one of the most sacred places in India, where the source
of the Narbada river is situated. Unlike the two great ranges which it
connects, the Maikala forms a broad plateau of 880 square miles in
extent, mostly forest country inhabited by Gonds. The elevation of
the range does not ordinarily exceed 2,000 feet, but the Lapha hill,
a detached peak belonging to it, rises to 3.500 feet. The range
c 2
3o MAIKALA
is best known for the magnificent forests of sal {Shorea rubustd) which
clothe its heights in many places. These are mainly situated in
zamlndari estates or those of Feudatory chiefs, and hence are not
subject to any strict system of conservation, and have been much
damaged by indiscriminate fellings. The hills are mentioned in ancient
Hindu literature as the place of Maikala Rishi's penance, though
Yyasa, Bhrigu, Agastya, and other sages are also credited with having
meditated in the forests. Their greatest claim to sanctity lies, however,
in the presence upon them of the sources of the Narbada and Son
rivers. The Markandeya Purana relates how, when Siva called succes-
sively on all the mountains of India to find a home for the Narbada,
only Maikala offered to receive her, thus gaining undying fame ; and
hence the Narbada is often called Maikala-Kanya, or ' daughter of
Maikala.' The Mahanadi and Johilla, as well as many minor streams,
also have their sources in these hills. Local tradition relates that in
the fourth and fifth centuries a. d., during the Gupta rule, this plateau
was highly populated ; and the Ramayana and the Puranas mention
the Mekhalas as a tribe of the Vindhya range, the former work placing
them next the Utkalas or people of Orissa. The Rewah State has
lately begun to open up the plateau. Iron ore is met with in some
quantity, and is still worked at about twenty villages to supply the
local demand.
Mailan. — Hill in the Surguja State, Central Provinces, situated in
230 31' N. and 830 37' E., and rising to a height of 4,024 feet above
sea-level.
Mailar. — Village in the Hadagalli taluk of Bellary District, Madras,
situated in 140 48' N. and 750 42' E. Population (1901), 1,722. It is
famous throughout the District for the annual festival held at its temple
every February, at which a cryptic sentence containing a prophecy
(karanikani) regarding the prospects of the coming year is uttered.
The temple is dedicated to Siva in his form of Mallari. The story
is that a demon called Mallasura ('the demon Malla') and his brother,
having by severe penances extracted from Brahma a promise that they
should never be harmed by any being in any form then existing, began
to harass the rishis. The gods were appealed to ; and Siva put on
a new form, so as to evade Brahma's promise, and taking with him
forces to the number of seven crores, also in new forms (such as dogs)
which had never before served in an arm)', warred with Mallasura and
his brother for ten long days and at length slew them both with his
bow and overcame their followers. The gods and rishis were in
transports at his triumph, and joined in foretelling unbroken prosperity
as the fruit of it. The ceremonies and rites at the festival form
a curious sort of miracle-play representative of this war in heaven
and its result. The pilgrims to the festival go about shouting Elukoti '
MAILOG 31
Ehtkoti ! ('seven crores ! ') instead of the name of the god as usual :
and the goravas, the special name for the men (and women) who have
dedicated themselves to this temple in the curious manner prevalent in
the western taluks, dress themselves up in blankets and run about on
all fours, barking and pretending that they are Siva's army of dogs.
After residing for ten days, the period during which Siva fought with
Mallasura and his brother, on a hillock outside the village, the god
returns. He is met half-way by the goddess, his wife, who comes to
congratulate him on his success, and the two remain for some time at
the place of meeting. The expectation of good times to follow the
victory is represented by the prophecy or kdranikam. It is pronounced
on this tenth day, and all the thousands of people present crowd round
the place where the god and goddess have halted. A huge wooden
bow, about 10 feet long, symbolic of that with which Siva slew Mall-
asura, is brought and placed on end. A Kuruba (the same man has
performed the ceremony for many years in succession) who has fasted
for the past week steps forward and receives the benediction of the
temple manager. He then climbs partly up the bow, being supported
by those nearest him. For a minute or two he looks in a rapt manner
to the four points of the compass, then begins shuddering and trembling
as a sign that the divine afflatus is upon him, and calls out ' Silence ! '
The most extraordinary and complete silence immediately falls upon
the great crowd of pilgrims, every one waiting anxiously for the
prophecy. After another minute's pause and again gazing upwards
to the heavens, the Kuruba pronounces the word or sentence which
foretells the fate of the coming year, invariably following it with the
word Parak! meaning ' Hark ye,' or 'Take ye note.' It is stated that
in the year before the Mutiny the prophecy was ' they have risen against
the white-ants.' Latterly the sentence has either been of exceedingly
cryptic meaning, or has related to the prospects of the crops.
Mailog (Ma/i/og).— One of the Simla Hill States, Punjab, lying
between 300 52' and 310 5' N. and 760 52' and 760 58' E., with an
area of 43 square miles. Population (1901), 8,968. Patta, its capital,
lies 30 miles south-west of Simla station, at the foot of the Kasauli hill.
The chiefs of Mailog came from Ajodhya. The State used to pay
tribute to the Mughal emperors through Bilaspur, and with that State
was occupied by the Gurkhas between 1805 and 181 5. In the latter
year, on the expulsion of the Gurkhas, the Thakur received a sanad
from the British Government confirming him in the possession of the
State. Thakur Raghunath Chand succeeded in 1880 and obtained the
title of Rana. in 1898. On his death in 1902 he was succeeded by his
minor son, Thakur Durga Chand, and the State is now administered
by a council of four members. The State has a revenue of Rs. 20,000,
out of which Rs. 1,440 is paid as tribute.
32 MAIL SI
Mailsi. — TaKsll of Multan District, Punjab, lying between 29° 35'
and 300 19' N. and 710 45' and 720 52' E., with an area of 1,658 square
miles. Its long southern boundary is formed by the Sutlej, which
periodically floods the lowland along its bank. Between the lowlands
and the still uncultivated Bar lies a tract of country irrigated by inun-
dation canals from the Sutlej. The population in 1901 was 109,727,
compared with 106,050 in 1891. It contains 332 villages, including
Mailsi, the head-quarters. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4
amounted to 2-1 lakhs.
Maimana. — Head-quarters of the district of the same name in
Afghan-Turkistan, situated in 350 55' N. and 640 46' E.; 2,860 feet above
the sea. The town, which is a large one as far as area is concerned,
the circuit of its walls equalling that of Herat, comprises about 3,000
houses and 233 shops, but has a generally deserted and decayed look.
There are no important industries, the manufactures being limited to
barak and kurk (both woollen fabrics), and a coarse blue cotton cloth.
The principal articles of trade are Bokhara and Meshed silk, Russian
leather, and printed cotton goods, English cotton cloth, velvets, tea,
indigo, and hardware ; and the usual agricultural products of the
country — wheat, barley, tobacco, and dried fruits. Maimana derives
such importance as it possesses from being the place of exchange for
goods brought from Herat, Kandahar^ and Meshed on one side, from
Kabul and Balkh on another, and from Bokhara and Andkhui on the
third. The population is chiefly Uzbeg, but representatives of every
race in Central Asia and Afghanistan are to be found in the bazars.
Until the reign of AmTr Abdur Rahman Khan, Maimana maintained
a semi-independence under its own chiefs; but in 1883-4 the AmTr
dispatched a force to bring it under subjection, and Dilawar Khan, the
chief, surrendered and was sent to Kabul. The Amir at first appointed
a member of the chiefs family as Wall, with very restricted powers, the
real control resting in the hands of an Afghan Resident. In 1892 the
tribal levies and inhabitants of the Maimana district broke into
rebellion, which Abdur Rahman soon suppressed ; the Wall was
removed, and Maimana has since been treated as an ordinary Afghan
district.
Maimansingh. — District, subdivision, and town in Eastern Bengal
and Assam. See Mymensingh.
Maindargi. — Head-quarters of the taluka of the same name in the
Kurandvad State, Bombay, situated in 170 28' X. and 76° 20' E.
Population (1901), 6,153. It is administered as a municipality, with
an income of about Rs. 400. Weaving of coarse cloth and blankets
is carried on.
Maingkaing. — North-eastern township of the Upper Chindwin
District, Upper Burma, comprising the basin of the Uyu river, and
MAINPURI DISTRICT 33
lying between 24° 22 and 250 480 N. and 94' 41' and 96° 20' E., with
an area of 4,665 square miles. The population, which is almost wholly
Shan, amounted approximately to 11,000 in 1891, and to 23,303 in
1901, distributed in 248 villages. Maingkaing (population, 470), on
the Uyu river, about 30 miles from its mouth, is the head-quarters.
The population is confined to the banks of the Uyu and a few of its
tributaries. Except for a few patches of level ground near the Uyu,
the whole country is a maze of hills. The greater part of the township
is dense jungle, and is exceedingly unhealthy. The area cultivated in
1903-4 was 29 square miles, and the land revenue and thathameda
amounted to Rs. 39,000.
Maini. — Town in the Khatao taluka of Satara District, Bombay.
See Mayni.
Mainpat. — -A magnificent table-land in the Surguja State, Central
Provinces, 18 miles long and 6 to 8 miles broad, lying between 220 46'
and 220 54' N. and 830 8' and 830 24' E. It rises to a height of 3,781
feet above the sea and forms the southern barrier of the State. From
the southern face of the plateau, which is mainly composed of gneiss
and ironstone, long spurs strike out into the plains of Udaipur, while
the northern side is a massive wall of sandstone, indented like a coast-
line with isolated bluffs standing up in front of the cliffs from which
they have been parted. The plateau is well watered throughout, and
affords, during the summer months, abundant grazing for the cattle of
Mirzapur and Bihar.
Mainpuri District. — District in the Agra Division, United Pro-
vinces, lying between 260 53' and 270 31' N. and 780 27' and 790 26' E.,
with an area of 1,675 square miles. It is bounded on the north by
Etah ; on the east by Farrukhabad ; on the south by Etawah and Agra;
and on the west by Agra and Etah. The whole District forms a level
plain, and variations in its physical features are chiefly due to the rivers
which flow across it or along its boundaries, generally .
from north-west to south-east. The Jumna, which aspects,
forms part of the southern boundary, is fringed by
deep ravines, extending two miles from the river, incapable of culti-
vation, but affording good pasturage for cattle, as well as safe retreats
for the lawless herdsmen or Ahirs. North-east flow, in succession, the
Sirsa, the Aganga, the Sengar, the Arind or Rind, the Isan, and the
Kali NadI (East), which last forms the greater part of the northern
boundary. A well-defined sandy ridge lies in the west of the District,
and a range of sandhills follows the course of the Kali XadT, a little
inland. Shallow lakes or marshes abound over the whole area, but are
most common in the central table-land, in which are many large
stretches of barren soil called mar.
The soil consists entirely of Gangetic alluvium ; but katikar is abun-
34 MAINPURI DISTRICT
dant, both in nodular and block form. Saline efflorescences occur in
many parts.
The flora presents no peculiarities. The District is well wooded, and
extensive groves of mango and shisham {Dalbergia Sissoo) abound.
The great d/idk jungles (Butea frondosa) which formerly studded the
District have been largely cut away. Babul [Acacia arabica) is common.
The weed baisuri {Phtchea laticeolata) is a pest in the west, and ka?is
(Saccharinn spontaneum) is sometimes troublesome in the sandy soil
to the north-east.
There are few wild animals in the District. Antelope occur in some
numbers, and nilgai in the dhak jungles. Leopards and hyenas are
found in the Jumna ravines, and wolves everywhere. Pigeons, water-
fowl, and quail are common. Fish are plentiful, and the right of fishing
in the rivers and tanks is often valuable.
The climate of Mainpurl is that of the Doab generally. It is hot,
but not excessively sultry during the summer months. The annual
rainfall averages 31 inches, and the tract near the Jumna receives
slightly more than the rest. Variations from year to year are con-
siderable.
Nothing definite is known of the early history of Mainpurl, though
mounds concealing ancient ruins are common. A few places are, as
usual, connected with episodes in the Mahabharata.
The first precise notice of the District, however, is
found in the records of its Muhammadan invaders. In 1194 Raprl
was made the seat of a Musalman governor, and continued to be
the local head-quarters under many successive dynasties. During the
vigorous rule of Sultan Bahlol (1450-88) Mainpurl and Etawah formed
a debatable ground between the powers of Delhi and Jaunpur, to both
of which they supplied mercenary forces. After the firm establishment
of the LodI princes, Raprl remained in their hands until the invasion of
the Mughals. Babar occupied it in 1526, and Etawah also came into
his hands without a blow. Raprl was wrested from the Mughals for
a while by the Afghan, Kutb Khan, son of Sher Shah, who adorned it
with many noble buildings, the remains of which still exist. On the
return of Humayun, the Mughals once more occupied Mainpurl.
Akbar included it in the sarkars of Kanauj and Agra. The same
vigorous ruler also led an expedition into the District for the purpose
of suppressing the robber tribes by whom it was infested. During the
long ascendancy of the line of Babar the Musalmans made little
advance in Mainpurl. A few Muhammadan families obtained posses-
sions in the District, but a very small proportion of the natives accepted
the faith of Islam. Under the successors of Akbar Raprl fell into
comparative insignificance, and the surrounding country became sub-
ordinate to Etawah.
POPULATION 35
Like the rest of the Central Doab, Mainpurl passed towards the end
of the eighteenth century into the power of the Marathas, and finally
became a portion of the province of Oudh. When the region was
ceded to the British by the Nawab of Oudh in 1801, Mainpurl was
made the head-quarters of the extensive District of Etawah. With the
exception of a raid by Holkar in 1804, which was repulsed by the
provincial militia, there are no events of importance to recount during
the early years of British supremacy. Its unwieldy size was gradually
reduced by the formation of Etah and Etawah as separate Districts.
The construction of the Ganges Canal was the only striking event
between the cession and the Mutiny of 1857.
News of the outbreak at Meerut reached Mainpurl on May 12 ; and
on the 22nd, after tidings of the Aligarh revolt had arrived at the
station, the 9th Infantry rose in open mutiny. The few Europeans at
Mainpuri gallantly defended the town till the 29th, when the arrival
of the Jhansi rebels made it necessary to abandon the District entirely.
The Magistrate and his party were accompanied as far as Shikohabad
by the Gwalior troopers, who then refused to obey orders, but quietly
rode off home without molesting their officers. The fugitives reached
Agra in safety. Next day the Jhansi force attacked the town, but was
beaten off by the well-disposed inhabitants. The District remained in
the hands of the rebel Raja of Mainpuri, who held it till the re-
occupation, when he quietly surrendered himself, and order was at
once restored.
There are 8 towns and 1,380 villages. Population has fluctuated
during the last thirty years. Between 1881 and 1891 excessive floods
threw much land out of cultivation ; but the seasons
in the following decade were more favourable. The
number of inhabitants at the last four enumerations was: (1872)
765,845, (1881) 801,216, (1891) 762,163, and (1901) 829,357. The
density of population is below the average of the western plain. The
District is divided into five talmls — Mainpuri, Bhongaon, Karhal,
Shikohabad, and Mustafabad — the head-quarters of which (except
that of Mustafabad, which is at Jasrana) are at places of the same
names. The principal town is the municipality of Mainpuri. The
table on the next page gives the chief statistics of population in 1901.
About 93 per cent, of the population are Hindus, and less than 6 per
cent. Musalmans, a very low proportion for the United Provinces.
Western Hindi is spoken almost universally, the prevailing dialect
being Braj.
The most numerous Hindu castes are Ahirs (graziers and culti-
vators), 143,000; Chamars (tanners and labourers), 107.000: Kachhls
(cultivators), 68,000 : Brahmans, 68,000 ; and Rajputs, 6S,ooo. Among
Musalmans the chief tribes or castes are Shaikhs, 8,100: Pathans,
36
MAINPURI DISTRICT
6,600; Fakirs, 5,700; and Behnas (cotton-carders), 5,200. Agriculture
supports 70 per cent, of the population, a high proportion ; general
labour 6 per cent., and personal service 6 per cent.
Tahsil.
V
u
it
a
"£
"lis
u
<
Number of
c
0
"3
a.
0
PL,
U
W -"
§1
3*
S.&
O Ul
PL,
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
C
O
H
3
1
1
2
1
>
Mainpuri .
Bhongaon .
Karhal
Shikohabad
Mustafabad
District total
386
459
218
294
3i8
2 49
39°
189
287
265
183,180
226.940
98,398
1 57.659
163,180
475
494
451
53r>
513
+ 7-0
+ 16-2
- 1.9
+ 12>5
+ 5-i
5,327
5.832
2.386
3,792
2,241
1,675
S
1,380
829,357
495
+ 8-8
19,578
Agriculture.
There were only 308 native Christians in 1901, of whom 196. were
Methodists and 45 Presbyterians. The American Presbyterian Church
commenced work here in 1843.
The District is divided by its rivers into three tracts of varying
qualities. On the north-east the area between the Isan and the Kali
Nadi is composed of light sandy soil called b/iur,
with here and there loam, especially near the west,
where these two rivers are farthest apart. Between the Isan and Sirsa
lies the garden of the District, a rich tract of fertile loam, interspersed
with many shallow lakes, patches of barren usar land, and occasional
jungle. The third tract, commencing a little south of the Sengar, has
some sandy stretches, but is much better than the north-eastern tract,
and as far as the Sirsa little inferior to the central tract. South of
the Sirsa the soil deteriorates ; there are no jhils and no usar ; the land
is not so rich, and irrigation is scantier, the spring-level sinking rapidly
as the Jumna ravines are approached.
The District contains the usual tenures of the Provinces, but zamhi-
dari and pattidari are more common than bhaiyachara mahals. There
is one large talukdari estate belonging to the Raja, of Mainpuri, which
is described separately. The main agricultural statistics are given on
the next page, in square miles.
The chief food-crops, with the area under each (in square miles),
are: wheat (220), jowdr (122), barley (no) bajra (100), and gram (90).
Poppy and cotton are the most important non-food crops, covering
28 and 39 square miles respectively.
No improvements can be noted in agricultural practice, except the
increase in the area double cropped, and in the area under wheat,
maize, and poppy. A steady demand exists for advances under the
Agriculturists' and Land Improvement Loans Acts, which aggregated
1*3 lakhs during the ten years ending 1900. One-third of this sum
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS
was advanced in the famine year 1896-7. The loans in 1903 4
amounted to Rs. 4,500. In the central and part of the south-western
tract drainage was defective and has recently been improved, especially
in the latter, where the Bhognlpur branch of the Lower Ganges Canal
had caused some obstruction.
Tahstl.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated. Cultivable
h waste.
Mainpurl .
Bhongaon .
Karhal
Shikohabad
Mustafabad
Total
386
459
218
294
3i8
179
260
no
196
181
152
205
101
l6o
IOI
50
61
27
44
26
1,675
926
719
208
Note. — These figures are for various years from 1900 to 1903, later figures
not being available.
The cattle are of the ordinary inferior type, though a little success
has been achieved in improving the strain by imported bulls. Some-
thing has also been done to improve the breed of horses, and stallions
have been kept here for many years. In 1870 an attempt was made,
without success, to improve the breed of sheep. The best goats are
imported from west of the Jumna. Sirsaganj is the great cattle market.
Mainpurl is well supplied by canal-irrigation in almost every portion,
and 900 square miles are commanded. In the latest years for which
statistics are available, out of 719 square miles irrigated canals supplied
266. The central tract is served by the Cawnpore and Etawah branches
of the Lower Ganges Canal, which originally formed part of the L^pper
Ganges Canal. The tract north-east of the Isan is served by the Bewar
branch, and part of that south-west of the Sengar and Sirsa by the
Bhognlpur branch. The last tract is perhaps that in which irrigation
is most defective. Wells supplied 396 square miles, and other sources,
chiefly small streams, 57. Towards the Jumna, and in the sandy tracts,
wells cannot be constructed easily.
Kankar is found abundantly in both block and nodular form. The
only other mineral product of the District is saltpetre, which is largely
manufactured from saline efflorescences.
The District has few arts or manufactures. Glass bangles are made
from reh. Wood-carving was once popular in many parts, including
a peculiar variety in which the wood is inlaid with
brass or silver wire.
Shikohabad, another was recently built at Mainpurl,
and a third is working at Sirsaganj. Indigo is still made in twenty-
three factories, which employ about 1,000 hands.
The chief exports are wheat and other grains, oilseeds, hides, and
cotton ; and the imports are salt, metals, piece-goods, sugar, tobacco,
Trade and
[here is one cotton-gin at communications.
38 MAWPURI DISTRICT
and rice. The trade is largely with Cawnpore, but sugar comes from
Rnhilkhand and tobacco from Farrukhabad. Some traffic is carried
by the canal.
The East Indian Railway crosses the south-western corner, and
a branch line, recently constructed, connects Shikohabad with Mainpurl
and Farrukhabad, thus traversing the District from west to east. There
are 197 miles of metalled and 200 miles of unmetalled roads. The
Public Works department has charge of the former ; the cost of all
but 83 miles of the metalled and of all the unmetalled roads is met
from Local funds. Avenues of trees are maintained on 102 miles.
Few Districts in the Provinces are so well supplied with roads, and
only in the south-west are communications defective. The grand
trunk road passes through the north-west, with a branch to Agra
through Mainpurl town, which is also connected by metalled roads
with the surrounding Districts.
Mainpurl suffered severely in 1837-8, when extensive remissions of
revenue were necessary, but nothing more was done to relieve distress.
. In 1 860-1 relief wrorks were opened and 4,000 able-
bodied persons worked daily, besides 4,600 who
received gratuitous relief. In 1868 the situation was saved by timely
rain, and grain was actually exported. Distress was felt in 1877-8,
especially in the south-west of the District, where canal-irrigation was
not available, and relief works had to be opened. In 1896-7 prices
were high, but 2,000 temporary wells were made from Government
advances, besides 12,000 constructed from private capital, and distress
was confined to the immigrants from Rajputana. A test work attracted
only a daily average of 100 persons. The four branches of the canal
now make the District practically immune.
The ordinary District staff includes the Collector, and four Deputy-
Collectors recruited in India. There is a tahslldar at the head-quarters
. , . . . of each tahsll. Mainpurl is also the head-quarters
Administration. r „ „ . . ..... r
01 an Executive Engineer in charge of a division of
the Lower Ganges Canal, and of an officer of the Opium department.
There are two regular Munsifs. The District and Sessions Judge
of Mainpurl and the Sub-Judge exercise jurisdiction also over Etawah
District. Crime is of the usual nature, but outbreaks of dacoity are
frequent. Cattle-theft is not uncommon, and offences against the
opium law are numerous. Mainpurl has long held a bad reputation
for female infanticide, and 21,082 persons were still under surveillance •
in 1904, by far the largest number in any District of the United
Provinces.
In 1 80 1 Mainpuri became the head-quarters of the District of
Etawah, which then included, besides the present District, parts
of Farrukhabad, Agra, Etah, and Etawah. In 1803 large additions
ADMINISTRATION 39
were made, and in 1824 four subdivisions were formed, the Mainpuri
portion remaining under the Collector of Etawah, who still resided
at Mainpuri. The District began to take its present form in 1837.
Early settlements were for short periods, and were based on the records
of previous collections and on a system of competition, preference,
however, being given to the hereditary zamindars, if they came forward.
The first regular settlement was made in 1839-40, when a revenue
of 12-5 lakhs was fixed. This assessment was, as it turned out,
excessive, owing to the failure to allow for the after-effects of the
famine of 1837-8; and it was reduced in 1845-6 to 10-5 lakhs, rising
gradually to 11-4 lakhs in 1850-1. The next settlement was made
between 1866 and 1873. Soils were marked off on the village map by
actual inspection, and the rents payable for each class of soil were
ascertained. The revenue assessed amounted to rather less than halt
the ' assets ' calculated by applying these rates, and was fixed at
12-8 lakhs. In 1877, owing to floods, mainly along the Kali Nadi, the
settlement of seventy villages was revised. Between 1883 and 1887
serious injury from floods again occurred along the Kali Nadi, and
kaus grass spread, while in the south the new Bhognipur branch of
the canal had caused damage. The revenue was reduced by about
Rs. 19,000. The present demand falls at an incidence of Rs. 1-5
per acre, varying from little more than 8 annas to nearly Rs. 1-12.
A revision of settlement has just been completed.
Collections on account of land revenue and total revenue are
given below, in thousands of rupees : —
1880-1.
1 890- 1.
1900-1. 1903-4-
Land revenue
Total revenue
12,60
14,46
12,23
i6,95
12,74 12,44
i/,9i lS>3i
Besides the single municipality of Mainpuri, there are seven towns
administered under Act XX of 1856. Outside these, local affairs are
managed by the District board, which has an income of about a lakh,
chiefly derived from rates. In 1903-4 the largest item of expenditure
was Rs. 81,000 on roads and buildings.
The District Superintendent of police has a force of 4 inspectors,
83 subordinate officers, and 340 men, besides 102 municipal and town
police, and 1,859 rural and road police. A sub-inspector and 1 1 head
constables are specially maintained in connexion with the surveillance
of villages where female infanticide is believed to be prevalent. There
are 15 police stations. The District jail contained a daily average
of 293 prisoners in 1903.
Mainpuri takes a very low place in respect of literacy. In 1901 only
2-4 per cent, of the population (4-2 males and 0-2 females) could
4o MAINPURI DISTRICT
read and write. The number of public schools fell from 151 in 1881
to 133 in 1 90 1, but the number of pupils rose from 4,146 to 4,851.
In 1903-4 there were 153 public schools with 5,151 pupils, of whom
173 were girls, besides 82 private schools with 811 pupils. Three
of the public schools are managed by Government, and most of the
remainder by the District or municipal boards. In 1903-4, out of a
total expenditure on education of Rs. 38,000, Local funds contributed
Rs. 32,000 and fees Rs. 3,000.
There are 8 hospitals and dispensaries, with accommodation for
36 in-patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 47,000, of
whom 772 were in-patients, and 1,920 operations were performed.
The expenditure in the same year was Rs. 8,200, chiefly met from
Local funds.
About 25,000 persons were successfully vaccinated in 1903-4, repre-
senting 30 per 1,000 of population. Vaccination is compulsory only
in the municipality of Mainpurl.
I M. A. McConaghey and D. M. Smeaton, Settlement Report (1875) :
District Gazetteer (1876, under revision).]
Mainpuri Tahsil. — Central northern tahsil of Mainpuri District,
United Provinces, comprising the parganas of Mainpuri, Ghiror, and
Kuraull, and lying between 270 5' and 270 28' N. and 780 42' and
790 5" E., with an area of 386 square miles. Population increased
from 171,152 in 1891 to 183,180 in 1901. There are 249 villages and
three towns, Mainpuri (population, 19,000), the District and tahsil
head-quarters, being the largest. The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 2,24,000, and for cesses Rs. 36,000. The density of
population, 475 persons per square mile, is slightly below the District
average. The tahsil is bounded on the north by the Kali NadI, and
is also crossed by the Isan and its tributary the Kaknadiya, and by the
Arind. Near the Kali Nadi lies a considerable area of sandy soil or
bhitr ; but most of the tahsil consists of fertile loam, in which some
large swamps or jl/ils, now partly drained, and patches of usar or
barren land alone break the uniformly rich cultivation. Three branches
of the Lower Ganges Canal provide ample means of irrigation. In
1 900-1 the area under cultivation was 179 square miles, of which 152
were irrigated. Wells supply about half the irrigated area, canals one-
third, and tanks ox j hi Is most of the remainder.
Mainpuri Estate.— A lalukdari estate in the District of the same
name, United Provinces, with an area of 89 square miles. The rent-
roll for 1903-4 amounted to more than a lakh, and the revenue and
cesses payable to Government by the estate were Rs. 58,000. The
Rnja of Mainpuri is regarded as the head of the Chauhan Rajputs in
the Doab, He traces descent to the renowned Prithwl Raj of Delhi,
who fell before Muhammad Ghorl in 1 192. According to tradition,
MAINPURI TOWN 41
the Chauhans settled near Bhongaon early in the fourteenth century.
It is probable that the Rai Pratap, mentioned by the Muhammadan
historians as occupying part of this District towards the close of the
fifteenth century, was a member of the family. Pratap aided Bahlol
Lodi in his wars with Jaunpur and was confirmed in his estates. Jagat
Man, ninth in descent from Pratap, founded the city of Mainpuri,
which was extended in 1 749 by another descendant. During the rule
of the Oudh government, towards the close of the eighteenth century,
the Raja was deprived of many of the farms he had previously held ;
but at the cession to the British a large tract was settled with him
as talukdar, the estate being sometimes known as Manchana. In 1840
it was decided that settlement should be made with the subordinate
proprietors where these existed, the talukdar receiving a certain pro-
portion of the rental ' assets,' but being excluded from management
of the villages. The Raja now receives this allowance from 133
villages, while his zamlndari estate comprises 75 villages. In the
Mutiny Raja Tej Singh rebelled, and the estate was confiscated and
conferred on his uncle Bhawani Singh, who had contested the title
when Tej Singh succeeded. The present Raja, Ram Partab Singh,
is a son of Bhawani Singh.
Mainpuri Town. — Head-quarters of the District and tahsll of the
same name, United Provinces, situated in 270 14' N. and 790 3' E., at
the junction of metalled roads from Agra, Etawah, Etah, and Fatehgarh,
and on a branch of the East Indian Railway recently opened from
Shikohabad. Population (1901), 19,000. The town, which lies south
of the Isan river, is made up of two parts, Mainpuri proper and
Muhkamganj, lying respectively north and south of the Agra road.
The former existed, according to tradition, in the days of the Pandavas,
while another fable connects an image known as Main Deo with the
name. It seems to have been of no importance till the Chauhans
migrated here from Asauli at dates ranging from the thirteenth to the
sixteenth century, according to different versions. The town contains
a fort, composed partly of brick and partly of mud, belonging to the
Raja. Muhkamganj was founded in 1803 by Raja Jaswant Singh. In
the Mutiny the place was occupied by the Jhansi rebels, who plundered
and burnt the civil station, but were beaten off when the}' attempted
to sack the town. The Agra branch of the grand trunk road runs
through the centre and forms a wide street, lined on either side by
shops which constitute the principal bazar. Besides a tahslli and
dispensary, the town contains the head-quarters of the American
Presbyterian Mission, a large sarai and grain market called Raikesganj,
after the Collector who built it about 1849, and a fine street called
I.aneganj, after another Collector. The civil station, with the District
offices and jail, lies north of the Isan, which is crossed by >tone
42 MAINPURI TOWN
bridges. Mainpuri has been a municipality since 1866. During the
ten years ending 1901 the income and expenditure averaged Rs. 16,000.
In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 22,000, chiefly from octroi (Rs. 16,000) ;
and the expenditure was Rs. 25,000. Trade is mainly local, but may
be expected to expand now that the railway is opened. The place
is noted for the production of articles of carved wood inlaid with brass
wire. A steam cotton-ginning factory, recently opened, employs about
100 hands. The municipality maintains two schools and aids two
others, with 322 pupils in 1904. There are also a District and tahsill
schools, and a Presbyterian Mission school.
Maiskhal. Island off the coast of Chittagong District, Eastern
Bengal and Assam, lying between 210 29' and 210 45' N. and 910 50'
and 910 58' E., with an area of 102 square miles. Population (1901),
24,228. Through the centre and along the east coast-line rises a range
of low hills 300 feet high ; the west and north are fringed by mangrove
jungle and are of the same character as the Sundarbans. Among the
lulls is built the shrine of Adinath, which attracts pilgrims from all
parts of the District. The greater portion of the island belongs to
a permanently settled estate.
Mai sur. -Native State, District, taluk, and town. See Mysore.
Maizar. — Village on the southern bank of the Margha river in
the Madda Khel territory, Northern VVaziristan Agency, North-West
Frontier Province, situated in 32° 54' N. and 690 37' E. On June 10,
1897, the Madda Khels treacherously attacked the Political officer's
escort, and shot down several British officers and sepoys of the force
under the walls of the village. A punitive expedition was dispatched,
which exacted a fine of Rs. 10,000, besides Rs. 9,000 as compensation
for the property taken in the attack, and the surrender of six of the
ringleaders.
Majhaull. — Village in the Deoria tahsil of Gorakhpur District,
United Provinces. See Salempur-Majhauli.
Majhgawan. — Village lands in the Mau tahsil of Banda District,
United Provinces, containing the town of Rajapur.
Majitha. — Town in the District and tahsil of Amritsar, Punjab,
situated in 31° 46' N. and 740 58' E., 12 miles north-east of Amritsar
city. The main branch of the Bari Doab Canal runs between Majitha
and the village of Kathu Nangal, a station on the Amritsar and
Pathankot Railway, 4 miles to the north. Population (1901), 6,403.
The town is said to have been founded by a Gil J at from the Malwa,
named Madu, who called the town Madu Jetha after his eldest son
(Jetl/a). To the Jat clan of this village belonged the Majitha Sardars,
some of whom, such as Sardars Desa Singh and Lehna Singh, held
high places at the court of Ranjit Singh. The municipality was
created in 1867. The income during the ten years ending 1902-3
MAKHU
43
averaged Rs. 3,700, and the expenditure Rs. 3,000. In 1903-4 the
income was Rs. 4,800, chiefly from octroi ; and the expenditure was
Rs. 4,700. Some carpets are manufactured, but the town is not of
any commercial importance. There is an Anglo-vernacular middle
school and a dispensary.
Majuli. — Island (or char) in the north of Sibsagar District, Assam,
lying between 260 45' and 270 12' N. and 930 39' and 940 35' E.,
formed by the diversion of the Kherkutia channel from the main
stream of the Brahmaputra. This channel subsequently receives the
waters of the Subansirl, in itself a large river, and is then known as
the Luhit to the point where it rejoins the parent stream opposite the
mouth of the Dhansiri. The island has an area of 485 square miles,
with a population (1901) of 35,000, and is the site "of the Auniati,
Dakhinpat, Garamur, and other sattras, or priestly colleges, which
are held in great reverence by the Assamese. The Majuli is much
exposed to flood and diluvium, and the staple crops are summer rice
and mustard. It contains numerous streams, lakes, and patches of
tree forest covered with beautiful cane brake, and the general effect is
very picturesque. The island has but one road and no town, and an
old-world air pervades the place which savours more of the eighteenth
than the twentieth century.
Makanpur. — Village in the tahsil of Bilhaur, Cawnpore District,
United Provinces, situated in 260 54' N. and 790 59' E., 40 miles
north-west of Cawnpore city. The shrine of a Musalman saint, named
Shah Madar, who had originally been a Jew, attracts a large number
of pilgrims annually, both Musalman and Hindu, the latter regarding
the saint as an incarnation of the god Lakshmana. In addition to the
religious attractions of the fair, a large cattle-market is held, at which
15,000 to 20,000 animals of all kinds are offered for sale.
Makhtal.— Taluk in Mahbiibnagar District, Hyderabad State, with
an area of 511 square miles. The population in 1901, including jaglrs,
was 69,560, compared with 68,031 in 1891. The taluk contains
120 villages, of which 13 are jagir, and Makhtal (population, 4,476)
is the head-quarters. The land revenue in 1901 amounted to i-8 lakhs.
In 1905 the taluk was enlarged by the addition of some villages from
Narayanpet, but lost 31 villages to Yadglr in Gulbarga. The town of
Narayanpet is now included in this taluk, which forms the borderland
between the Carnatic and the Telingana country.
Makhu. — Town in the Zira tahsil of Ferozepore District, Punjab,
situated in 310 6' N. and 750 4' E., 30 miles north-east of Ferozepore
town. Population (1901), 1,355. The municipality was created in
1867. The income during the ten years ending 1902-3 averaged
Rs. 1,100, and the expenditure Rs. 1,000. In 1903-4 the income was
Rs. 1,500, chiefly from octroi ; and the expenditure was Rs. 1,000.
VOL. XVII. D
44 MAKRAT
Makrai. — Feudatory State in the Central Provinces, lying between
2i° 58' and 220 14' N. and 76° 57' and 770 12' E., within the Harda
lahsil of Hoshangabad District, with an area of 155 square miles. The
State contains some rich villages in the open valley of the Narbada ;
but the greater part of it is situated on the lower slopes of the Satpura
range, consisting of low hills covered with 'forest, of which teak, say
(Terminalia tomenlosa), and tinsa {Ougeinia dalbergioides) are the
principal trees. The head-quarters of the State are at Makrai, which
contains an old hill-fort, and is 15 miles from Bhiringi station and
19 miles from Harda on the Great Indian Peninsula Railway. The
ruling family, who are Raj Gonds, claim a high antiquity of descent
and a jurisdiction extending in former times over the whole of the
Harda tahsil. There is, however, no historical evidence in support of
their pretensions, and all that is known is that they were deprived by
Sindhia and the Peshwa of the forest tracts of Kalibhit and Charwa.
The present chief, Raja Lachu Shah, alias Bharat Shah, was born in
1846 and succeeded in 1866. He was temporarily set aside for mis-
management in 1890, but reinstalled in 1893, when he appointed a
Diwan with the approval of the Chief Commissioner. The population
of the State in 1901 was 13,035 persons, showing a decrease of 30 per
cent, in the previous decade, during which it was severely affected by
famine. Gonds and Korkiis form a considerable portion of the popu-
lation. In 1904 the occupied area amounted to 62 square miles, of
which 54 were under crops. The cropped area is said to have
decreased by 3,000 acres since 1894. Wheat is the staple crop, and
1'owar, cotton, and gram are also grown. The revenue in 1904
amounted to Rs. 62,000, of which Rs. 43,000 was derived from land,
the incidence ot land revenue being Rs. 1-8 per acre. Other
principal sources of revenue were forests (Rs. 5,500), excise (Rs. 5,000),
and law and justice (Rs. 1,400). The expenditure in the same year
was Rs. 64,000, of which Rs. 14,000 was expended in the maintenance
of the ruling family, Rs. 6,100 on administration, Rs. 4,700 on police,
Rs. 1,600 on education, Rs. 1,700 on medical relief, and Rs. 9,000 on
miscellaneous items. The receipts and expenditure during the five
years ending 1903 averaged Rs. 65,000 and Rs. 61,000 respectively.
No tribute is paid to Government. The State contains 42 miles of
unmetalled roads. It maintains five primary schools, the total number
of pupils being 273. In 1901 the number of persons returned as able
to read and write was 353. There is a dispensary at Makrai. The State
is under the charge of the Deputy-Commissioner of Hoshangabad Dis
trict, subject to the control of the Commissioner, Nerbudda Division.
Makran (Mdkkurari). — The south-western division of the Kalat
State, Baluchistan, lying between 250 \' and 270 21' N. and 6i° 39'
and 650 36' E., with an area of about 26,000 square miles. It is
MAKRAN 45
bounded on the east by the Jhalawan country and part of Las Bela ;
on the west by Persia ; on the north by the Siahan range, which
separates it from Kharan ; and on the south by the
• • Physical
sea. The coast-line, which stretches dry and and aspects
from Kalmat to Gwetter Bay, is about 200 miles
long. Much of the country consists of mountains, the parallel ranges
of which have a general direction east to west, enclosing narrow valleys.
The more important are the Makran Coast, Central Makran, and
Siahan Ranges. They gradually ascend in height, as they leave the
sea, to an elevation of about 7,000 feet. Within them lie the cultivated
areas of the country, including Kulanch ; Dasht ; Nigwar ; Kech, also
known as Kej, of which Kolwa, Sami, Tump, and Mand form part ;
and Panjgur with Rakhshan. The Central Makran hills contain
the minor cultivable tracts of Buleda, Balgattar, Parom, Gichk, and
Raghai. The most important rivers are the Dasht and the Rakshan.
They are dry. throughout the greater part of the year, but carry heavy
floods, and one of their features is the frequent pools from which water
is drawn off for purposes of irrigation. Among streams of minor
importance may be mentioned the Shadi Kaur, which enters the sea
near Pasni ; and the Basol, which breaks through the Makran Coast
Range. Gwadar and Pasni are the seaports, and a little traffic is
carried on at Jlwnri. The coast is open and exposed, and owing to
the shoaling of the water no large steamers can approach nearer than
two miles from the shore.
The only information we possess about the geology of the country is
derived from Dr. Blanford's observations \ It is known to contain
a large development of eocene flysch (Khojak shales), while along the
coast the Siwaliks include numerous intercalations of marine strata,
known as the Makran group, containing rich fossil fauna of upper
miocene age. The coast appears to coincide with a line of faulting,
and the mud volcanoes, which occur near it, are probably connected
with this fracture. The vegetation of the country is similar to that
which occurs generally throughout Southern Baluchistan, consisting of
an ill-favoured, spiny scrub. Such species as Capparis aphylla, Sa/va-
dora oleoides, Zizyphus Jujuba, Prosopis spicigera, Acanthodium spicatum,
Tamarix articulata, several kinds of Acacia, and many Astragali are
common. The mangrove grows in the swamps on the coast. Sind
ibex and mountain sheep are common in the hills, and ' ravine deer '
(gazelle) along their skirts. An occasional leopard is killed, and wild
hog are to be found in places.
The climate is marked by three zones of very different character.
Along the coast it is uniform and, though hot, not unpleasant. In
Kech the winter is healthy and dry, but the heat in summer is intense
1 Records, Geological Survey of India, vol. v; and Eastern Persia (1876).
P ?
46 MAKRAN
and in remarkable contrast to the milder atmosphere of the coast.
Panjgur lies in the most temperate zone, with severe cold in winter
and moderate heat in summer. The north wind (gorlch) is experienced
everywhere throughout the year. It is scorching in summer and
cutting in winter. During the winter Kech is subject to dense fogs,
called nod; and, to guard against the damp and the mosquitoes, every
native of Makran possesses a mosquito-curtain. The rainfall is capri-
cious and uncertain, and the country is liable to long periods of
drought. Previous to 1904 good rainfall had not been received in
Kolwa, Kulanch, and Dasht for five years, and this is said to be no
uncommon occurrence. The two periods during which rain is ex-
pected are known as bashsham and bahargah. Bashshdm brings the
summer rains, between May 15 and September 15, which generally
affect the eastern side of the country. The north and west are more
dependent on the winter rains (bahargah), falling between November
and February.
Makran is generally known as Kech-Makran, to distinguish it from
Persian Makran. Kech-Makran and Persian Makran together con-
stitute the Makranat, a term occurring in several
histories. The etymology of the name is uncertain.
By some Makran is said to be a corruption of maki khoran, ' fish-
eaters,' identifiable with the Ichthyophagi of Arrian. Lord Curzon
considers the name to be Dravidian, and remarks that it appears as
' Makara ' in the Brihat Sanhita of Varaha Mihira in a list of tribes
contiguous to India on the west. To the Greeks the country was
known as Gedrosia. Lying on the high road from the west to the
east, Makran is the part of Baluchistan round which its most interesting
history centres. Legendary stories tell of the marches of Cyrus and
Semiramis through its inhospitable wastes, marches which Alexander
sousht to emulate when he made his famous retreat from India in
325 B.C., so graphically described by Arrian. The Shahnama relates
how Kaikhusru of Persia took the country from Afrasiab of Turan ;
and the memory of the former, and of his grandfather Kai-Kaus, is
preserved in the names of the Khusravi and Kausi karez in Kech.
But the suzerainty over Makran gravitated sometimes to the west,
and sometimes to the east. At one time the Sassanian power was
in possession ; later we hear of its conquest by Rai Chach of Sind.
The Arabs, in the seventh century, made themselves masters of the
country; but, on the decline of the Khalifat, it disappears from
authentic history until Marco Polo mentions it about 1290 as the
most westerly part of India under an independent chief. Local
tradition relates that of the indigenous races the Rinds, Hots, and
Maliks successively held sway in the country after the Arabs; the
Maliks were followed by the Buledais, who in their turn were ousted
POPULATION 47
by the Gichkis from India. In the time of Ahmad Shah Durrani, the
country was reckoned in the province of Kirman. Owing to internal
dissensions, the Gichkis fell under the suzerainty of Kalat in the middle
of the eighteenth century ; and Mir Naslr Khan I acquired the right
to half of the revenue of the country, besides extending his conquests
westward into Persian Makran. In 1862 Makran came into the
prominent notice of the British Government in connexion with the
construction of the Indo-European Telegraph line, and a British officer
was stationed at Gwadar from 1863 to 187 1. Meanwhile Persia was
extending her power eastward, and in 1879 it was found necessary to
depute Colonel Goldsmid to settle the western boundary. Internally
matters had gone from bad to worse, owing to the disputes between the
Khan of Kalat and the dominant races, the Gichkis, Nausherwanis, and
others, until at length a settlement was effected by Sir Robert Sandeman
in 1884. The interference of the British Government has ever since
been constantly required, and frequent visits have been paid to the
country by European officers supported by escorts. In 1891 Mr. Tate,
of the Survey of India, was appointed as the Khan's representative;
but he was withdrawn in 1892, being succeeded by a Hindu Govern-
ment official as the Khan's nazitn. A rising of the Makranis took place
in 1898, when the iidzim was temporarily captured, but the rebels
shortly afterwards received a severe lesson at the fight of Gokprosh.
A Brahui of good family was thereupon appointed nazim. A dis-
turbance in 1 90 1 led to another small expedition, which captured
Nodiz fort. An Assistant Political Agent, who is ex-officio commandant
of the Makran Levy Corps, has been posted to Panjgur since 1904.
From careful inquiries made in 1 903 the population of Makran was
estimated at about 78,000. The permanent villages number 125, the
chief of which are Turbat, the head-quarters of the _ , i#
, ■ ■ • r^ - tV j t • rro. Population.
administration, Gwadar, Pasni, and Isai. I he more
important villages are those clustering round the forts, which number
fifteen. The population may be divided into five classes: the dominant
races; the middle-class cultivators, generally known as Baloch; culti-
vators of irrigated lands, menials, and artisans, called Darzadas, Nakibs,
and Loris ; fishermen, known as Meds and Koras ; and dependants of
servile origin. It is distributed into groups, each of which lives
independently of the rest ; and the democratic tribal system, which
is so strongly prevalent in other parts of the Kalat State, is here non-
existent. The dominant races include the Gichkis, Nausherwanis,
Bizanjaus, and Mirwaris, the whole of whom probably do not number
more than about 500 persons. Their influence is due either to their
acquisition of the country by conquest, or to the fact that they repre-
sent the ruling power in Kalat. They are strictly endogamous, and
Gichkis born of Baloch mothers are known as tolag, i. e. ' jackal '
48 MAKRAN
Gichkis, and lose much of their social status. The Baloch are the
peasant proprietors ; the more important are the Hot, Kauhdai, Sheh-
zada, Kalmati, and Rais. The Darzadas and Nakibs are regarded as
of aboriginal descent. They are courageous and of fine physique.
Of the coast population, the Meds are fishermen and the Koras
seamen who make voyages in their vessels to distant countries. Servile
dependants abound, and do much of the cultivation and all the house-
hold work for men of means. Many of them are Baloch or descendants
of Baloch who were captured in the frequent raids which took place in
pre-British days. About half of the people are Sunni Muhammadans
and the other half Zikris, a curious sect whose alleged incestuous and
other immoral practices appear to have been much exaggerated. The
language of the country is Baluchi. The majority of the population
live by agriculture. Other occupations are flock-owning, seafaring and
fishing, weaving, and pottery-making.
Most of the cultivable land consists of ' dry-crop ' area. Irrigation
exists in Kech and Panjgiir, which could probably be improved and
developed. Its sources are underground channels
{karez), channels cut from pools in rivers (kaur-jo),
and springs. The karez in use number 127, and the channels cut from
rivers 118. The best soil, known as milk, consists of a soft white clay.
When it contains a mixture of sand, it is known as ziuvar. The
principal spring crops {jopag) are wheat and barley. Minor crops
include beans and pulses. The chief autumn crop (er-aht) is jowar;
rice is cultivated in Kech, Buleda, Panjgur, and Zamuran ; while
Tump, Dasht, and Kulanch produce cotton. The date, however, is
the crop par excellence of Makran, and the best are said, even by the
Arabs, to surpass those of Basra. The cultivators are well versed in
the artificial impregnation of the date-spathes, on which the quality
of the produce depends. Amen, the date-harvest from July to
September, is the pivot round which the thoughts of all the people of
Makran centre, and is a signal for a general influx of all the inhabi-
tants of the surrounding country to Kech and Panjgur. Horses, camels,
cows, donkeys, every beast and every man lives on dates. Laghati, or
compressed dates, constitutes the staple food of the poor. Those pre-
served with date-juice in earthen jars, called humb, are much relished
everywhere. More than 300,000 date-trees are assessed to revenue by
the Khan, but the actual number exceeds this figure. The Makrani is
an able, though indolent, cultivator, and with the introduction of peace
and security agriculture will doubtless develop.
Horse-breeding is not so popular as elsewhere in Baluchistan, and
few mares are kept. The breed of cattle is small and generally of a
brown colour. Makran donkeys are known for their fleetness. Goods
an; carried chiefly by camels, which are available everywhere, except
TRADE AXD COMMUNICATIONS 49
along the coast. The commonest sheep in the country are white.
Brown and grey sheep, known as bor and klrg, are especially valued for
their wool, which is made into overcoats {shal). Four-horned sheep
are not uncommon in Dasht and Nigwar. Xo system of forest reserva-
tion has yet been introduced. The commonest trees are the tamarisk,
which abounds in river-beds, and the acacia. No minerals of economic
value have yet been found.
The people comprising the artisan class are generally landholders
also. They have no stock in trade, and merely supply manufactured
articles from the material furnished to them. The
weaving industry is moribund, owing to the impor- communions,
tation of European cloth. A few coarse cottons are,
however, still manufactured. Kerchiefs, used by the women to put
over their hair, are made from floss silk obtained from Sarbaz in Persia.
Horse-cloths, sword-belts, and shoes are embroidered in silk. The
pottery is of the roughest description, consisting of round pitchers and
earthen jars. .
In 1902-3 the imports to the Makran ports from India were valued
at 6-| lakhs and the exports at 7 lakhs. These figures, however, include
the trade with the ports of Sonmiani and Ormara in Las Bela. No
statistics are available regarding the trade which is carried on with
places in the Persian Gulf, Arabia, and Africa. The chief centres are
Gwadar, where the largest transactions take place, Pasni, Turbat, and
Isai. Wholesale trade is carried on entirely by Hindus from Sind and
Khojas from Cutch Mandvi. The retail trade is mostly in the hands
of Hindus, but a few of the indigenous inhabitants and some Babis
from Kalat are also engaged in it. The principal exports are raw wool,
hides, cotton, matting, dates, salted fish, fish-maws, and shark-fins ; and
the chief imports are piece-goods and grain, including large quantities
of wheat, rice, and jowar.
The communications consist solely of caravan routes, most of which
are exceedingly bad, especially those from north to south, which cross
the hill ranges at right angles. The main road from Quetta to Bampur
in Persia passes through the Panjgur valley ; another important route
between Karachi, Las Bela, and the west traverses the Kolwa and
Kech valleys and eventually also reaches Bampur. Routes from
Gwadar and Pasni converge on Turbat northwards. The latter has
been recently improved under skilled supervision, and is being con-
tinued to Panjgur through Buleda. Another track from Turbat reaches
Panjgur through Balgattar. Steamers of the British India Steam
Navigation Company carrying the mails call at Pasni and Gwadar
on alternate weeks. Both these places have post and telegraph
offices.
The production of grain in the country is probably insufficient for
50 MAKRAN
its requirements, but a good date-harvest is enough to meet the needs
of the scanty population for the year. In times of scarcity the inhabi-
tants, rapidly dispersing, find a plentiful demand for labour at Karachi
and in Rajputana.
The administration of the country is conducted, on behalf of the
Khan of Kalat, by an officer known as the nazim. He is assisted
. . . . by four naibs* who are stationed in Tump, Kolwa,
Administration. ,, . , -p. . _ T , , . . ., . ,
Pasm, and Panjgur. Irregular levies are maintained,
numbering 79 horse and 81 foot, at a total cost of about
Rs. 32,000 per annum. The infantry hold the important forts of
Turbat, Naslrabad, and Tump in Kech, Bit in Buleda, and Isai in
Panjgur. All persons, including holders of revenue-free grants, are
bound to assist the nazim with armed men when occasion requires.
For this purpose allowances amounting to Rs. 6,000 per annum are
granted to certain leading men by the Khan. A telegraph subsidy
of Rs. 5,520 is paid by the British Government for the protection of
the Indo-European Telegraph line. A Levy Corps of 300 men under
two British officers, with its head-quarters in Panjgur, is being stationed
along the western frontier. Its cost, about 1-2 lakhs per annum, is
borne by the British Government. Disputes are generally referred to
kazis for decision according to the Muhammadan law. Important
awards are confirmed by the Political Agent in Kalat. Crime is con-
spicuous by its absence, the number of criminal cases decided in 1 900-1
being only 63. The total cost of administration, including the pay
of the irregular levies, is about Rs. 80,000 per annum.
It has been stated that Nasir Khan I obtained from the Gichkls only
a right to the collection of half the revenues of the country. In the
course of the long series of struggles between the Khans of Kalat and
the dominant groups which followed, the position gradually changed ;
and the Khan has now obtained, by confiscation, exchange, &c, the
exclusive right to the revenue of some places, while retaining the right
to a moiety in others. Elsewhere, the dominant classes hold exclusive
rights to collect. The revenue is taken by the appraisement of cereals,
the State share being generally one-tenth ; by contract ; and by a cash
assessment on irrigated lands, known as zarr-e-shah, which has now
degenerated into a poll-tax of very unequal incidence. A cash assess-
ment is levied on date-trees, and grazing tax is collected at the rate of
one sheep in 40 or 50 and one seer of ghi. Among other receipts
are transit dues, tithes in kind on all fresh fish caught on the coast, and
duties on imports and exports. In 1902-3 the total revenue derived
from the country by the Khan was Rs. 45,500, to which a grant of
Rs. 36,700 was added by him to meet the expenses of administration.
A little education is imparted by a few ignorant mullas and kazis,
generally Darzadas and Afghans. A Hospital Assistant is attached to
MAKE AN A 5 1
the nizim, who affords medical relief in a few cases. The people are
very superstitious and attribute almost all diseases to evil spirits, for
casting out which special processes are employed. Night-blindness,
which is attributed by the people to their diet of fish and dates, is
common. Fevers, sore eyes, and ulcers are of constant occurrence
Cholera and small-pox not infrequently visit the country. Vaccination
is unknown, but inoculation is popular, the usual fee being four annas.
The people thoroughly understand the value of segregation, and careful
precautions are taken against the transport of infection by flies.
[Ross, Memorandum on Makrdn (Bombay, 1867); East and West,
vol. hi, No. 31, May, 1904, contains an account of the ancient history
of the country by Shams-ul-ulama J. J. Modi.]
Makran Coast Range. — Mountain range in Baluchistan, known
locally as Bahr-i-Garr, which skirts the Arabian Sea for 280 miles
between 250 22' and 260 o' N. and 6i° 44' and 66° 3' E. Its width
varies from 35 to 70 miles. The prevailing rock is a pale-grey clay or
marl, occasionally intersected by veins of gypsum and interstratified
bands of shelly limestone and sandstone. The parallel ranges of the
system descend gradually from east to west. Everywhere defiles, rents,
and torrent beds are to be seen. The principal ridges from east to
west are Dhrun (5,177 feet), Gurangatti (3,906 feet), Taloi (3,022 feet),
and Gokprosh, whose highest point is Janzat (4,345 feet). Gokprosh
is famous as the scene of the defeat of the Baloch rebels in 1898.
Neither permanent inhabitants nor cultivated lands exist. A few
stunted trees and scrub jungle compose the only vegetation. Sind
ibex and mountain sheep are plentiful.
Makran Range, Central. — Mountain range in Baluchistan, occu-
pying the centre of Makran, between 260 3' and 270 39' N. and 620
19' and 650 43' E. Springing from the hills of the Jhalawan country
its two well-defined and gradually descending ridges, the Zangi Lak
or Dranjuk hills (6,166 feet) on the north and the Koh-i-Patandar
(7,490 feet) with its continuation the Kech Band (3,816 feet) on the
south, run west-south-west for about 250 miles. The tumbled mass in
the centre merges on the west into the Zamuran hills, and the northern
portion stretches into the Persian Bampusht range. The width is
uniform, about 45 miles. Sandstone is the prevailing rock, sometimes
associated with shaly strata and limestone. Within the range lie the
valleys of the Raghai, Gichk, and Gwargo rivers, Balgattar, Buleda,
and Parom. The Zamuran hills are alone inhabited, and have some
cultivation and vegetation.
Makrana. — Village in the Parbatsar district of the State of Jodhpur,
Rajputana, situated in 270 3' N. and 740 44' E., on the Jodhpur-
Blkaner Railway. Population (1901), 5,157. The village derives its
importance from its marble quarries, which have been noted for
52 WAKRANA
centuries, and from which the material used in the construction of the
Taj Mahal at Agra was obtained. It has been proposed to use this
marble for the Victoria Memorial Hall at Calcutta. The quarries vary
in depth from 30 to 75 feet, and the yearly out-turn averages about
900 or 1,000 tons. The marble is excavated by blasting, and is then
cut into required sizes by means of steel saws. The chips and dust
left behind after the blocks have been hauled to the surface are burnt
into lime, and used for the finer kinds of plastering. There are now
twenty-six quarries being worked, which give employment to about
100 labourers daily, mostly of the Silawat caste of Muhammadans.
Maksudabad. — Old name of Murshidabad Town, Murshidabad
District, Bengal.
Maksudangarh (Naiakila). — Petty State in Central India, under
the Bhopal Agency, with an area of about 81 square miles. It lies in
Malwa and takes its name from the chief town. The State originally
formed a part of Raghugarh. In 1776 Raja Balwant Singh of Raghu-
garh granted the tract to his brother Budh Singh, whose son Durjan
Sal ( 1 795-1 811) considerably extended his possessions, founding a
State of which the town of Bahadurgarh (now Isagarh in Gwalior) was
the capital. Early in the nineteenth century his lands were seized
by Sindhia, but were in part restored by Sindhia's general, Jean
Baptiste Filose, who in 181 6 installed Beri Sal Khichi, of the Lalawat
branch of the family, as chief of Maksudangarh. Since then it has
existed as a separate State, feudatory to Gwalior, to which, however,
it pays no tribute. Its position is thus peculiar, as the chief does not
hold under a British guarantee. Since the establishment of the Bhopal
Agency, however, the internal administration has invariably been con-
ducted under the supervision of the Political Agent, without inter-
ference on the part of the Gwalior Darbar. The present chief,
Raghunath Singh, succeeded in 1864 at the age of fifteen. The State,
which had been mismanaged, was taken under superintendence by the
Political Agent in 1880, with the concurrence of the Maharaja Sindhia,
and is still under supervision. The chief bears the hereditary title
of Raja.
The population was : (1891) 14,422, and (1901) 14,284, giving a
density of 176 persons per square mile. Hindus number 12,214, or
85 per cent.; Animists, 1,661, or 12 per cent.; and Musalmans, 398.
The State contains 80 villages. About 16 square miles are cultivated.
The soil is fertile and bears good crops, but the absence of roads
prevents any great development of trade. Opium, the most important
product, has to be taken more than 50 miles by country track to the
railway. The total revenue is about Rs. 37,000, of which Rs. 28,000
is derived from land.
The chief town is Maksudangarh, situated in -24° 4' N. and 77°
MALABAR
30
18' E., about 1,700 feet above sea-level. Population (1901), 2,222.
It is a small place, formed of an irregular congeries of houses
dominated by the fort called Naiakila or the 'new fort,' which was
built by Raja Vikramaditya of Raghugarh about 1730. A school,
a hospital, a jail, and a British post office are situated in the town,
which is 30 miles by fair-weather road from Biaora on the Bombay-
Agra high road.
Makurti. — Peak in the Kundahs in the Ootacamund taluk of the
Nilgiri District, Madras, situated in ri° 22' N. and 760 31' E., at an
elevation of 8,403 feet above sea-level. This is a favourite point for
excursions from Ootacamund, the ascent being made by a zigzag path
cut on the eastern face. Its western side is an almost unbroken
precipice, several hundred feet in depth. The spirits of men and
buffaloes are supposed by the Todas to take a leap together into
Hades from this peak.
Malabar (Malayalam, or Malayam, ' the land of hills :). — Perhaps
the most beautiful, and certainly one of the richest and most fertile,
of the Districts of Madras, lying on the west coast of the Presidency,
between io° 15' and 120 18' N. and 750 n' and 760 51' E. Its
ancient name was Kerala, which included also the District of South
Kanara and the Native States of Cochin and Travancore ; the form
Malabar appears to be derived from Arabic sources, the termination
bar meaning ' country.'
Excluding the Laccadive Islands, the District has an area of 5,795
square miles, and stretches for a distance of 150 miles along the
Arabian Sea from South Kanara in the north to Cochin State on
the south. On the east it is separated from Coorg, the Nilgiris, and
Coimbatore by the Western Ghats, which form a continuous mountain
barrier from 3,000 to 8,000 feet high, at a distance from the coast
which varies from 20 miles in the north to 60 in the south, and are
interrupted only at the Palghat Gap, 16 miles wide, the one break in
the whole of the range. In two places the limits of the District extend
beyond the mountain wall : namely, in the Wynaad .
taluk, a plateau 3,000 feet above sea-level, which aspects,
really forms part of the great Mysore table-land ; and
in the Attapadi and Silent Valleys, which lie behind the irregular
ridge stretching from the Kundahs to the northern pillar of the
Palghat Gap. The most conspicuous peak in the Malabar hills is
the Vavul Mala or 'Camel's Hump,' 7,600 feet high, which heads
a magnificent buttress thrown out to the south-west below the Tamar-
asseri pass, where the general line of the Ghats recedes eastward.
This spur constitutes the right flank of the Nilambur Valley, while
the left is formed by the Kundahs, which rise to over 8,000 feet in
the Nilgiri Hills and Makurti peaks on the Nilgiri boundary.
54 MALABAR
The Ghats are thickly wooded in most parts, and contain mountain
scenery of unrivalled beauty, many of the peaks being precipitous and
inaccessible. The country below presents the general appearance of
a sea of forest-covered hills. Long wooded spurs with deep ravines
run down from the main range, and are succeeded by gentler slopes,
covered with low jungle, and by bare downs with gradually widening
valleys of luxuriant cultivation. Nearer the coast the laterite downs
shelve suddenly into rice plains and lagoons fringed with coco-nut palms.
Along the coast is a level strip seldom more than 2 or 3 miles wide.
It was thus described by Ibn Batuta as early as the fourteenth
century : ' The whole of the way by land [down the coast] lies under
the shade of trees, and in all the space of two months' journey there
is not one span free from cultivation ; everybody has his garden, and
his house is planted in the middle of it.'
With the exception of three tributaries of the Cauvery — the Bha-
vani, which rises in the Attapadi Valley and flows through Coim-
batore, the Kabbani and the Rampur, which rise in the Wynaad
and traverse Mysore — all the numerous rivers of Malabar flow west-
ward from the Ghats to the sea, where they are backed up by littoral
currents and discharge into a line of backwaters and lagoons parallel
to the coast. Most of the rivers are navigable by small boats for some
miles beyond tidal influence, and many of the lagoons are connected
by small canals ; there is thus an extensive system of inland waterways
of great commercial importance. The longest of the rivers is the
Ponnani, but the most important are the Beypore and the Valar-
pattanam ; all three are connected with extensive systems of back-
waters.
The seaboard is entirely open except in the extreme north at Mount
Delly, a massive laterite island hill, celebrated' as the first point of
India sighted by the Portuguese ships. South of this as far as Calicut
small headlands of laterite cliff, forming shallow bays, alternate with
long stretches of sand ; beyond Calicut is one unbroken stretch of
sand. The sea bottom shelves very gradually, and there is no deep
water within three miles of the shore. Thereafter it plunges suddenly
down to 1,000 fathoms and more. Small craft find shelter in the
mouths of the bigger rivers ; while at Calicut, Quilandi, and Cochin
shifting mudbanks afford a calm roadstead in all weathers.
The greater part of the low country is covered with laterite, but the
underlying rock consists of fine-grained gneisses, quartzose, garneti-
ferous, and quartzo-felspathic. The laterite is of two kinds : namely,
vesicular, derived from the decomposition of the gneiss in situ ; and
pellety, a detrital rock formed of the debris of the vesicular variety.
The Wynaad plateau is composed chiefly of rocks of the charnockite
series with biotite gneiss and biotite granite, in the former of which
PHYSICAL ASPECTS 55
auriferous reefs occur. Veins of pegmatite, carrying ruby mica of fair
size and quality, are found in the south of it.
Owing to the perennial humidity of the climate, the flora of the
District is very luxuriant. It is similar in its general character to that
of Ceylon, but varies with the many changes in altitude and moisture
which occur. Palms, bamboos, the jack-tree, and the pepper-vine are
among the more characteristic plants of the lower levels. Higher up
are heavy evergreen forests full of large timber ; and tree-ferns, orchids,
and mosses are plentiful. The Hortus Malabaricus of Van Rheede,
a Dutch governor of this part of the country, is the earliest treatise on
the flora of Southern India and describes as many as 794 different plants.
The fauna of Malabar is extremely varied. Throughout the Ghats
and the Wynaad are found the usual large game common to the South
Indian hills, such as tigers, bears, leopards, bison, sa/nbar, and hog.
Elephants abound, especially in the Wynaad and Nilambur forests,
where large numbers are caught in pits by the Forest department.
Spotted deer are confined to the hills at the foot of the Ghats, and
the Nilgiri ibex {Hemiiragus hylocrius) to the Palghat hills and the
Kundahs. Crocodiles and otters abound in the backwaters, and a large
number of edible fish of many kinds are caught all along the coast.
The climate, though excessively damp, is on the whole healthy ; but
the Wynaad and lower slopes of the Ghats, with the country imme-
diately at the foot of the hills, are malarious, especially from February
to June. The temperature of the low country varies little the whole
year round, seldom rising as high as 900 or falling below 700; there
is a constant sea-breeze during the day in the hottest weather. The
mean temperature for the year at Calicut is below 8i°.
The rainfall is heavy and unfailing throughout the District, and the
seasons are regular. Thunderstorms begin among the hills in April.
In May the south-west monsoon sets in, and banks up the clouds
against the Ghats. The rains break early in June and continue to the
end of September, when the south-west monsoon dies away. Three-
fourths of the total fall is received during these four months. In
October the north-east monsoon sets in, the rains slacken, and by
December the dry season is established. The rainfall is lightest in
Palghat, where the gap in the Western Ghats prevents the accumulation
of so much moisture as elsewhere, and heaviest among the high hills
in the south of the Wynaad. The annual fall for the whole District
averages 116 inches.
Famine, therefore, is practically unknown ; while, since the rapid
rivers have cut deep beds for themselves, floods are rare. Nor is there
any record of serious natural calamities of other kinds, such as cyclones
or earthquakes, except the storm-wave of 1847, which did much damage
on the Laccadive Islands and a little on the mainland.
56 MALABAR
The early history of Malabar is inseparable from that of the adjoining
State of Travancore. Identical in people, language, laws, customs, and
climate, the whole of ancient Kerala is homogeneous
History. . . , . . . ,. . , ,
in every respect, except in the accident of a divided
political administration. To trace the successive waves, whether of
invasion or of peaceful colonization, which are now represented by the
Cherumans and Tiyans, Nayars and Nambudris, overlying one another
in social strata, or to examine the physical justification for the legendary
origin of this interesting country, is beyond the scope of this article.
It is probable that the later flood of immigration which gave to
Kerala or Chera its Nayars and Nambudris was part of a general
movement southward, which in prehistoric times brought the best of
its people and its Brahmanism to Southern India. It is also likely
that the physical formation of Kerala was due to some natural process,
gradual or convulsive, which gave rise to the local legend of its having
been the gift of the ocean. In very ancient times a traffic sprung up
between the Mediterranean and the roadsteads of Malabar. The
Phoenicians came by way of the Persian Gulf and afterwards by the
Red Sea. Possibly the Jews made the same voyage in the reigns of
David and Solomon. The Syrians under the Seleucids, the Egyptians
under the Ptolemies, the Romans under the emperors, the Arabs after
the conquest of Egypt and Persia, the Italians, more especially the
Republics of Venice, Florence, and Genoa, have each in turn main-
tained a direct trade with the western ports of the Madras Presidency.
In the early political history of Malabar the first figure that emerges
from the mist of tradition is Cheraman Perumal, the last of the
sovereigns of Chera. He is represented as voluntarily resigning his
throne, subdividing his kingdom, and retiring to Mecca to adopt Islam.
The date of Cheraman has been the subject of much discussion ; but
recently information has been received that his tomb still exists at
Sabhai on the Arabian coast, and the dates on it were said to indicate
that he reached that place in a.h. 212 (a. d. 827) and died there in
a. H. 216 (a.d. 831). His departure from Malabar may possibly have
taken place on August 25, 825, which is the first day of the Kollam era
still in use on the coast. The epoch popularly assigned to him is the
middle of the fourth century. It is probable that, if the resignation
and partition actually occurred, they were forced on the ruler by the
growing power and turbulence of his feudatory chiefs and by the
encroachments of the Western Chalukya dynasty. From this time
Malabar remained divided among numerous small chieftains, of whom
Kolattiri or Chirrakkal in the north and the Zamorin (or Samuri) in the
south were the most conspicuous. It was with these last two, and with
the Cochin Raja, that the early Portuguese adventurers first entered
into relations.
HISTORY
57
Yasco da Gama visited Malabar in 1498, and his successors speedily
established themselves at Cochin, Calicut, md Cannanore. In
1656 the Dutch appeared in the Indian seas to compete with the
Portuguese for the trade of the country. They first conquered Can-
nanore, and in 1663 captured the town and fort of Cochin, as well
as Tangasseri, from their rivals. In 171 7 they secured the cession
of the island of Chetwai from the Zamorin. But in the next half-
century their power began to wane : Cannanore was sold to the
Cannanore family, represented at that time by AH Raja, in 1771:
Chetwai was conquered by Haidar in 1776, and Cochin captured by
the English in 1795. The French first settled at Calicut in 1698.
In 1726 they obtained a footing in Mahk, and in 1751 acquired
Mount Delly and a few outposts in the north, all of which fell into
the hands of the English in 1761. Their frequent wars with the
English ended in the destruction of their commerce in the East,
Mahe having been thrice taken and thrice restored. The English
established themselves in 1664 at Calicut, in 1683 at Tellicherrv,
and in 1684 at Anjengo, Chetwai, and other commercial factories.
Tellicherrv became their chief entrepot for the pepper trade ; and so
rapid was the extension of their power and influence that in 1737 the
English factors mediated a peace between the princes of -Kanara and
Kolattiri. They obtained the exclusive privilege of purchasing the
valuable products of the country : namely, pepper, cardamoms, and
sandal-wood.
For nearly a century the Maratha pirates under Angria and other
chiefs infested the coast, and ravaged even inland towns by sailing up
the Beypore, Ponnani, and other rivers, till 1756, when they were
destroyed by a British expedition. The Ikkeri or Bednur Raja in
1736 and 1 75 1 invaded the country of Kolattiri and imposed fines
on the northern division. The Palghat State, after dismemberment
by the Rajas of Calicut and Cochin, sought the alliance of Mysore,
then ruled by its Hindu Raja, who stationed a subsidiary force in
Palghat. It was this connexion which afforded Haidar AH, when he
became ruler of Mysore, a pretext for invading Malabar in defence of
his ally, the Palghat Achchan. In 1760 Haidar sent an army to
Palghat and descended the ghats through Coorg in person. Again
in 1776, at the instigation of All Raja, the Mappilla chieftain of Can-
nanore, he made an easy conquest of the whole country, the Rajas
flying into the jungles or taking refuge in the English settlement of
Tellicherry. They, however, took advantage of the war between
Haidar and the English in 1768 to reinstate themselves until 1774.
when Haidar again passed down the ghats with two armies and com-
pletely subjugated the country, the Hindu chiefs retiring to Travancore
and Tellicherry.
58 MALABAR
On war breaking out between the English and the French in 1778,
Haidar resented the asylum that had been granted by the former to
refugees in 1769, and began hostilities by investing Tellicherry fort.
The siege was prosecuted in a fitful manner for two years till reinforce-
ments arrived from Bombay, when it was raised by a sortie, the success
of which was so complete as practically to annihilate the besieging
army. Peace intervened between 1784 and 1788, when Tipu Sultan,
son and successor of Haidar, descended the ghats and commenced
a religious persecution of the people. This produced a rebellion ; and,
on the breaking out of the war between him and the British in 1790,
the refugee chiefs were encouraged by proclamation to join the British
cause. The contest terminated in the cession of Malabar (except
the Wynaad) to the Company by the Treaty of Seringapatam in 1792.
Since that date the District has remained in the peaceable possession
of the British, except for the rebellion of the Kottayath (Pychy) Raja
in the north and various Mappilla chiefs in the south (1 795-1805).
The Wynaad fell to the British on the death of Tipu Sultan in 1799.
Prehistoric menhirs and dolmens, in which have been found bones,
pottery, iron implements, and beads, are scattered all over the District.
Peculiar to Malabar are the topi kallu ('hat-stones'), kuda kalht
(' umbrella-stones '), and bee-hive sepulchres cut in the laterite rock.
A large number of Roman coins of the early emperors have been found
in Kottayam, and a few elsewhere. The architecture of the temples,
both Hindu and Muhammadan, perhaps suggests Mongolian influence ;
the most striking feature is the reverse slope of the eaves above the
veranda, a peculiarity which is found all down the West Coast but
nowhere else in India south of Nepal. Most of the temples are small ;
the finest are at Guruvayur, Calicut, and Taliparamba.
During the last thirty years the population of the District has
advanced steadily if not rapidly. In 1871 it was 2,261,250; in 1881,
Population 2'365>°35; in 1891, 2,652,565; and in 1901, 2,800,555.
Malabar is now the third most populous District in
the Presidency, and, notwithstanding the large areas of hill and forest
included within its limits, is more densely peopled than any other
except the rich delta of Tanjore. The rate of increase is little affected
by outside influences, famine being practically unknown, emigration
small, and immigration a negligible quantity. The District contains ten
taluks, of which particulars, according to the Census of 1901, are shown
in the table on next page, and also includes the Laccadive Islands.
Each taluk is divided into amsams (parishes) instead of villages, and
these are again subdivided into desams. The custom by which each
family lives in its own separate homestead is inimical to the growth
of towns, and there are only seven in all Malabar : namely, Calicut,
Tellicherry, Pai.ghat, Cannanore, Cochin, Badagara, and Pon-
POPULATIOX
59
NANI. Of every ioo of the people 68 arc Hindus, 30 (a far larger
proportion than in any other District) Musalmans, and 2 Christians.
Malayalam, a language which is confined to the Malabar coast, is the
prevailing vernacular, though 4 per cent, of the total population speak
Tamil. Mahl is the language of the islanders of Minicoy, one of the
Laccadives.
£
Number of
U
0 »
0
a
=
= — - .
- •-
£ 5
« C - J: 0
u-^2 2 -•
w u
a
.2 v
t* 0.2 " -
&<*<*£
Taluk.
p
en
C
3
3 5.
5 Rj — L T
— r. — 1-
5 o 5 *
V
u
<
4S|
0
H
I
*-<
0 »
Kottayam .
223
209.516
436
+ 7--'
28,249
Chirakkal .
677
I
273
320.107
473
+ 2-9
32,810
Kurumbranad
5°5
1
339
327,310
648
+ 7-6
39, "9
Wvnaad
821
5«
75,' 49
92
— 2-1
4,649
Calicut
379
I
180
255,612
674
+ 7-5
33,447
Ernad
979
221
357,M2
365
+ 3-9
2 2,745
YValavanad .
S82
• . .
316
35i,m
398
+ 7.0
30,611
Palghat
643
I
136
390,098
607
+ 4.8
37,335
Ponnani
426
I
459
478,376
',123
+ 6.5
45,5*7
Cochin
2
I
3
25,859
« 2,930
+ 9-0
6.01 1
Laccadive Islands
District total
5
10,274
- 3-5
461
5,795
7
2,213
2,800,555
4S 1
+ 5-6
280.954
The Hindus of the District include 113,000 Tamils (30 per cent, of
whom are Brahmans), about 20,000 Telugus, and a sprinkling of other
races ; but the enormous majority consists of Malayalam-speaking
castes peculiar to the country. The most numerous of these are the
Tlyans (or Iluvans), the toddy-drawer caste, who number 661,000.
Next come the Nayars (391,000), originally the military caste of the
District and still the aristocracy. They are followed by the Cherumans
(246,000), the agricultural labourers of the country, who are often
adscripti glebae in the strictest sense, and form one of the most unpro-
gressive communities in the Presidency. The Kammalans (artisans)
are the only other caste over 100,000 strong. The Nambudri Brah-
mans, though numbering under 20,000, deserve mention from their
influential position. They are almost invariably landholders, often of
large estates. Unlike most Brahmans, they keep aloof from public
affairs, and despise modern education ; but they are the object of the
deepest reverence from all other castes.
Space does not permit of a detailed account of the man)- ways in
which Malayalam caste customs differ from those of the rest of the
Presidency, but two peculiarities may be noticed. The first is the
vitality of the doctrine of ceremonial pollution, which is elaborated in
great detail and is still scrupulously observed except in the towns.
There are regularly graduated degrees of distance within which one
VOL. XVII. E
6o MALABAR
caste is held to pollute another ; and a high-caste man returning from
his bath shouts out to warn others of his approach, so that they may
step aside into the fields and not pollute him. The second is the
prevalence of the Marumakkattayam law, or system of inheritance
through females, which makes a man's sister's children his nearest
heirs. This is invariable among the Nayars and kindred castes, and
is followed by most of the Tiyans and Mappillas of North Malabar
and by some of those of South Malabar. The custom presumably
originated in the uncertainty regarding parentage that arose from the
polyandry which was formerly widely practised and may still exist in
isolated cases. Among the Hindu Marumakkattayam castes, marriage
consists in a union {sambandhani) formed by a girl who has reached
maturity with a man of her own or a higher caste, the main ceremonial
being the presentation of a piece of cloth by the bridegroom. This
union is dissolvable at will, and the children born of it belong to the
mother's family (tanvad) and do not inherit their father's property. In
1891, in compliance with a movement among a section of the Nayars,
the Government appointed a Commission to consider how a more
permanent form of marriage might be provided for Marumakkattayam
castes ; and a law was enacted by which, if sambandhams were formally
registered, the property of the parents could be bequeathed to the
children of the union.
The Musalmans of Malabar number 843,000, or more than one-
third of all the followers of that faith in the Presidency. Of these,
806,000 are classed as Mappillas, a name originally applied to Arab
traders and their descendants by the women of the coast, but now used
to include all indigenous West Coast Muhammadans, among whom are
comprised large numbers of converts from the lower Hindu castes, and
descendants of the victims of Tipu's persecution. Of the remainder,
24,000 are Labbais, also a mixed race.
Eurasians are more numerous in Malabar than in any other District
except Madras and the Nilgiris.
The people of Malabar are less exclusively agricultural than those of
other Districts. This is due to the fact that a large number live by
fishing and fish-curing, wood-cutting, oil-pressing, rice-pounding, and
milking the palm-leaf hats and umbrellas which are universally used.
The number of those who subsist by service in temples, astrology, and
teaching is also above the average.
Of the 51,000 Christians in the District, 46,000 arc natives and
4,000 Eurasians. The Native Christian Church of the West Coast,
founded traditionally either by St. Thomas or by missionaries from
Babylonia in the fourth century, appears to have been more or less
independent till the sixteenth century, though acknowledging generally
the supremacy of the Nestorian Patriarch of Babylon. After a long
AGRICULTURE 61
struggle against the influence of St. Francis Xavier and various Jesuit
and other Portuguese missionaries, culminating in the famous synod
of Uiamper (Udayamperur) in 1599, the Church passed under the
domination of the Pope; but with the rise of the Dutch power the
greater portion of the original Native Church threw off its allegiance to
Rome in 1653 and attached itself to the Jacobite Patriarch of Antioch.
The Carmelite missionaries, who first came to the country in 1656,
gradually won back a large number of the native Christians to Rome ;
and the remaining section, falling under the influence of the Church
Missionary Society in the beginning of the nineteenth century, have
split up into two bodies. The indigenous Church, therefore, is now
represented by three organizations : namely, the Romo-Syrians, who
acknowledge the Pope and are Roman Catholics, though they have
their own Syrian rite ; the Jacobite Syrians, who follow the Patriarch
of Antioch ; and the Reformed Syrians or St. Thomas Christians, who
appoint their own bishops, and whose doctrines approximate to those
of the Anglican Church.
The present Roman Catholic missionaries are Carmelite Fathers and
Jesuits. The only Protestant mission is the Basel German Lutheran
Mission, established in 1839. It has churches and schools in all the
taluks except Ernad and Cochin, and a congregation numbering about
6,000, or 12 per cent, of the Christian population.
The agricultural conditions of Malabar differ from those of the
East Coast as widely as do its physical features. The prevailing soil
is a red ferruginous loam, but on the slopes of the .
Ghats there is a rich layer of black mould formed
of decayed vegetable matter. On the hills and plateaux of the low
country the soil varies from rich loam to uncultivable laterite, the
former being most prevalent in the Ernad, Walavanad, and Palghat
taluks, where there is extensive 'dry' (unirrigated) cultivation. The
best rice crops of the District are grown in the deeper inland valleys,
where a tenacious soil is enriched by the surface earth washed down
from the hills. The shallower valleys contain a light loam, which
becomes sandy as they broaden out near the coast, or clayey where
they meet the bigger rivers and backwaters. Above the line of ' wet '
cultivation there is as a rule a fringe of gardens, each with its home
stead, often reaching to the very top of the hill-side; but in the
southern taluks the slopes are more frequently terraced and cultivated
with 'wet crops' to a considerable height above the level of the valley.
The soil of the level country near the coast is poor and very sandy, and
subject to damage from salt-water floods. It is, however, peculiarly
adapted to the growth of the coco-nut palm, with which the coast land-
are thickly planted.
Two ' wet crops ' are grown in most of the valleys with the help of
e 2
62 MALABAR
the two monsoons. The first {kanni) is sown in April and May and
reaped in August and September, while the second {makaram) is sown
in September and October and reaped in January and February. On
some of the best lands a third crop (punja) is sown in February and
reaped in May. On ' single-crop ' lands one or other of the above is
grown ; but the cultivation season varies almost infinitely with the
nature of the land and its irrigation facilities, and in some cases
extends over ten months. In the better soils rice is usually planted
out from nursery beds ; elsewhere it is sown broadcast. ' Dry crops '
are raised usually with the help of the south-west monsoon from May
to August. Modern — rice grown on the open lower hills and in
parambas (orchards) — is raised on the better soils once in two or three
years, on the worse soils once in five years. On the best it is usually
followed immediately by a crop of gingelly (Sesamum indicuni) and
another of chama {Panicum miliare), the three crops occupying the
land for more than eighteen months. Pitnam — a mixed crop of rice,
millet, &c. — is raised once in seven or eight years on hill-sides roughly
cleared by burning.
The 5,795 square miles of which the District consists include
1 8 square miles of ' minor indms ' ; the rest, except the Laccadives
and a small area held on special terms by All Raja of Cannanore, is
ryotwdri. There are no accurate statistics of the area under culti-
vation, &c. ; but the extent cropped in 1903-4 (including temporary
cultivation, i.e. the actual area cultivated for the year with 'dry crops')
was about 2,200 square miles, or 38 per cent, of the total area. Of the
remainder, the major portion consists of high hills, forests, and other
uncultivable areas.
Rice is the staple food-grain, covering 60 per cent, of the net area
cultivated. In gardens and parambas, which occupy nearly half the
cultivated area, by far the most important crop is the coco-nut palm.
Next come areca palms, plantains, and pepper, the latter being practi-
cally confined to the three northern taluks and the Wynaad. Other
garden products are jack, mango, palmyra palms, betel-vines, cinnamon,
and many kinds of vegetables. Gingelly, chama, ragi, and various
pulses are raised on the open hills and in parambas; ginger is a
valuable ' dry crop ' in Ernad, Walavanad, and parts of Ponnani, and
cardamoms in Kottayam and the Wynaad, while lemon-grass is being
widely grown in Ernad. About 4,800 acres in the Wynaad are under
coffee and 4,600 acres under tea.
No accurate statistics exist to show the extension in the area of hold-
ings. Near the coast there is little cultivable waste, while inland the
limits of cultivation are being steadily pushed back into the jungles.
The Malabar ryot is very conservative in his methods of cultivation,
and still generally confines himself to the use of straw- and leaf-manure
FORESTS 63
for ' wet ' lands. Fish-manure is used in some gardens on the coast
and in the Wynaad. The gardens could often be much improved by
a more extended use of well-irrigation. No advantage has been taken
of the Land Improvement Loans Act.
There are no important local breeds of stock. In the four southern
taluks, where cattle are comparatively numerous, the majority are
imported from Coimbatore. Male buffaloes are widely used in culti-
vation. In the northern taluks animals are imported from Coorg and
Mysore, and they are bred to a small extent in the Wynaad. Cattle
are fed mainly on rice straw.
The cultivation of the District depends on the practically unfailing
rainfall, and there are no irrigation works of any importance. ' Wet '
lands are irrigated where necessary by diverting into them the innumer-
able streams which flow down the valleys, and some of the high-lying
fields by baling with picottaks from small reservoirs and wells. A few
temporary dams are constructed on the upper waters of the Ponnani
river and its tributaries in the Palghat and Walavanad taluks, and
a little land is irrigated by baling from the same river throughout its
course. Gardens are watered by hand from the wells which most of
them contain.
Nearly one-third of the total area of Malabar is occupied by forests
The forest zone, which begins about 5 miles from the foot of the
Western Ghats and extends to the eastern boundaries
of the District, includes both evergreen and deciduous
growth. The former is found on the Ghats and the slopes of the hill
ranges in the north of the Wynaad, from a height of 500 feet upwards,
the region of very heavy rainfall (over 200 inches). The principal
timber trees in the evergreen forests are ebony, white and red cedar,
///// {Calophyllum inophyllum), irimbogam {Hopea parviflora), ai/ii
(Artocarpus hirsuta), and jack (Artocarpus integrifolia) ; in the decidu-
ous forests, teak, vengai (Pterocarpus Marsupium), ventek (Lagers troemia
microcarpa), black-wood (Dalbergia latifolia), karimaradu (Termtnalia
tomentosa), irul (Xylia dolabriformis), as well as jack and aim. Minor
forest produce includes cardamoms, dammar, honey, wax, gall-nuts,
soap-nuts, gum kino, ginger, cinnamon, pepper, &c. Most of the
forests are private property, and their produce has long formed an
important source of wealth to the country ; but continued unscientific
forestry is denuding most of the hills of their valuable trees, as it has
long ago denuded the bigger isolated hills in the plains.
The Government forests cover 454 square miles, and are divided
into two divisions, North and South Malabar, each under a separate
Forest officer. The former includes the Wynaad (199 square miles of
forest) and Kottayam (32 square miles); and the latter Ernad (161),
Walavanad (33), and Palghat (29). There are also about So square
64 MALABAR
miles of ' reserved ' lands, which are mainly leased forests. The most
important Reserves are in the north of the Wynaad and at Nilambiir
(Ernad), where there are valuable teak plantations. The total receipts
from Government forests in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 1,19,000, includ-
ing a considerable sum from the sale of trapped elephants.
The minerals of the District are now hardly worked at all. Iron ore
is rudely smelted in small quantities in the east of Ernad and Walava-
nad. Gold seems to have been extensively worked by the natives in
ancient times, both by surface washing and mining, in the valley of the
Bevpore river, one of the tributaries of which is called the ' Gold river,'
and up the slopes of the Ghats in East Ernad and South Wynaad.
The soil throughout these parts is auriferous, and there are numerous
reefs of considerable thickness. About 1874 a determined attempt
was made by various English companies to establish the industry by
scientific quartz-crushing ; but none of the mines was a success. At
present gold-working is confined to a little sand-washing in the bed of
the Beypore river. Mica is mined to a small extent in South Wynaad.
Laterite is quarried throughout the District for building purposes, and
clay for tiles and pottery is worked in most of the taluks.
Few arts of importance are practised in the District. The weaving
of calico, which derives its name from Calicut, has practically died out,
though coarse cotton cloths for local use are made
Trade and tQ a gmall extent jn many villages. The Basel
communications. . r °
Mission has weaving establishments at Cannanore
and Calicut. The chief indigenous industries are the manufacture of
yarn from coco-nut husks, the husks being soaked in pits in the back-
waters and the fibre beaten out by hand; toddy-drawing from coco-nut,
sago, and palmyra palms, the liquor being largely drunk by the lower
castes and also distilled or manufactured into coarse sugar ; fish-curing,
which is mainly in the hands of the Mappillas and Mukkuvans, and is
carried on at 31 Government yards; and the pressing of coco-nut and
gingelly oils in small mills worked by bullocks.
There are four mission and three native factories for the manufacture
of tiles, bricks, pipes, <x:c., from the special clays found in the District.
Their total annual output is valued at over 2 lakhs, of which more than
90 per cent, comes from the mission establishments. The tiles are
widely exported. At Calicut. Tellicherry, and Ferokh are steam
curing-works belonging to various European firms, at which coffee,
cinchona, pepper, and ginger are cured and dried. The value of the
produce dealt with at these factories in 1902-3 was estimated at over
44 lakhs, the bulk being coffee from the Wynaad, Coorg, Mysore, and
the Nllgiris. A steam spinning-mill at Calicut, belonging to a native
company, was established in 1883, with a nominal capital of 6 lakhs;
the annual out-turn of cotton yarn is between 500 and 600 tons.
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 65
Owing to its extensive seaboard, the maritime commerce of the
District is far more important than its inland trade. The chief ports
are Cochin, Calicut, Tellicherry, Cannanore, Beypore, Badagara, and
Ponnani. The total value of the exports and imports in 1903-4
amounted to 512 lakhs and 223 lakhs respectively. The most impor-
tant exports are coffee, coir (coco-nut) yarn and fibre, and pepper,
which together make up over half the total, the other chief articles
being tea, cinchona, ginger, cardamoms, copra (dried coco-nut kernels),
coconut oil, salted fish, wood, and tiles. The chief imports are salt,
rice and other grain, piece-goods, cotton twist and fabrics, metal ware,
machinery, glass, hardware, dyes, drugs, gunny, and kerosene oil. The
bulk of the ginger trade is with the United Kingdom, but pepper is
sent largely to Italy, France, and Germany, coffee to France and
Australia, coir and coco-nut oil to Germany, France, and the United
States, and sandal-wood to France, Germany, and America. Half the
coast traffic is with Bombay, but rice is largely imported from Burma
and Bengal.
The Ghat barrier practically confines the inland trade with the
eastern Districts to the route through the Palghat Gap, and most of
it goes by rail. Of the products of the District, coco-nut oil, salted
fish, and timber, and of its imports rice, salt, and piece-goods, are the
chief articles carried by rail ; while jaggery, tobacco, oilseeds, sandal-
wood, and hides are the chief imports. By road, cattle are imported
from Coimbatore, and rice is exported from the Palghat taluk, while
from Mysore and Coorg tea and coffee come down to the coast,
and grain and cattle are received in exchange for piece-goods, salt,
and coco-nut oil.
The larger ports are the chief centres of general commerce, and
Palghat concentrates the grain and cloth trade with the East Coast.
For internal trade there are numerous weekly markets, the most impor-
tant of which are at Vaniamkulam and Chowghat. The sea-borne
trade is largely in the hands of European firms at Calicut, Cochin, and
Tellicherry. Of the native castes, Mappillas are the chief traders ;
but numerous ParsI, Arab, and Gujarati merchants are settled on the
coast, and in Palghat are found some Labbais and Chettis from
the Tamil country.
The south-west line of the Madras Railway (standard gauge) enters
the District in the south-east through the Palghat Gap and runs along
the Ponnani river to within a few miles of the sea, and then turns north
and follows the coast to Cannanore, a total distance of 157 miles. The
line is now being extended into South Kanara. From Olavakod a small
branch of 2\ miles runs to Palghat, and from Shoranur the new metre-
gauge line, opened by the Cochin State in 1902, goes to Ernakulam.
The total length of metalled roads in the District is 606 miles, and of
66 MALABAR
unmetalled roads 790 miles. Of the metalled roads, 70 miles are under
the charge of the Public Works department and the rest are maintained
from Local funds. There are avenues of trees along 1,534 miles of
road, including by-roads not maintained from public money. The
chief lines are the road from Calicut to the Coimbatore frontier
through Malappuram and Palghat ; the four ghat roads from Canna-
nore, Tellicherry, and Calicut to the Mysore and Nilgiri frontiers,
through the Perambadi, Peria, Tamarasseri, and Karkur passes respec-
tively ; and the coast road from the South Kanara border to Beypore.
The District as a whole is fairly well supplied with roads except in the
eastern portions of the four northern taluks, the inner parts of Ernad
and Walavanad having been opened out during the last twenty years in
connexion with the suppression of Mappilla outbreaks. But the hilly
nature of the country necessitates a large number of made roads if
communication is to be easy.
Equally important with the roads is the extensive system of inland
water communication, which includes the Conolly Canal and the
Ponnani and Valarpattanam rivers, and comprises in all 587 miles
of navigable river and backwater, connected by 50 miles of canal. The
backwaters are not deep, and the canals are adapted only for small
boats, being mostly from 10 to 12 feet broad and very shallow. All
the traffic, both of goods and passengers, is carried in primitive native
dug-outs.
The sea-borne coasting traffic is mainly carried in native craft called
pattamars. There are 39 ports and sub-ports, but these afford little
protection from bad weather except for the smaller boats that can
enter the mouths of the rivers on which many of them are situated.
Coasting steamers of the British India and Asiatic lines call at the
chief ports frequently, except during the monsoon, and both lines carry
passengers,
Famine in the strict sense is unknown in Malabar, since the south-
west monsoon never fails. But though the District exports grain, it does
. not produce enough for its own consumption ; and in
a time of scarcity elsewhere the general rise in the
price of food-stuffs, combined with the increased demand from neigh-
bouring Districts, is liable to cause distress among the poorer classes,
especially in the later months of the monsoon when field labour is not
required and the new harvest is not available. In the great famine of
1876-7 high prices were combined with a serious failure of the second
crop, and gratuitous relief had to be given widely. Similar measures
were necessary to a small extent in the monsoon of 1897, when an
average of 6,000 persons were fed daily for five months.
For general administrative purposes the District is grouped into six
subdivisions. Three of these are usually in charge of Covenanted
ADMINISTRA TIOX 6 7
Civilians. They are the Palghat subdivision, comprising the Pal-
chat and Ponna.ni taluks ; the Malappuram subdivision, comprising
Erxad and Walavanad : and the Tellicherry sub- . .
.... . . c ._, „ T^ Administration.
division, consisting of the Chirakkal, Kottayam,
and Kurumbranad taluks. The remaining three subdivisions, the
Wyxaad, Calicut, and Cochin, formed of the taluks of the same names,
are each under a Deputy-Collector recruited in India. The outlying
ports of Anjengo and Tangasseri were also included in the charge of
the Deputy-Collector at Cochin till 1906, when they were constituted
into a new unit called the District of Anjengo, under the administrative
control of the Resident in Travancore and Cochin. The Laccadive
Islands fall under the administration of the Calicut divisional officer.
For judicial purposes the District is divided into North and South
Malabar, with District Courts at Calicut and Tellicherry. Subordinate
to the former are three Sub-Judges and twelve District Munsifs ; and
to the latter, eight Munsifs. The District ranks second in the Presi-
dency in the number of the civil suits filed.
Grave crime is now comparatively rare ; but since 1836 the public
peace has been periodically disturbed by outbreaks among the Map-
pillas. Starting with the murder of a Hindu landlord, the looting of
a house, or the defiling of a Hindu temple, a small body of these men
will run riot over the country, gathering adherents as they go, until
finally brought to bay, when the}- invariably sell their lives as dearly as
possible. Experience has proved that Native troops cannot be relied
on to deal with these outbreaks; and since 1851 a detachment of
British infantry has been stationed at Malappuram, the most con-
venient centre of the menaced tract, and in the same year a special
police force was organized for their suppression. In 1852 the Tangal
(high-priest) of Tirurangadi, who was suspected of fomenting the
disturbances, was banished by Mr. Conolly, the District Magistrate ;
and in the following year a special Act was passed providing for the
treatment of Mappilla fanatics, and for the fining of the villages in
which outbreaks should occur. Two years later Mr. Conolly was
murdered in his veranda by a body of fanatics who had escaped from
the Calicut jail The Mappilla Act was then for the first time put into
force. The most serious outbreaks in recent years have been in 1S73
at Kolattur ; in 1885 at Trikkalur in the Ernad taluk, when twelve
fanatics took up a strong position in a Hindu temple from which they
were only dislodged by the use of dynamite; in 1894 at Mannarakkat,
when the gang numbered thirty-five and had to be driven from their
position by a howitzer; and in 1896, when nearly a hundred men were
shot down in the Manjeri temple.
Inquiries show that though agrarian grievances, such as eviction by
Hindu landlords, or the refusal of a landowner to grant a site for
68 MALABAR
a mosque, have been the incentives to many of these outbursts, yet in
all the big outbreaks it has been impossible to impute any definite
motive to the majority of those who joined the gang. The one constant
element is a desperate fanaticism : surrender is unknown ; the martyrs
are consecrated before they go out and hymned after death. Other
noticeable features are that the gang mainly consists of men, or boys, of
the lowest class ; while with few exceptions the outbreaks have origi-
nated within a radius of 15 miles round Pandalur, a hill in Ernad which
was the home of one of the chief Mappilla robbers who disturbed the
early years of British supremacy. It lies amid large tracts of uncleared
jungle, which have long attracted the unsuccessful Mappillas, who are
crowded out of their villages in the west, and who remain for the most
part ignorant and destitute and ready on slight provocation to let their
smouldering fanaticism kindle.
Special efforts have been made for many years to encourage educa-
tion and to open up the country in the fanatical zone ; but the natural
characteristics of the District and its inhabitants make progress in
either of these directions necessarily slow. Two regiments of Map-
pillas recently raised for the Indian Army have been disbanded.
In Malabar, unlike other Districts of Southern India, the Hindu
rulers appear to have levied no regular land revenue, but to have
contented themselves with customs and tolls and with the occasional
levy of special contributions. The Nayars quickly attained pre-eminence
among the various immigrant tribes, and organized the country on
a military basis, dividing it into nads, each under its Nayar chief, who
in return for military service granted his vassals fiefs held free of land
revenue and carrying with them various administrative and other
privileges. The chiefs themselves retained domains for their own
support. This organization was probably not disturbed by the Brahman
immigration, though the Brahmans in Malabar, as elsewhere, attained
great influence and received large grants of land for their own support
and the maintenance of their temples ; and the feudal system seems
to have continued both when the nads were combined into a kingdom,
and when, on the abdication of the last of the Perumals, the country
was again split up into nads. As the influence of the Rajas who
succeeded to the Chera kings declined, the process of disintegration
continued, and the fief-holders and Brahman landowners naturally
claimed independent lordship of their lands ; and these formed the
majority of the jantnis (landowners) on whose share of the produce
the Mysore assessment was eventually levied.
Haidar All, on his conquest of the District at the end of the
eighteenth century, proceeded to introduce a regular system of land
revenue. The various nads were, however, settled at different times
and according to no definite system. The principle was to take for
ADMIA 7.9 TRA TIOX 69
the government revenue a share in money of the janmVs rent, or pattom ;
but the share appears to have varied from 10 per cent, on some 'wet'
lands in North Malabar to 100 per cent, on gardens in South Malabar-
The rate of commuting into money the rents paid in kind likewise
varied in the different ndds, while in North Malabar the collection was
entrusted to the chiefs of the adds and in South Malabar to Muham-
madan officials.
On the cession of the District to the British, the Commissioners
appointed to settle the country adopted the Muhammadan revenue
assessment. During 1792-3 the Zamorin and other Rajas were allowed
to collect the revenue; and in 1794 a system of quinquennial settle-
ment with the Rajas of the nads, based on the Muhammadan accounts
prepared in 17S2, was introduced. The zamlndari system, however,
failed to work ; the Government resumed the collection of the revenue,
and, owing to the continued complaints of inequality, the Collector
appointed in 1801 set himself to revise the whole assessment on regular
principles. On ' wet ' lands one-third of the net produce, after deduct-
ing cultivation expenses, was to go to the cultivator, and the remainder
or pattom was to be divided in the proportion of six-tenths to the
Government and four-tenths to the janmi. On paramba lands the gross
produce of the trees was to be divided in three equal shares between
the cultivator, the janmi, and the Government. These principles were
approved and a proclamation issued accordingly in 1805; but the
settlement was not proceeded with, as it was decided that the existing
assessment was adequate and not unpopular. Subsequently a settle-
ment of garden lands on these lines was taken in hand and introduced
into various taluks between 1829 and 1840; and in the Kurumbranad
taluk this settlement was revised in 1853. Otherwise the Muham-
madan settlement of 1776 remained in force till 1900, when the intro-
duction of a new settlement was begun, based on a scientific survey
conducted between 1887 and 1895 and following the principles of the
ryotwari settlements of the other Districts of the Presidency.
In the new settlement the cultivable land has been divided into
' wet,' ' garden,' and ' dry ' ; and acreage rates, based on the Government
share of the produce claimed in the proclamation of 1805, have been
assigned. The new rates were introduced throughout the District by
the end of 1903-4. The result will be an enhancement of the land
revenue by about 76 per cent., or 13 lakhs, an increase which is to be
attributed to the rise in prices during a period of more than a century
and to the increase in the area brought under permanent assessment,
which amounts to about 50 per cent, above the area shown in the old
accounts. Under the old settlement ' wet ' rates varied from 4 annas
to Rs. 40 per acre, the average being Rs. 3 ; for gardens and ' dry '
land no accurate acreage rates are obtainable. Under the new settle-
7o
MALABAR
ment the 'dry' assessment averages (excluding the Wynaad) R. 0-13-2
per acre (maximum Rs. 2, minimum 4 annas), the ' wet ' assessment
Rs. 3-8-1 1 (maximum Rs. 7-8-0, minimum 12 annas), and the ' garden '
assessment Rs. 2-15-3 (maximum Rs. 7, minimum R. 1).
The revenue from land and the total revenue in recent years are
given below, in thousands of rupees: —
1880-1.
1 890- 1.
1 900-1.
•903-4-
Land revenue .
Total revenue .
2i,39
35,88
20,95
38,07
23,94
46,64
29>97
54,55
The landlord's right in the soil is held to vest in the janmi. The
word janmam, literally meaning 'birth,' perhaps carries with it the idea
of hereditary ownership. The probable evolution of the janmi as land-
lord has been sketched above. As now interpreted by the Courts,
janmam right means the proprietary interest of the landlord in the soil,
and is freely bought and sold : but the idea of property in land is of
comparatively modern growth. The commonest form of tenure under
the janmi is kanam, which word seems to mean literally 'visible pro-
perty,' and to be applied to the sum lent by a tenant to his landlord,
or, originally, to the present brought by a retainer to his chief in return
for protection. As now defined by the Courts, a kanam implies
a usufructuary mortgage entitling the mortgagee to a twelve years'
occupancy with a right to his improvements, subject to the payment
of an annual rent to the mortgagor. There are various subsidiary
forms, differing according to the interest in the land secured to the
mortgagor. The ordinary forms of simple lease (verumpattoni) and
mortgage {panayam) are now becoming common.
Outside the five municipalities of Calicut, Cochin, Caxxaxore,
Palghat, and Tellicherrv, local affairs are managed by the District
board and the taluJi boards of the five subdivisions of Tellicherry,
Calicut, Malappuram, Palghat, and Wynaad. The expenditure of the
boards in 1903-4 was nearly 4 A lakhs, more than half of which was
laid out on roads and buildings. The chief sources of income are the
land cess and toll and ferry collections, yielding nearly 2-67 and 1-59
lakhs respectively. The District possesses none of the Unions common
on the East Coast, few of its villages being built in the close order
which demands expenditure on sanitation.
The District Superintendent of police is assisted by three Assistant
Superintendents, stationed at Palghat, Malappuram, and Tellicherry.
There are 105 police stations in the District and 2 outposts. The force
consists of 24 inspectors, 3 European head constables, 141 head con-
stables, and 1,125 constables. The special force reorganized in 1885
for the suppression of the Mappilla outbreaks, with its head-quarters at
A D MINIS TRA TION 7 1
Malappuram, consists of one inspector, 4 European head constables,
4 head constables, and 81 constables.
The Central jail is at Cannanore, while 21 subsidiary jails have
a total accommodation for 527 prisoners.
According to the Census of 1901, Malabar stands fourth among
Madras Districts in the literacy of its population, of whom 10 per cent.
(17-4 males and 3-0 females) are able to read and write. Education
is most advanced in the coast taluks, and most backward in the Wynaad,
with its many coolies and hillmen, and in Ernad, the most distinctively
Mappilla taluk. The total number of pupils under instruction in
1880-1 was 31,894; in 1890-1, 70,329; in 1900-1, 84,408; and in
1903-4, 91,661, including 19,331 girls. On March 31, 1904, there
were (besides 564 private schools) 1,038 public educational institutions
of all kinds, including 954 primary, 75 secondary, and 6 training and
special schools, and the three Arts colleges at Calicut, Palghat, and
Tellicherry. Of the public institutions, 24 were managed by the
Educational department, 96 by local boards, and 50 by municipalities :
while 639 were aided from public funds, and 229 were unaided but
conformed to the rules of the department. As usual, the vast majority
of those under instruction are only in primary classes, though Malabar
stands third among Madras Districts in the proportion of pupils under
secondary instruction. Of the male population of school-going age
24 per cent, were under instruction in primary standards in 1903-4,
and of the female population of the same age nearly 7 per cent. Among
Musalmans, the corresponding percentages were 35 and 10 respectively.
Eew of these have advanced beyond the primary stage, and a large pro-
portion receive instruction only in the Koran. The total number of
female pupils exceeded that of any other District. There were 22
primary schools for Panchama boys, with 908 pupils. The total expen-
diture on education in 1903-4 was Rs. 5,18,000, of which Rs. 2,10,000
was derived from fees. Of the total, 53 per cent, was devoted to
primary education.
The District possesses 14 hospitals and 9 dispensaries, including
a leper hospital at Palliport (Pallipuram), near Cochin, founded by
the Dutch in 1728. They contain in all accommodation for 419 in-
patients. In 1903 the total number of cases treated was 261,000, of
whom 5,100 were in-patients, and 10,000 operations were performed.
The total expenditure amounted to Rs. 78,000, the great part of which
was met from Local and municipal funds.
Malabar is backward in regard to vaccination. Statistics for 1 903-4
show that the number of persons successfully vaccinated was 23 per
1,000, compared with an average for the Presidency of 30. Vaccination
is compulsory only in the municipalities.
[Eor further information regarding the District, see Malabar, by
72
MALABAR
W. Logan (1887), and Malabar Law and Custom, by H. Wigram and
L. Moore (Madras, 1900).]
Malaisohmat. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 491, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 200. The principal products are rice, millet, bay
leaves, areca-nuts, and oranges. There are deposits of lime in the
State, but they are not worked.
Malakand. — A pass which crosses the range north of Peshawar
District, North-West Frontier Province, and leads from Sam Ranizai
into the Swat valley, situated in 340 34' N. and 710 57' E. The pass
is traversed by an ancient Buddhist road. Early in the sixteenth
century the Ytisufzai Pathans effected their entrance into Swat by the
Malakand, and in 1587 Zain Khan, a general of the emperor Akbar,
built a fort here. In 1895 the pass was taken by the Chitral relief
force, and has since been occupied as a military post, near which is
also the head-quarters of the Dir, Swat, and Chitral Political Agency.
On July 26, 1897, the post was suddenly attacked by a large gathering
of Swatis under a fanatical leader, the Mulla Mastan or ' Mad Mulla.'
Tribesmen from Utman Khel and Upper Swat poured in, raising the
numbers to 12,000 men. Fighting continued until August 1, when
the tribes were repulsed. Chakdarra, which also was besieged by the
tribesmen, was relieved the next day.
Malambi (or Malimbi). — A fine conical hill in the north-east of
Coorg, Southern India, situated in 12° 40' N. and 750 58' E., 4,488
feet high, conspicuous in all that part of the country.
Malanggarh (Bawa Making). — Hill fortress in the Kalyan taluka
of Thana District, Bombay, situated in 190 7' N. and 730 13' E.,
10 miles south of Kalyan town. It is known also as the Cathedral
Rock. Like most of the Thana hill forts, Malanggarh rises in a
succession of bare stony slopes, broken by walls of rocks and belts
of level woodland. It is most easily reached from Kalyan across
a rough roadless tract of about 8 miles, ending in a climb of a per-
pendicular height of about 700 feet. Connected with the base of the
hill is a forest-covered table-land, upon which is the tomb of the Bawa
Malang. At the time of Captain Dickinson's survey in 1818, there
were a few dwellings for the garrison here, of which the ruined sites
alone remain. From this table-land the ascent to the lower fort is very
steep, and upwards of 300 feet high. The latter part is by an almost
perpendicular rock-hewn staircase, at the top of which is a strong gate-
way covered by two outstanding towers, enabling even the smallest
garrison to make the place impregnable. From the lower to the upper
fort there is a perpendicular ascent of 200 feet by means of a narrow
llight of rock-hewn steps, on the face of a precipice so steep as to
make the ascent at all times most difficult and dangerous. The upper
MALAVALLI TOWN
73
fort, a space of 200 yards long by about 70 broad, is nothing more
than the top, as it were, of the third hill. It has no fortifications, but
there are traces of an enclosure and of the walls of an old building.
The water-supply is from a range of five cisterns, and a copper pipe
is used to carry water to the lower fort. A yearly fair, held here in
February, is attended by both Hindus and Muhammadans.
Malappuram Subdivision. — Subdivision of Malabar District,
Madras, consisting of the Erxad and Walavanad taluks.
Malappuram Town. — Town in the Ernad taluk of Malabar Dis-
trict, Madras, situated in n° 4' N. and 76° 4' E., 31 miles south-ea^t
of Calicut, with which it is connected by a good road. Population
(1901), 9,216. It is notable as the centre for many years of the
Mappilla fanatical outbreaks. A detachment of British troops has
been stationed here since 1873, and a special police force since 1885.
The chief buildings are the churches (Protestant and Roman Catho-
lic), the divisional officer and magistrate's court, the barracks, and the
office of the Assistant Superintendent of police. A weekly market is
held here.
Malavalli Taluk. — Eastern taluk of Mysore District, Mysore State,
lying between 120 13' and 120 33' N. and 760 54' and 77° 20' E., with
an area of 391 square miles. The population in 1901 was 101,779,
compared with 85,910 in 1891. The taluk contains one town, Mala-
valli (population, 7,270), the head-quarters; and 231 villages. The
land revenue demand in 1903-4 was Rs. 97,000. The Cauvery forms
part of the southern boundary, receiving from the north the Shimsha,
into which all the waters of the taluk flow. About the middle of the
southern boundary are situated the Falls of the Cauvery, on either
side of the island of Sivasamudram. The taluk generally is an un-
dulating plain, except in the south-east, where there are a State forest
and several high hills, including Kabbaldurga (3,507 feet). In the
south-west is Kundurbetta (3,129 feet). The soil is rocky and shallow
in the south-east and north west, generally red mixed with sand else-
where, and improves in the south-west, where there is some black soil.
Mulberry is the chief garden crop. Some land is irrigated by channels.
The Cauvery Power-works at Sivasamudram have recently attracted
population.
Malavalli Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name
in Mysore District, Mysore, situated in 12° 23' N. and 77° 4' E.,
18 miles south of Maddur railway station. Population (1901), 7,270.
In the seventeenth century it was an important place, with a large
fort, now ruinous. Haidar All gave Malavalli in jdgir to his son
Tipu, who planted a large fruit garden near the tank, now occupied
by paddy-fields. To the west of the town took place the battle in
which Tipu Sultan was defeated by the British in 1799. After the
74 MALAVALLI TOWN
action he had the place destroyed, to prevent its being of any use
to the British. The establishment of the Cauvery Power-works at
Sivasamudram has revived the importance of Malavalli. A small
Faith Mission has a station here. The municipality dates from 1873.
The receipts and expenditure during the ten years ending 1901
averaged Rs. 1,700. In 1903-4 they were Rs. 2,100 and Rs. 1,600.
Malavalli Village. — Village in the Shikarpur taluk of Shimoga
District, Mysore, situated in 140 29' N. and 750 19' E., 20 miles north-
west of Shikarpur town. Population (1901), 500. It is of interest on
account of the Satakarni inscription found on a pillar, probably of the
second century, the oldest in Mysore next to the edicts of Asoka.
From this it appears that the village was then called Mattapatti.
Malayagiri. — The highest peak in Orissa, Bengal, situated in the
Pal Lahara Tributary State, in 210 22' N. and 850 16' E. The hill,
which is 3,895 feet above the sea, is isolated and commands a magnifi-
cent view over the surrounding country. Water is obtainable near the
summit, on which there is space for building sites.
Malcolmpeth. — Sanitarium in Satara District, Bombay. See
Mahabaleshwar.
Malda District (Maldaha). — District in the Rajshahi Division of
Eastern Bengal and Assam, lying between 240 30' and 250 32' N.
and 870 46' and 88° 31/ E., with an area of 1,899 square miles. It
is bounded on the north-western corner by Purnea District and on
the north-eastern by Dinajpur ; Rajshahi lies to the south-east, while
the Ganges forms a continuous western and south-western boundary
separating it from the Santal Parganas and Murshidabad.
The Mahananda flows through the District from north to south,
dividing it into two nearly equal parts which present very different
characteristics. "West of the river the surface is com-
asnects posed of the newer alluvium and is comparatively
low, a great deal of it having been subject to fluvial
action in very recent times ; the Ganges once washed the walls of
Gaur, but it now flows 16 miles farther west. The eastern half of the
District lies in the older alluvium of the Barind, and has a stiff clay
soil and high undulating surface, broken by the deep valleys of the
Tangan and Piirnabhaba and their tributary streams ; towards the
south in the Nawabganj thana, as in other portions of the District
bordering on the Ganges, the surface declines into the newer alluvium.
The Ganges skirts the District, forming a natural boundary from the
north-west corner to the extreme south. Its flood-waters, as deflected
from the hills of Rajmahal, are perpetually cutting away the Malda
bank, which is everywhere low and composed of loose sand. Among
many former channels and deserted backwaters the little winding
stream of the Bhaglrathi (also called the Chhoti Bhagirathi) deserves
MALDA DISTRICT 75
mention, as being the historical river-bed which defended the city
of Gaur. This is almost dry in the winter, but becomes navigable
for country boats during the rainy season. It ultimately joins the
Pagla or Pagli, a larger branch of the Ganges, which runs in a
meandering course to the south-east, and encloses, before it regains
the Ganges, a large island about 16 miles long. The Pagla is navigable
during the rains, but in the dry season it retains no current and
becomes fordable at many points. The Mahananda enters Malda
from Purnea and joins the Ganges at the south-eastern corner of the
District. Its tributaries are, on the right bank, the Kalindn, and on
the left bank, the Tangan and Pumabhaba, which bring down the
drainage of Dinajpur. The Mahananda flows in a deep and well-
defined channel between high banks, and varies in breadth from about
400 to 800 yards. At certain seasons of the year, the melting of the
snows in the mountains, combined with the local rainfall, causes
the river to rise as much as 30 feet, and an embankment has been
constructed just above the civil station of English Bazar to protect
it from inundation. There are no lakes ; but old channels of the
Ganges are numerous, and between Gaur and the Mahananda there
are extensive undrained swamps.
The District is covered with alluvium. The Barind belongs to an
older alluvial formation, which is usually composed of massive argil-
laceous beds of a rather pale reddish-brown hue, often weathering
yellowish, disseminated throughout which occur kankar and pisolitic
ferruginous concretions. The low-lying country to the west of the
Mahananda and in the south is of more recent formation, consisting
of sandy clay and sand along the course of the rivers, and of fine silt
consolidating into clay in the flatter parts of the river plain.
Where the ground is not occupied by the usual crops of North
Bengal, it is covered with an abundant natural vegetation, except in
the sandy beds of the greater rivers. Old river-beds, however, ponds
and marshes, and streams with a sluggish current have a copious
vegetation of Vallisneria and other plants. Land subject to inundation
has usually a covering of Tamarix and reedy grasses, and in some
parts where the ground is more or less marshy Rosa involucrata is
plentiful. Few trees occur on these inundated lands ; the most
plentiful and the largest is Barringtonia acutangula. Near villages
thickets or shrubberies of semi-spontaneous growth and more or less
useful trees of a rapid growth and weedy character are common. No
Government forests exist, but portions of the Barind are covered
with jungle known locally as katal. This consists chiefly of thorny
bush jungle, mixed with an abundance of pipal (Fiats religiosa).
banyan {Fiats indica), red cotton-tree (Bombax ma/adaricum), pakar-
trees, and nipal bamboos.
VOL. XVII. F
7 6 MALDA DISTRICT
Malda was once celebrated for its large game and especially for tigers.
Owing, however, to the clearing of the katal jungle and to the extension
of cultivation, tigers are now rarely met with, though leopards still
abound and frequently make their appearance even in the outskirts
of the civil station. Wild hog and spotted deer are also common, and
wild buffaloes are occasionally seen, though they have become very
rare. The swamps and ancient tanks of the District are infested with
big crocodiles ; and the larger swamps are frequented by game-birds
of almost every species found in Bengal.
The climate is not characterized by extremes of heat or rainfall.
Mean temperature increases from 630 in January to 86° in May, the
average for the year being 780. The highest mean maximum is 970 in
April and the lowest 500 in January. The annual rainfall averages
57 inches, of which 4-7 inches fall in May, 9-7 in June, 13-4 in July,
1 1-2 in August and September, and 3-4 in October.
Except in August, 1885, when an exceptional rising of the Ganges
caused great destruction of crops over about 300 square miles in the
south and south-west of the District, no serious flood has occurred in
recent years. In the earthquake of 1897 all the masonry houses
in English Bazar and Old Malda were damaged, the cost of repairs
to public buildings being estimated at Rs. 11,000, while private build-
ings suffered to the extent of 2\ lakhs. In the diara lands cracks
opened some half a mile in length, and in the higher lands subsidences
occurred in a few places.
The area included within Malda District contains two of the great
capitals of the early Muhammadan rulers of Bengal ; and at the present
day the sites of Gaur and Pandua exhibit some of
the most interesting remains in the Province. The
country originally formed part of the kingdom of Pundra or Paundra-
vardhana, the country of the Pods, and subsequently of the Baren-
dra division of Bengal under Ballal Sen. To this king is attributed
the building of the city of Gaur, which under his son Lakshman Sen
received the name of LakshmanavatI or Lakhnauti. Muhammad-i-
Bakhtyar Khiljl, who invaded Bengal at the end of the twelfth century,
expelled Lakshman Sen and moved the capital from Nadia. to Gaur.
About 1350 Shams-ud-dln Ilyas transferred the capital to Pandua,
where it remained for about 70 years till Jalal-ud-dln restored it to
Gaur ; but with this exception Gaur continued, in spite of many
vicissitudes, to be the capital of the viceroys and kings of Bengal till
1564, when Sulaiman KararanI removed the seat of government to
Tanda, a few miles to the south-west of Gaur. Munim Khan, after
defeating Daud Khan in 1575, occupied Gaur; but a pestilence broke
out in which thousands died every day, and the survivors fled, never
to return to their deserted homes. After this Tanda apparently con-
POPULATIOX 77
tinned to be the capital, but a few years later Rajmahal was made the
seat of government. The very site of Tanda is now unknown, though
it seems to have been an important place for about a hundred years
after the depopulation of Gaur ; in its neighbourhood was fought the
decisive battle in which prince Shuja was defeated by the generals of
Aurangzeb in 1660. The East India Company established a factory
at Malda as early as 1676, by the side of a Dutch factory already in
existence there. In 1683, when it was visited by William Hedge-,
(who spent a day in exploring the ruins of Gaur), the number of fact
was three1. In 1770 English Bazar was fixed upon for a Commercial
Residency, and continued to be a place of importance until the discon-
tinuance of the Company's private trade ; the fortified structure which
was originally used as the Residency is now occupied by the courts
and public offices. As an administrative unit the District only came
into existence in 1813, when, in order to secure a closer magisterial
supervision, various police circles were detached from the Districts
of Rajshahi, Dinajpur, and Purnea and placed in charge of a Joint-
Magistrate and Deputy-Collector stationed at English Bazar. A
separate treasury was first opened in 1832, but it was not till 1859 that
a Magistrate-Collector was appointed to the District. Anomalies
remained in the revenue, criminal, and civil jurisdiction which were
not adjusted till 1875, and since that time there have been only a
few unimportant transfers of jurisdiction. In 1905 the District was
transferred from the Bhagalpur Division of Bengal to the Rajshahi
Division of Eastern Bengal and Assam.
Malda is considered less unhealthy than the adjoining Districts of
Purnea, Dinajpur, and Rajshahi ; but it is very malarious, especially
in the undrained swamps between Gaur and the
Mahananda, and in the jungly tract to the east.
Malarial fever generally breaks out on the cessation of the rains ; and
in six years out of the ten ending 1900 it was one of the six Dis-
tricts in Bengal from which the highest fever mortality was reported ;
in 1899 it headed the list with a recorded mortality from fever of 41-7
per 1,000. Cholera is often rife, and a specially bad outbreak occurred
in 1899 in English Bazar.
The population has risen from 677,328 in 1872 to 711,487 in 1SS1,
to 814,919 in 1891, and to 884,030 in 1901. It is thus growing rapidly
in spite of the unhealthy conditions prevailing, and the density in 1901
was 466 persons per square mile. The increase during the decade
ending with that year amounted to 8^ per cent., being greatest in the
Gajol and Old Malda thanas in the Barind, where Santals are settling
in large numbers ; this tract is still, however, the least densely popu-
lated part of the District. In the Kaliachak and Sibganj thanas in the
1 Hedges 's Diary, vol. i, pp. 87-9.
F 2
78 MALDA DISTRICT
south-west new chars have attracted a number of Muhammadan culti-
vators from English Bazar and Nawabganj, and from Murshidabad on
the other side of the river. The immigrants from the Santal Parganas
now number 43,000 ; and there is also a considerable immigration
from Bhagalpur and other Bihar Districts, and from the United Pro-
vinces. The population is contained in 3,555 villages and three towns :
English Bazar, the head-quarters, Malda, and Nawabganj. Bengali
is spoken by 74 per cent, of the population and Bihar! by 21 per cent. ;
the Mahananda river forms a linguistic boundary, the northern dialect
of Bengali being prevalent in the east of the District, while in the west
the MagadhI dialect of Bihar! is the vernacular. The Mahananda is
likewise a religious boundary ; and the two main religions are nearly
equally divided, Hindus (440,398) constituting 50 per cent, of the
population and Muhammadans (424,969) 48 per cent.
Of the Muhammadans, no less than 399,000 are Shaikhs ; they are
probably for the most part descended from the Rajbansis or Koch,
who form the prevailing race of North Bengal east of the Mahananda,
and are the most numerous of the Hindu castes in the District
(64,000). Santals (including 18,000 returned as Animists) number
52,000, Chains (who are semi-Hinduized aborigines) 44,000, and
Chasatis 27,000 ; while among the less numerous castes, Gangai
(Ganesh) with 13,000 and Pundari (Puro) with 8,000 are distinctive
of this part of the country. Agriculture supports 57 per cent, of the
population, industries 19 per cent., and the professions one per cent.
The only Christian mission at work in the District belongs to the
London Baptist Missionary Society ; it has met with but little success,
the number of native Christians in 1901 being 173.
The low-lying recent alluvium in the west and south is enriched by
annual deposits of silt, and its fertile soil is well adapted for the culti-
vation of rice, mulberry, indigo, and mangoes. The
stiff clay soil of the Barind, which is best suited to
the growth of winter rice, produces also large crops of pulses and oil-
seeds. The north and north-west corner of the District lying between
the Mahananda, the Kalindn, and the Ganges is intersected by nullahs
and covered with jungle ; the soil here is extremely poor, but the short
grass affords pasturage to a considerable number of cattle.
In 1903-4 the net cropped area was estimated at 1,120 square miles
and the cultivable waste at 455 square miles; about 7 per cent, of the
net cultivated area is twice cropped. Rice constitutes the staple food-
crop and is grown on 611 square miles, of which 312 square miles are
estimated to be under the winter crop, while on most of the remainder
early rice is grown. Wheat covers 119 square miles, barley 34 square
miles, maize 25 square miles, pulses (including gram) and other food-
grains 153 square miles, oilseeds (chiefly mustard) 105 square miles,
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 79
and jute 38 square miles. Jute is grown for the most part in the
north-west of the District, and wheat, barley, and gram in the extreme
west. Mangoes, for the excellence and variety of which this District
is deservedly famous, are grown chiefly in the English Bazar thana.
But the profits from the sale of this fruit, as well as the improved
facilities for transport, have encouraged landowners to cultivate it in
all the thanas to the west of the Mahananda. Every plot of land
suitable for the growth of mango grafts is planted with them, and tracts
of land formerly growing ordinary rati or winter crops have in recent
years been converted into mango orchards. The mulberry is grown
in the central and south-western portion of the District ; and its culti-
vation gives a curious aspect to this part of the country, as the land has
to be artificially raised to the height of 8 or 10 feet, to prevent the
plants from being destroyed by the annual floods. Indigo is still
grown on the Ganges diaras to the west, covering about 1,000 acres,
but the area under this crop has been largely reduced.
Cultivation has rapidly extended around the ruins of Gaur and also
in the Barind, where the greater portion of the cultivable area has been
cleared of jungles in recent years ; and there has also been an extension
of cultivation in the swampy tract to the east of Gaur. Manure is used
only on mulberry lands, and artificial irrigation is unnecessary except
for the spring rice crop. The agricultural classes are on the whole
prosperous, and there has hitherto been little demand for advances
under the Agriculturists' and Land Improvement Loans Acts.
Good cart-bullocks are imported from the Districts to the west, but
the local cattle are poor. There are extensive tracts of waste land
in the Barind and elsewhere, but little nourishing pasture land. During
the rains the inhabitants of the diaras graze their cattle in the higher
tracts. An industrial exhibition, at which domestic animals and
poultry are shown, was instituted at English Bazar in 1903.
The staple industry of the District is silk. Its production may be
classed in three branches : the rearing of the cocoons, the spinning
of the raw silk, and the weaving of silk piece-goods.
Within the last twenty-five years the cultivation of comm^catf!>ns.
mulberry and the production of cocoons has nearly
doubled; and the annual output of cocoons is estimated at 100,000
maunds, worth from 25 to 30 lakhs, of which about 60,000 maunds
are exported. The annual export of silk thread is estimated at
1,650 to 1,700 maunds, and its value at 10 or n lakhs. The industry
is said to date back to the Hindu kingdom of Gaur ; and the cloth
known as Maldahi was for a long time a speciality of external com-
merce, but its manufacture is now very limited, and a few pieces only
are occasionally woven to meet the demands of a Bombay firm. The
export of ordinary silk piece-goods has also decreased, and it is
So MALDA DISTRICT
estimated that it does not now exceed Rs. 60,000. The East India
Company had a factory at Malda as early as 1676, and in 1876 there
were seven European concerns for the manufacture of raw silk ; but
there are now only two factories under European management, at
Baragharia and Bhola Hat, and the number of native factories has also
declined. In 1903-4 the European factories turned out 23,000 lb. of
raw silk, valued at 2-1 lakhs, which was exported chiefly to England
and France ; they also purchase and export large quantities of cocoons.
Some cotton cloth is woven ; but the only other important industry
is the manufacture of brass-ware and bell-metal at English Bazar,
Nawabganj, and Kallgram. The manufacture of indigo is languishing,
and the out-turn in 1903-4 was only 4 tons.
The chief exports are silk cocoons, silk thread, paddy and rice to
Calcutta, Dacca, Assam, and Bihar, mangoes (chiefly to Calcutta and
Eastern Bengal) and jute (to Calcutta, Murshidabad, Nagpur, Benares,
Meerut, and Eahore), while wheat, barley, gram, oilseeds, and chillies
are also exported. The imports comprise cotton piece-goods, coco-
nuts, betel-nuts, paper, g/ri, gur (molasses), sugar, copper, brass plates,
kerosene oil, shoes, umbrellas, and spices of all kinds. Coco-nuts and
betel-nuts are brought from Lower Bengal, ghl and gur from Bihar,
and the other articles mainly from Calcutta. A large part of the traffic
is carried in country boats down the Mahananda ; while some of the
trade is carried by boat or river steamer to Rajmahal on the East
Indian Railway, or to Damukdia Ghat on the Eastern Bengal State
Railway. The chief mart for the purchase and sale of silk cocoons
and silk thread is Amaniganj Hat, the sales on a market day occa-
sionally amounting to a lakh. The most important centre of trade is
Nawabganj on the Mahananda, while Malda and Rohanpur have
also an important rice trade.
No railway at present enters the District, but there is a project to
construct a branch line from Katihar to Sara Ghat or to Godagari
(to connect with an extension of the Ranaghat-Murshidabad branch
of the Eastern Bengal State Railway recently opened to traffic). Ex-
cluding 424 miles of village tracks, there are only 277 miles of roads,
of which 9 miles are metalled. The most important are those from
English Bazar to Nawabganj and to Rajmahal, and the Dinajpur road
branching off from the latter ; the road from Godagari to Dinajpur
passes through the south-eastern corner of the District. There are
32 ferries under the District board. The paucity of roads is due to
the excellence of water communications.
The Mahananda is navigable throughout the year by boats of
150 maunds up to Alal, the Tangan for boats of 100 maunds up to
Lalgola, and the Purnabhaba for boats of the same burden as far
as Dinajpur. Steamers belonging to the India General Steam Navi-
ADMINISTRATION 81
gation Company ply six days a week between English Bazar and
Sultanganj ; a service between Rajmahal and Damukdia Ghat stops at
various stations on the Malda side of the Ganges, and during the rains
a ferry steamer runs from Rajmahal to English Bazar and back three
days a week.
Some scarcity in 1885 and 1897 necessitated Government relief
on a small scale, but no actual famine has occurred in recent years.
The Magistrate-Collector is assisted at English Bazar, the head-
quarters, by a staff of three Deputv-Collectors and
o , , c* „ , ,r, , ,. Administration,
one bub-deputy-Collector. 1 here are no subdi-
visions in the District.
The civil courts subordinate to the District Judge are those of three
Munsifs, of whom two sit at English Bazar and one at Nawabganj.
The District and Sessions Judge, who is also Judge of Rajshahi, has
his head-quarters at Rampur Boalia in that District. Crime is on the
whole light, and the commonest offences are of a petty character or are
due to disputes about land.
The District, as already stated, is a recent creation from the Districts
of Purnea and Dinajpur, and its land revenue history cannot be stated
separately. In 1903-4 there were 655 estates, with a revenue demand
of 4-36 lakhs. The whole of the District is permanently settled, with
the exception of 40 estates with a total demand of Rs. 35,000, which
are temporarily settled or managed direct by Government. Little is
peculiar in the land tenures of the District, except the existence of
several large revenue-free estates granted as endowments to Muham-
madan fakirs. Under the halhasili tenure the annual rent varies both
according to the amount of land under cultivation and the nature of
the crop raised. This tenure is most common in the backward parts
of the District, and one of its incidents is that it allows a certain pro-
portion of the village lands always to lie fallow. Rent rates vary
largely for different kinds of land, being usually much lower in the case
of old holdings. Land yielding two or three crops brings in about
Rs. 1-14 per acre in the case of old holdings, and from Rs. 3 to
Rs. 4-8 per acre in the case of land newly brought under cultivation.
Low lands for winter rice yield from about Rs. 1-8 to Rs. 2-4 per
acre; spring rice lands from Rs. 3-12 to Rs. 6 and Rs. 12, and occa-
sionally even Rs. 18 and Rs. 24 per acre ; mulberry lands from Rs. 3
to Rs. 3-12 for unraised land and from Rs. 4-8 to Rs. 6 for well-raised
plots ; mango orchards from Rs. 4-8 to Rs. 6 ; and garden lands from
Rs. 6 to Rs. 15 per acre. The average holding of a tenant, as esti-
mated from certain typical estates in various parts of the District, is
1^ acres.
The following table shows the collections of land revenue and total
revenue (principal heads only), in thousands of rupees : —
82
MALDA DISTRICT
1880-1.
1 890- 1.
1900-1.
1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue .
4, J 5
6,69
4,29
7,69
4,40
8,So
4,40
9,08
Outside the municipalities of English Bazar, Old Malda, and
Nawabganj, local affairs are managed by the District board. In
19°3-4 its income was Rs. 87,000, of which Rs. 32,000 was derived
from rates; and the expenditure was Rs. 96,000, including Rs. 53,000
spent on public works and Rs. 25,000 on education.
English Bazar is protected by an embankment 2-| miles in length
from the inundations of the Mahananda and Kalindrl rivers.
The District contains ten ihanas or police stations and three out-
posts. In 1903 the force subordinate to the District Superintendent
consisted of 2 inspectors, 26 sub-inspectors, 20 head constables, and
255 constables. There was, in addition, a rural police force of 178
dajfaddrs and 1,784 chauklddrs. The District jail at English Bazar
has accommodation for no prisoners.
Education is backward; in 1901 only 3-7 per cent, of the popu-
lation (7-4 males and o«2 females) could read and write. An advance
has, however, been made in recent years, the number of pupils under
instruction having increased from 8,608 in 1883-4 to 1 1.752 in
1892-3, and to 12,009 in 1900-1. In 1903-4, 14,782 boys and
1,085 g'rls were at school, being respectively 22-5 and i-6 per
cent, of those of school-going age. The number of educational
institutions, public and private, in that year was 487, including 27
secondary and 444 primary schools. The expenditure on education
was Rs. 76,000, of which Rs. 9,000 was met from Provincial funds,
Rs. 23,000 from District funds, Rs. 1,100 from municipal funds, and
Rs. 35,000 from fees.
In 1903 the District contained nine dispensaries, of which one
had accommodation for 28 in-patients. The cases of 56,000 out-
patients and 500 in-patients were treated, and 2,419 operations were
performed. The expenditure was Rs. 15,000, of which Rs. 800 was met
from Government contributions, Rs. 5,000 from local and Rs. 2,000
from municipal funds, and Rs. 7,000 from subscriptions.
Vaccination is compulsory only in municipal areas. In 1903-4
the number of persons successfully vaccinated was 30,000, represent
ing 35 per 1,000 of the population.
[Martin (Buchanan Hamilton), Eastern India (1838), vol. ii, pp. 291-
582, and vol. iii, pp. 1-350 ; Sir W. W. Hunter, Statistical Account of
Bengal, vol. vii (1876); N. G. Mukerji, Monograph on the Silk Fabrics
of Bengal (Calcutta, 1903).]
Malda Town (or Old Malda).— Town in Malda District, Eastern
MA LEG AON TOWN 83
Bengal and Assam, situated in 250 2' N. and 88° 8' E., at the con-
fluence of the Kalindri with the Mahananda. Population (1901),
3,743. The town is admirably situated for river traffic, and probably
rose to prosperity as the port of Pandua. During the eighteenth
century it was the seat of thriving cotton and silk manufactures, and
both the French and Dutch had factories here. In 18 10 Malda was
already beginning to lose its prosperity ; and, though some trade is still
carried on in grain, it shows signs of poverty and decay. Malda was
constituted a municipality in 1869. The income during the decade
ending 1901-2 averaged Rs. 3,450, and the expenditure Rs. 3,300.
In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 3,400, mainly from a tax on persons
(or property tax) ; and the expenditure was Rs. 3,000. The town
contains a mosque built in 1566. At Nimasarai, near the confluence
of the Mahananda and Kalindri, stands an old brick tower with stones
shaped like elephant tusks projecting from its walls. It resembles
the Hiran Minar at Fatehpur Sikri, and was probably intended for
a hunting tower.
Malegaon Taluka. — Tdluka of Nasik District, Bombay, lying
between 200 20' and 200 53' N. and 740 180 and 740 49' E., with an
area of 777 square miles. It contains one town, Malegaon (popula-
tion, 19,054), the head-quarters; and 146 villages The population in
1901 was 96,707, compared with 86,243 *n 1891- The density, 124
persons per square mile, is below the District average. The demand
for land revenue in 1903-4 was 2-5 lakhs, and for cesses Rs. 17,000.
Malegaon is hilly in the north ; but in the south, except for a few small
hills, it is flat and treeless. Three ranges run through the tdluka, and
are crossed by numerous cart-tracks into Khandesh and the adjoining
taluka, the most southerly range being traversed by a section of the
Bombay-Agra trunk road. The tdluka is healthy and well watered.
The chief rivers are the Girna with its tributaries in the centre, and
the Bori in the north. The Girna passes close to Malegaon town.
The annual rainfall averages 21 inches.
Malegaon Town.— Head-quarters of the taluka of the same name
in Nasik District, Bombay, situated in 20° 33' N. and 740 32' E., on
the trunk road from Bombay to Agra, 154 miles north-east of Bombay
and 24 miles north-east of Manmad on the Great Indian Peninsula
Railway. Population (1901), 19,054. Malegaon was formerly a
cantonment, but the troops have now been finally withdrawn. It has
a municipality, established in 1863. The income during the decade
ending 1901 averaged Rs. 24,000. In 1903-4 the income was
Rs. 32,000. The town contains two cotton-ginning factories, about
3,000 hand-looms for cotton weaving, which employ 7,000 persons,
a Subordinate Judge's court, two English schools, and a dispensary.
Malegaon was occupied by Arab troops during the Pindari War. and
84
M ALE G AON TOWN
its capture by Colonel M'Dowell in May, 1818, was attended by a loss
of more than 200 of the British force. When the Arabs were dispersed
after the capture of the fort, many of them were escorted to Surat
and there shipped to their native country : others retired to Cutch,
Kathiawar, and the Deccan. The fort is said to have been built in
1740 by Narushankar, a daring Arab leader; other authorities refer its
construction to an engineer sent from Delhi.
Malegaon Village. — A jaglr village in the north-east of Bidar
District, Hyderabad State, situated in 180 41/ N. and 7 6° 58' E.
Population (1901), 270. It was once celebrated for its annual horse
fair, where upwards of 4,000 horses and ponies were disposed of for
prices ranging up to Rs. 700. Piece-goods, cloth of all kinds, hard-
ware, &c, were among other things exposed for sale. Owing to plague
and famine the fair has not been held since 1897.
Maler Kotla State. — Native State under the political control of
the Commissioner, Jullundur Division, Punjab, lying between 300 24'
and 300 41'' N. and 750 42' and 750 59' E., with an area of 167 square
miles. Population (1901), 77,506, giving a density of 478 persons
per square mile. It is bounded by the District of Ludhiana on the
north and by Patiala territory elsewhere, except for a few miles on
the western border, where it marches with some Nabha villages. The
country is a level plain, unbroken by a single hill or stream, and varied
only by sand-drifts which occur in all directions and in some parts
assume the shape of regular ridges. The Bhatinda branch of the
Sirhind Canal passes through the northern part of the State, but the
Nawab refuses to allow irrigation from it. The Nawabs of Maler
Kotla are of Afghan descent, and originally held positions of trust in
the Sirhind province under the Mughal emperors. As the empire sank
into decay during the eighteenth century, the local chiefs gradually
became independent. In 1732 the chief of Maler Kotla, Jamal Khan,
joined the commander of the imperial troops stationed in the Jullundur
Doab in an unsuccessful attack on Raja Ala Singh, the Sikh chief of
Patiala; and again in 1761, Jamal Khan afforded valuable aid against
his Sikh neighbour to the lieutenant whom Ahmad Shah, the Durrani
conqueror, had left in charge of Sirhind. The consequence of this
was a long-continued feud with the adjacent Sikh States, especially with
Patiala. After the death of Jamal Khan, who was killed in battle,
dissensions ensued among his sons, Bhikan Khan ultimately becoming
Nawab. Soon after Ahmad Shah had left India for the last time, Raja
Amar Singh of Patiala determined to take revenge on Bhikan Khan.
He attacked him, and seized some of his villages, till at last the Maler
Kotla chief found that he was unable to resist so powerful an enemy,
and a treaty was negotiated which secured peace for many years
between these neighbouring States. During this peace the forces of
MALER KOTLA STATE 85
Maler Kotla on several occasions assisted the Patiala Rajas when in
difficulties; and in 1787 Raja Sahib Singh of Patiala returned these
kindnesses by aiding Maler Kotla against the powerful chief of
Bhadaur, who had seized some of the Nawab's villages. In 1794
a religious war was proclaimed against the Muhammadans of Maler
Kotla by the Bedi Sahib Singh, the lineal descendant of Baba Nanak,
the first and most revered of the Sikh Gurus. This man, who was
half-fanatic and half-impostor, inflamed the Sikhs against the cow-
killers of Maler Kotla, and a great many Sikh Sardars joined him.
The Nawab and his troops were defeated in a pitched battle, and com-
pelled to flee to the capital, where they were closely besieged by the
fanatical Bedi. Fortunately for the Nawab, his ally of Patiala again sent
troops to help him ; and ultimately the Bedi was induced to withdraw
across the Sutlej by the offer of a sum of money from the Patiala Raja.
After the victory of Laswari, gained by the British over Sindhia in
1803, and the subjugation and flight of Holkar in 1805, when the
Nawab of Maler Kotla joined the British army with all his followers,
the British Government succeeded to the power of the Marathas in the
districts between the Sutlej and the Jumna ; and in 1809 its protection
was formally extended to Maler Kotla as to the other Cis-Sutlej
States, against the formidable encroachments of Ranjlt Singh of
Lahore. In the campaigns of 1806, 1807, and 1808, Ranjlt Singh
had made considerable conquests beyond the Sutlej ; and in 1808 he
occupied Fandkot, marched on Maler Kotla, and demanded a ransom
of Rs. 1,55,000 from the Nawab, in spite of the protests of Mr. (after-
wards Lord) Metcalfe, who was then an envoy in Ranjlt's camp. This
led to the resolute interference of the British, who advanced troops
under Colonel Ochterlony, and at the same time (December, 1808)
addressed an ultimatum to Ranjlt Singh, declaring the Cis-Sutlej States
to be under British protection. Finally, Ranjlt Singh submitted ;
Colonel Ochterlony formally reinstated the Nawab of Maler Kotla
in February, 1809; and in April of that year the final treaty between
the British Government and Lahore, which affirmed the dependence
of the Cis-Sutlej States on the former, was signed by Mr. Metcalfe
and Ranjlt Singh.
The present Nawab, Muhammad Ibrahim All Khan, born in 1857,
succeeded in 1877 ; but he has been insane for some years, and the
State is now administered by Sahibzada Ahmad AH Khan, the heir-
apparent, as regent. The State contains the town of Maler Kotla, the
capital, and 115 villages. The chief products are cotton, sugar, opium,
aniseed, tobacco, garlic, and grain; and the estimated gross revenue is
Rs. 5,47,000. The Nawab receives compensation from the Govern-
ment of India', amounting to Rs. 2,500 per annum, on account of loss
of revenue caused by the abolition of customs duties. The State
86
MALER KOTLA STATE
receives an allotment of 14 to 1 6 chests of Malwa opium annually,
each chest containing 1-25 cwt., at the reduced duty of Rs. 280 per
chest. The duty so paid is refunded to the State, with a view to
securing the co-operation of the State officials in the suppression of
smuggling. The military force consists of 50 cavalry and 439 infantry.
This includes the Imperial Service contingent of one company (177
men) of Sappers and Miners. The State possesses 2 serviceable
guns. The Nawab of Maler Kotla receives a salute of 11, including
2 personal, guns. The State contains an Anglo-vernacular high school
and three primary schools.
Maler Kotla Town. — Chief town of Maler Kotla State, Punjab,
situated in 300 32' N. and 750 59/ E., 30 miles south of Ludhiana town.
Population (1901), 21,122. The town is divided into two parts, Maler
and Kotla, which have lately been united by the construction of the
new Moti Bazar. The former was founded by Sadr-ud-dln, the founder
of the Maler Kotla family in 1466, and the latter by Bayazld Khan in
1656. The principal buildings are the houses of the ruling chief, a
large Dlwan Khana (courthouse) situated in Kotla, and the mausoleum
of Sadr-ud-dln in Maler. The cantonments lie outside the town. The
chief exports are grain and Kotla paper and survey instruments, manu-
factured in the town itself ; and the chief imports are cotton cloth, salt,
and lime. A large grain market has lately been constructed. The
town has a small factory for the manufacture of survey instruments,
employing about 20 hands. A cotton-press, opened in 1904, gives
employment to about 300 persons. Maler Kotla has since 1905 been
administered as a municipality. It contains a high school, a hospital,
and a military dispensary.
Malgaon. — Town in the Miraj (Senior) State, Bombay, situated in
1 6° 53' N. and 740 47' E. Population (1901), 5,774. It is adminis-
tered as a municipality, with an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 700. A
temple of Daudnath, which is supposed to have been dedicated by
the hero of the Ramayana, stands on a hill about 3 miles from the
town ; and just outside is the shrine of a Muhammadan saint named
Bawafan, at which a yearly fair, attended by both Hindus and Muham-
madans, is held. Malgaon is famous for its betel-nut gardens, the
produce of which is exported to Kolhapur, Poona, Bombay, and other
places. It is connected with Miraj, 6 miles away, by a good road,
which serves as a feeder to the Southern Mahratta Railway. The
town contains a branch post office and a school.
Malia. — State in the Kathiawar Political Agency, Bombay, lying
between 230 i' and 230 io' N. and 70° 46' and 710 2' E., with
an area of 103 square miles. The population in 1901 was 9,075,
residing in 17 villages. The revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,56,000, and
the cultivated area 68 square miles. The State ranks as a fourth-class
THE MALTA HS 87
State in Kathiawar. The Thakur or chief was raised from the fifth to
the fourth class to give him a greater hold over the Mianas, a predatory
tribe which infests the neighbourhood. He is a representative of the
elder branch of the Cutch family, and executed the usual engagements
in 1807.
Maliahs, The ('highlands'). — An elevated tract in the western half
of Ganjam District, Madras, comprising the country above and just
adjoining the Eastern Ghats, and lying between 180 48' and
200 26' N. and 830 30' and 840 36' E., with an area of 3,551 square
miles. They are also called the Agencies, because they are adminis-
tered by the Collector under special powers vested in him in his
capacity as Agent to the Governor. They are peopled by primitive
forest tribes. The ordinary courts have no jurisdiction in them, the
Agent and his Assistants administering both civil and criminal justice,
and much of the ordinary law of the land is not in force.
The tract consists of a series of wild undulating plateaux, divided
by lower valleys. In the north, almost the whole of the Udayagiri
taluk may be said to have an average elevation of 2,300 feet. Passing
west to Balliguda and Pokiribondo, the general level sinks to 1,700
and 1,500 feet, and farther south of Balliguda to 1,000 feet at Kotgar.
On the west of this last line is a higher plateau round Belghar, with
an average elevation of 2,500 feet, and in the southern centre of the
Balliguda taluk is another of between 2,500 and 3,000 feet. South of
this the general altitude is about 1,700 feet, again sinking in the
neighbourhood of Nolaghat in Ramagiri taluk to 1,000 feet ; while
still farther south the elevation once more rises, and the hills run up
into the three highest peaks in the District, all of which are above
4,500 feet.
The scenery throughout is usually beautiful, and in places remains of
the old heavy forest are still standing ; but the continual clearing of the
hill-sides for the purposes of the shifting cultivation practised by the
tribes prevents the trees from attaining any size. This shifting culti-
vation is effected by felling and burning a piece of forest, cultivating
the ground in a careless manner for two or three years, and then
moving to a fresh patch. The best growth now, which is on the slopes
leading up into the hill country, consists chiefly of sal (Shorea robusta).
The chief passes into the Maliahs are the Kalingia ghat from Russell-
konda, the Pippalaponka ghat from Gazilbadi, the Katingia ghat from
Surada, the Taptapani or 'hot spring' ghat (so called from a hot
sulphur spring it contains) from Digupudi, the Puipani ghat from
Surangi, and the Munisinghi ghat from Parlakimedi.
The Agency tracts are for the most part held on a kind of feudal
tenure, the proprietors being in theory bound to render certain services
when called upon. They comprise fourteen different Maliahs known
88
THE MALIAHS
by separate names, of which four, the Goomsur, Surada, Chinnakimedi,
and Parlakimedi Maliahs, are Government land.
In 1901 the population numbered 321,114, living in 1,926 villages.
Of the total, 139,000 were Khonds, 83,000 Savaras, 44,000 Panos, and
46,000 Oriyas. The Panos, who are often good-looking, have well-
marked gipsy proclivities. Their occupations are trade, weaving, and
theft. They live on the ignorance and superstition of the Khonds, as
brokers and pedlars, sycophants and cheats. Where there are no
Oriyas the Panos possess much influence, and are always consulted
by the Khonds in important questions, such as boundary disputes.
The Khonds live chiefly in the north and the Savaras in the south.
Both are primitive people and their religious beliefs are animistic,
though those who have settled below the Ghats have to some extent
adopted the ordinary Hindu gods and rites. Their languages, which
are called after them Khond and Savara, are unwritten.
The various dialects of the Khonds differ greatly in different localities,
and the ways and character of the tribe vary almost as much as their
dialects. Those inhabiting the Kutia country are the most warlike
and troublesome. Generally speaking, the Khonds are 'a bold and
fitfully laborious mountain peasantry, of simple but not undignified
manners ; upright in their conduct ; sincere in their superstitions ;
proud of their position as landholders, and tenacious of their rights.'
Khond women wear nothing above the waist except necklaces. The
men have one dirty cloth, the ends of which hang down behind like
a tail. Their head-dress is characteristic. They wear their hair very
long, and it is drawn forward and rolled up until it resembles a short
horn. Round this it is the delight of the Khond to wrap a piece of
coloured cloth or some feathers, and he also keeps his comb, pipe, &c,
inside it. The men go about armed with a ta?igi, a sort of battle-axe,
and use bows and arrows when after game. They are over-fond of
sago-palm liquor ; and in March, when the mahua flower falls, they
distil strong drink from it, and many of the male population remain
hopelessly intoxicated for days together. In places the Sondis, a caste
of traders and toddy-sellers, have obtained much of the Khonds' land
by pandering to their taste for liquor.
The Savaras are of poorer physique, and more docile and timid than
the Khonds. They use bows and arrows like the Khonds, and dress
their hair in the same sort of horn on the top of their heads. They are
not, however, nearly so addicted to strong drink. They are skilful
cultivators, and in some places grow rice by terracing the hill-sides with
much labour and ingenuity.
The dominant race above the Ghats are the Oriyas. The hill
villages are arranged into groups called muttahs, over each of which
is an hereditary headman, known as the patro or Bissoyi, who has a
MALlHABAD TAHSIL 89
number of paiks or guards under him. With one exception, all these
patros are Oriyas. Government holds them responsible for the good
order of their muttahs, and the Khonds almost everywhere obey them
willingly.
Government derives very little revenue from the Maliahs, except
from the Chokkapad khandam in the Goomsur Maliahs, which is
managed as a ryohvari area. All the zamlndars and chiefs who hold
Maliahs under special sanads (grants) pay nazardnas (fees) to Govern-
ment, and receive fixed amounts from the patros of the several muttahs,
who^in their turn get fixed mamuls (customary payments) from the
several villages in their muttahs.
The Maliahs had an evil repute in days gone by for frequent meriah,
or human, sacrifices to the earth-god to secure good crops. The
Khonds were the great offenders in this matter. The meriah victim
was formally purchased and destined for sacrifice, and on the day
appointed was stupefied with intoxicants and then, after certain cere-
monies, was publicly done to death, the body being cut up into small
pieces which the people buried in their fields before sundown. The
method of sacrifice varied. At Balliguda the victim was tied to a
horizontal bar, roughly shaped to resemble an elephant's head, which
turned on a vertical post. The bar was whirled round and round, and
as it revolved the people hacked to shreds the still living victim. One
of these diabolical contrivances is now in the Madras Museum.
Special officers were appointed to suppress this custom (and female
infanticide, which was also common) ; but it persisted as late as 1857,
and even in 1880 an attempted sacrifice in Vizagapatam District was
very nearly successful. Some hundreds of persons of both sexes who
had been bought for sacrifice were rescued by the special officers, and
three or four of them are still alive and in receipt of a monthly dole
from Government. The Khonds now substitute a buffalo for the
human victim.
Malihabad Tahsil. — Northern tahsil of Lucknow District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Malihabad and Mahona, and
lying between 260 52' and 270 9' N. and 8o° 34' and Si0 4' E., with an
area of 334 square miles. Population increased from 175,542 in 1891
to 184,230 in 1 90 1. There are 379 villages and only one town, Mali-
habad (population, 7,554), the tahsil head-quarters. The demand for
land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 3,30,000, and for cesses Rs. 51,000.
The density of population, 552 persons per square mile, is the lowest
in the District. Across the centre of the tahsil flows the Gumti, whose
banks are fringed by ravines and bordered by a sandy tract. In the
north-east the soil is clay, and tanks and jhils abound. The south-
western portion is intersected by several small streams and is very
fertile. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation was 213 square miles, of
9o MA LIN A BAD TAHSIL
which 73 were irrigated. Weils supply two-thirds of the irrigated area,
and tanks most of the remainder.
Malihabad Town. — Head-quarters of the tahsil of the same
name in Lucknow District, United Provinces, situated in 260 55' N.
and 8o° 43' E., a mile from a station on the Oudh and Rohilkhand
Railway and on the road from Lucknow city to Hardoi. Population
(1901), 7,554. According to tradition, the town was founded by
Malia, a Pas! ; but nothing is known of its history till the reign of
Akbar, when it was inhabited by Pathans. It contains two bazars
built in the eighteenth century, one of which owes its origin to Nawab
Asaf-ud-daula. Besides the usual offices, a dispensary and a branch
of the American Methodist Mission are situated here. Malihabad
is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about Rs.
2,300. It has little trade, but a kind of tinfoil is manufactured in
small quantities, and the place is noted for its mangoes and orchards
of ber {Zizyphus Jujubd). A school for boys contains 175 pupils and
one for girls 29.
Maliwun (Siamese, Maletvau). — Southernmost township of Mergui
District, Lower Burma, lying on the mainland between 90 58' and
io° 55' N. and 960 27' and 980 56' E., and including islands which extend
to 90 38' N. and 970 44' E. Its area is 989 square miles. The eastern
boundary runs for most of the way along the Pakchan river, on the
other side of which is the Siamese State of Renong. The head-quarters
were moved in 1891 from Maliwun, the principal tin-mining centre in
the District, situated on a tributary of the Pakchan, to the healthier
and more accessible Victoria Point at the southern extremity of the
mainland. Except for a few Government officials and their families,
there are no Burmans in the township, the population of which was
7,719 in 1 89 1 and 5,265 in 1901, composed of Siamese in the rice
plain on the right bank of the Pakchan, Chinese in the mining camps,
Malays along the coast, and Salons about the islands. The township
contains 41 villages and hamlets. Until the time of Alaungpaya the
Pakchan was an important trade route. The country seems to have
been completely depopulated by that monarch's devastations, and was
left a good deal to itself till, fifty years ago, immigration had led to
such a series of dacoities and piracies that measures had to be con-
certed between the British and Siamese Governments for the main-
tenance of order. In 1859 the population was only 733. The next
year the tract was leased to a Chinaman, who took over the adminis-
tration for ten years ; but internal brawls in 1861 led to the establish-
ment of a frontier police under a European inspector, and later to the
appointment of a resident magistrate. The village of Victoria Point,
called by the Siamese Kawsong, by the Malays Pulodua (both meaning
' two islands '), and by the Burmans Kawthaung, a corruption of the
MALKAPUR TOU'X 91
Siamese name, contains about 80 houses. The Government building-,
are pleasantly situated on rolling hills, from which the islands of the
Archipelago and the Pakchan river, with the mountain ranges of
Renong beyond it, are visible at the same time. Except for the rice
plain on the Upper Pakchan and a few small patches elsewhere, the
whole township is under dense forest. The area cultivated in 1903-4
was 7 square miles, and the land revenue Rs. 4,600. The total revenue
raised in the same year amounted to Rs. 30,000.
Maliyas. — Hill tracts in the north of the Madras Presidency. See
Maliahs.
Malkangiri.— Agency tahsil in Vizagapatam District, Madras,
situated north of the Ghats on the western border of the District,
and bounded east and west by the Machkund and Sabari rivers. Area,
2,396 square miles; population (1901), 35,856, compared with 28,277
in 1 89 1 ; number of villages, 566. The tahsil is the largest and most
sparsely peopled in the Presidency, the density of population being
only 15 persons per square mile. Malkangiri is a wild forest-clad area,
watered by the Sabari and Sileru, and sloping down to the Godavari
border. Good teak and sal (Shorea robusta) forests exist, and they
are being ' reserved ' by the Raja of Jeypore, to whom the talisil
belongs. The head-quarters are at Malkangiri village. Among the
inhabitants, besides hill tribes, are found a considerable number of
Telugus who have immigrated from the neighbouring Agency tract
in Godavari.
Malkapur Taluk. — Taluk of Buldana District, Berar, lying between
200 $$' and 2 1° 2' N. and 760 2" and 760 36' E., with an area of 792 square
miles. The population fell from 177,877 in 1891 to 173,234 in 1901,
the density in the latter year being 219 persons per square mile. The
taluk contains 288 villages and two towns, Malkapur (population,
13,112), the head-quarters, and Nandura (6,669). The demand for
land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 5,24,000, and for cesses Rs. 41,000.
Malkapur lies in the fertile valley of the Puma, which bounds it on
the north, while on the south it is bounded by the hills of the Balaghat.
Malkapur Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in
Buldana District, Berar, situated in 200 53' N. and 760 15' E., on the
Nalganga, a tributary of the Puma, at an elevation of 900 feet, with
a station on the Nagpur branch of the Great Indian Peninsula Railway,
308 miles from Bombay and 213 from Nagpur. Population (1901),
13,112. Two bands or dams cross the Nalganga here, one of which is
said to have been constructed about two hundred years ago to facilitate
communication with the peth or suburb, and the other about fifty years
later to fill the town ditch with water and thus protect it from surprise
by marauders. A dilapidated rampart of dressed stone with live gates
and twenty-eight bastions surrounds the town, which is divided into
VOL. XVII. G
92 MALKAPUR TOWN
four principal quarters. One of the gates bears on it an inscription, to
the effect that it was erected in 1729 during the rule of Muhammad
Maali Khan. Malkapur is mentioned in the Ain-i-Akbari as the head-
quarters of a pargana in the sarkar of Narnala. The town is said to
have been founded about four hundred and fifty years ago by a prince
of the Fariiki house of Khandesh, and to have been named by him
after the princess (/na/ika) his daughter ; but the story is improbable,
for we have no record of any journey in this direction by Miran GhanI
Adil Khan, the Faruki prince of the period. In 1761 the town was
rich enough to pay Rs. 60,000 to the army of Raghunath Rao Peshwa,
for exemption from plunder. The Nizams used to keep a force of
about 20,000 men in this frontier district of their dominions. Daulat
Rao Sindhia and RaghujT Bhonsla were encamped near Malkapur
when the British envoy, Colonel Collins, after presenting General
Wellesley's ultimatum, quitted Sindhia's camp on August 3, 1803.
Malkapur was the scene of several petty battles between zamlndars,
rival talukdars, Rajputs, and Musalmans during the period between
the beginning of the nineteenth century and the Assignment of Berar.
A subordinate civil court is established at Malkapur, which also
contains a fa/isl/, a courthouse, schools, a dispensary, and some ginning
factories. A mosque near the kazis house is said to be older than
the town.
Mallani. — The largest district in the State of Jodhpur, Rajputana,
situated in the west of the State, with an area of 5,750 square miles.
In 1901 it contained one town, Barmer, and 464 villages, with a total
population of 172,330, of whom about 75 per cent, were Hindus,
12 per cent. Musalmans, 6 per cent. Animists, and 5 per cent. Jains.
The population in 1891 was 221,184; the decrease is due to the
famine of 1 899-1 900. The most numerous castes are the Tats, 40,000 ;
Bhils, 11,700; Rajputs, 11,400 (of whom 1,400 are Musalmans);
Mahajans, 11,000; Brahmans, 9,400; and Balais or Chamars, 8,000.
The salient feature of the country is the sandhills, which in some
places rise to an altitude of 300 to 400 feet. The northern and
western portions form part of the desert stretching into Sind and
Jaisalmer. Water is usually brackish, and in some spots deadly to man
or beast. Wells and pools yield potable water only after the rains
and become noxious by March, so that in the summer there is a great
scarcity of water and the use of a wholesome well has to be paid for.
The sandy wastes provide excellent grazing for the herds of camels,
cattle, sheep, and goats kept by a large migratory population, including
some of the hardy Baloch tribes. The only river in Mallani is the
Luni, which enters the district at Jasol and pursues a tortuous course
of about 80 miles till it passes into the Sanchor district of the State,
and thence to the Rann of Cutch. There are about 40 jhih or marshes
MALLANI 93
in the vicinity of Banner, Takhtabad, and Setrao, some of which cover
an area of 400 or 500 acres. In favourable seasons, wheat is grown in
their beds, and when they are dry they yield a good supply of water at
a depth varying from 8 to 24 feet. Fuller's earth is found in con-
siderable quantities ; and the principal manufactures are cloth of a
mixture of cotton and wool, woollen blankets, small rugs of camel hair,
millstones, and horse and camel saddlery. The horses of Mallani are
famous for their hardiness and ease of pace, and though light-boned
will carry heavy weights; the best are bred in the villages of Xagar and
Gurha. The administration of the district is in the hands of a Super-
intendent, under whom are the hakim or chief local officer ; the Munsif,
who settles civil suits and disputes about land ; and the risalddr, who
is the head of the local police. There are four vernacular schools of
long standing, and a couple of small hospitals.
Historically the tract is very interesting, and justly claims to be the
cradle of the Rathor race in the west. Here, in the beginning of the
thirteenth century, Rao Siahji and his son AsthanjT, having conquered
Kher (now a ruined village near Jasol) and the adjoining tract called
Mewo, from the Gohel Rajputs, planted the standard of the Rathors
amid the sandhills of the Luni. The eighth in succession from Siahji
was Rao Salkha, in whose time, about the middle of the fourteenth
century, a separation took place. Salkha had three sons : namely,
Mallinath, Viramdeo, and Jetmal. A portion of the tribe followed
the fortunes of Viramdeo, whose son Chonda captured Mandor from
the Parihar Rajputs in 1381, and whose descendants ruled first there
and subsequently at Jodhpur. The rest of the tribe remained on the
banks of the Luni with Salkha's eldest son, Mallinath, after whom
the district of Mallani is named. Succession following the rule of
partition, the country became minutely subdivided among the descen-
dants of Mallinath, and the dissensions and blood-feuds thereby created
offered the chiefs of Jodhpur opportunities to interfere and establish
an overlordship which continues to the present day. The district was
for centuries one continual scene of anarchy and confusion ; and the
Jodhpur Darbar, when called upon to remedy this, acknowledged its
inability. In these circumstances, in 1836, it became necessary for the
British Government to occupy Mallani and restore order by reducing
the principal Thakurs. The district was subsequently held in trust
by Government, the rights of the Jodhpur chief being recognized ; and
as the Darbar gave increasing evidence of sound administration, its
jurisdiction has been gradually restored — namely, military in 1S54.
civil in 1891, and criminal in 1898. The whole of Mallani consists
of jaglr estates, the principal being Jasol, Banner, and Sindri, hold by
descendants of Mallinath, and Nagar and Gurha, held by descendants
of Jetmal. They pay a small tribute called faujbal to the Jodhpur
g 2
94 MALLANJ
Darbar, which thus derives an income of about Rs. t8,ooo, including
a few miscellaneous items.
Mallanwan. — Town in the Bilgram tahsil of Hardoi District, United
Provinces, situated in 270 3' N. and 8o° 9' E., on the old route from
Delhi to Benares, north of the Ganges. Population (1901), 11,158.
The Shaikhs who inhabit the place claim to have come with Saiyid
Salar, and it was of some importance under native rule. In 1773
a force of the Company's troops was cantoned between Mallanwan
and Bilgram, but was removed soon after to Cawnpore. At annexation
in 1856 Mallanwan was selected as the head-quarters of a District ; but
after the Mutiny the offices were removed to Hardoi. The town is
administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about Rs.
2,700. There is a considerable manufacture of vessels of brass and
bell-metal. The school has 216 pupils, and the American Methodist
Mission has a branch in the town.
Malot (1). — Ancient fortress, now in ruins, in the District and tahsil
of Hoshiarpur, Punjab, situated in 310 50' N. and 760 E. It was founded
by a Pathan general in the reign of Bahlol LodI (1451-89), and became
under Sher Shah the capital of the tracts which now form Hoshiarpur
and Kangra Districts. In 1526 it was surrendered to Babar by Daulat
Khan, ruler of the Punjab, and in later times it fell into the hands of
the hill Rajputs.
Malot (2). — Fort and temple on a precipitous spur projecting from
the southern edge of the Salt Range, Jhelum District, Punjab, situated
in 320 42' N. and 720 50' E., about 9 miles west of Katas. The fort is
said to have been built five or six centuries ago by Raja Mai, a Janjua
chief, whose descendants still hold the village. The temple, with its
gateway, stands on the extreme edge of the cliff. They are in the
earlier Kashmir style, built of coarse red sandstone, much injured by
the action of the weather. The temple is 18 feet square inside, with
remarkable fluted pilasters and capitals, on each of which is a kneeling
figure.
{Archaeological Survey Reports, vol. v, pp. 85-90.]
Malpe. — Village and port in the Udipi taluk of South Kanara
District, Madras, situated in 130 28' N. and 740 46' E. It is the best
natural port in the District, the roadstead being sheltered by the island
of Darya Bahadurgarh. The St. Mary Isles, on which Vasco da Gama
landed in 1498 and set up a cross, lie about 3 miles to the north-west.
The Basel Mission has a tile factory here.
Malpur. — Petty State in MahI Kantha, Bombay.
Malpura. — Head-quarters of the nizamat and tahsil of the same
name in the State of Jaipur, Rajputana, situated in 26° 18' N. and
750 23' E., about 55 miles south-west of Jaipur city, and connected
with the Rajputana-Malwa Railway at Naraina by an unmetalled road
mAlur taluk a 95
about 38 miles long. Population (1901), 6,502. The town has a
more than local reputation for the namda or felt manufactured there.
Blankets, gugis, or capes with hoods worn in the rainy season, Hindu
prayer-rugs, saddle-cloths, gun-covers, and floorcloths are the chief
articles made from this material ; and they are largely exported. A ver-
nacular middle school is attended by about 120 boys, and the hospital
has accommodation for 4 in-patients. There are numerous excellent
irrigation works in this district ; among them the Tordi Sagar, a few
miles to the south of Malpura town. Completed in 1887 at a cost of
5 lakhs, this tank, when full, covers an area of over 6 square miles, and
can hold water sufficient to irrigate about 2 7 square miles. The total
expenditure up to 1904 was about 6-3 lakhs, while the total revenue
realized up to the same date was 6-4 lakhs.
Malsiras Taluka..— Taluka of Sholapur District, Bombay, lying
between 170 35' and 180 2' N. and 740 37' and 750 13' E., with an area
of 574 square miles. It contains 69 villages, the head-quarters being
at Malsiras (population, 2,263). The population in 1901 was 52,533,
compared with 74,039 in 1891. The taluka is very thinly populated,
with a density of only 92 persons per square mile, the average for the
District being 159. The demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was
i- 1 lakhs, and for cesses Rs. 8,000. Malsiras is generally flat and bare
of trees, except in the west, where there is a chain of hills. Water is
not plentiful. The chief rivers are the Nira and Bhlma. The taluka
chiefly consists of good black soil. The climate is dry and hot, and
the rainfall scanty and uncertain.
Malsiras Village. — Head-quarters of the taluka of the same name
in Sholapur District, Bombay, situated in 1 70 53' N. and 740 58' E.
Population (1901), 2,263. A weekly market is held on Tuesday. The
village contains an old Hemadpanti temple of Someshwar, and a
shrine of Hanuman, on the high road from Poona to Pandharpur,
which is much frequented by pilgrims. There is one school.
Malur Taluka. — South-western taluk of Kolar District, Mysore,
lying between 120 48' and if n' N. and 770 51' and 780 8' E., with
an area of 267 square miles. The population in 1901 was 61,908,
compared with 54,180 in 1891. The taluk contains one town, Malur
(population, 3,632), the head-quarters ; and 374 villages. The land
revenue demand in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,21,000. Malur occupies the
watershed separating the Palar and Ponnaiyar rivers. The high-lying
tracts are bare or covered with low jungle. The north-east is the most
fertile part, watered by streams flowing west to the Ponnaiyar. There
are many large tanks. Good potatoes are grown. The soil is red
and comparatively deep, mixed with sand in the south-west ; in the
east it is grey and shallow, being similar in the south, where rock
crops up.
96 MALUR VILLAGE
Malur Village. — Village in the Channapatna taluk of Bangalore
District, Mysore, situated in 130 o' N. and 77° 56' E., on the Kanva.
Population (1901), 2,515. Most of the residents are Brahmans of the
Srivaishnava sect, who give it the name Rajendrasimha-nagara. There
are several ruined temples, but a large one of Aprameyaswami is
kept in good order. The place was of importance under the Cholas.
Vijnaneswara is said to have here composed the law book Mitakshara,
his celebrated commentary on Yajnavalkya, its date being about 11 00.
Malvalli. — Taluk and town in Mysore District, Mysore. See
Malavalli.
Malvalli. — Village in Shimoga District, Mysore. See Malavalli.
Malvan Taluka. — Southern taluka of Ratnagiri District, Bombay,
lying between 160 1' and 160 19' N. and 730 27' and 730 41' E., with
an area of 238 square miles. It contains one town, Malvan (popula-
tion, 19,626), the head-quarters; and 58 villages, including Masura
(8,855) and Pendur (5,364). The population in 1901 was 107,944,
compared with 92,437 in 1891. The increase is due to the presence
of large numbers of Bombay mill-hands, whose homes are in Malvan,
and whom the closing of mills in 1901 had forced to return to their
villages. The density, 454 persons per square mile, is much above the
District average. The demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was
Rs. 89,000, and for cesses Rs. 6,000. The taluka forms a considerable
stretch of the Ratnagiri sea-board, intersected by the Kolamb and
Kalavali creeks. The interior is a series of rugged hills and rich
valleys. Rice and sugar-cane are grown along the Karli and Kalavali
creeks. The headland of Rajkot at Malvan offers a secure harbour to
small steamers and country craft which anchor in Malvan Bay, but the
bay is dangerous to vessels without a pilot. The climate is on the
whole healthy. The annual rainfall averages 88 inches. The supply
of water for drinking and other purposes is abundant. The Karli and
Kalavali creeks are navigable by small craft for 20 miles. The chief
ports on the sea-board are Devgarh, Achra, and Malvan, forming the
Malvan customs division.
Malvan Town (Maha-lava/ia, the 'Salt Marsh ').— Head-quarters
of the taluka of the same name in Ratnagiri District, Bombay, situated
in 1 6° 3' N. and 730 28' E., 70 miles south of Ratnagiri town. Popu-
lation (1901), 19,626. In a bay almost entirely blocked by rocky
reefs, there were formerly three islands. On the larger of the two outer
islands was the famous fort of Sindhudrug, and on the smaller the
ruined fort of Padmagarh. Sindhudrug or the 'ocean fort,' built by
Sivajl, was very extensive, little less than 2 miles round the ramparts.
To the Marathas it is Sivaji's cenotaph, and his image is worshipped in
the chief shrine. On what was once the inner island, now part of the
mainland, is situated, almost hidden in palms, the old town of Malvan.
MALWA AGENCY 97
The English had a factory here in 1702. The modern town of Malvan
has spread far beyond the limits of the former island. Within the
boundaries of the town, on rising ground surrounded on three sides
by the sea, is Rajkot fort. Malvan was formerly a stronghold of the
Maratha pirates, known as 'the Malwans'; but in 181 2 it was, under
the Treaty of Karvir, ceded to the British by the Raja of Kolhapur.
Towards the close of 18 12 Colonel Lionel Smith completely extirpated
the pirates. Iron ore of good quality is found in the neighbourhood.
The value of trade at the port of Malvan in 1903-4 was : imports
12 lakhs, exports 6\ lakhs. The town contains a Subordinate Judge's
Court and eleven schools, of which two are for girls.
Malwa Agency. — A collection of Native States in charge of a
Political Agent under the orders of the Agent to the Governor-
General in Central India, lying between 220 20' and 250 9' N. and
740 32' and 760 28' E. It has an area of 8,919 square miles, and is
bounded on the north and west by Ra.jputa.na ; on the south by the
Bhopawar and Indore Residency Political Charges; and on the east
by Bhopal.
The total population in 1901 was 1,054,753, of whom Hindus
numbered 839,364, or 81 per cent.; Musalmans, 107,290, or 10 per
cent.; Animists, 55,013, or 5 per cent.; Jains, 36,615, or 3 per cent.;
and Christians, 1,488. The density of population is 118 persons per
square mile. The Agency contains 15 towns, of which the chief
are Ujjain (population, 39,892), Ratlam (36,321), Jaora (23,854),
Nimach including cantonment (21,588), Mandasor (20,936), and
Dewas (15,403); and 3,847 villages.
After the conclusion of the Treaty of Mandasor with Holkar in 1818,
the local corps raised in accordance with its provisions was stationed
at Mehidpur, and the commandant received military and civil powers.
His charge comprised the whole of the Agency as it was up to
March 20, 1907, before the inclusion of the Indore Agency and the
lately transferred Indore districts, but not the Nimach district, which
was at that time included in Rajputana. After the Mutiny, Colonel
Keatinge, who was placed in political control of the country, moved
his head-quarters from time to time between Mandasor, Agar, and
Mehidpur. In i860, when the Central India Horse was regularly
constituted and stationed at Agar, the dual military and civil control
of the charge, then called the Western Malwa Agency, was entrusted
to the commandant. The civil work becoming too heavy for this
officer to deal with adequately, the Malwa Agency was created under
a separate Political officer in 1895, the head-quarters being placed at
Nimach. In 1903 the Indore State districts comprised in the charge
were handed over to the Resident at Indore. A further change was
made in March, 1907, when the Indore Agency was abolished, and the
9S MALWA AGENCY
Suites and estates directly under the Agent to the Governor-General
were transferred to the Political Agent in Malwa. In 1854, on the
first appointment of an Agent to the Governor-General, the twin States
of Dewas and several estates, of which the Thakurat of Bagli was the
most important, remained directly under the Agent to the Governor-
General, who delegated the powers of control to his First Assistant.
The increase of secretariat work at head-quarters necessitated the
abolition of this arrangement, and the charge was transferred. There
are now five States with their head-quarters in the Agency : the Hindu
twin States of Dewas, the Muhanimadan treaty State of Jaora, and the
mediatized Hindu States of Ratlam, Sitamau, and Sailana. In
addition to the above, the Political Agent also has charge of a con-
siderable portion of Gwalior territory, of the Pirawa pargana of
Toxk, and of numerous holdings under British guarantee, of which
Piploda and Bagli are the most important (see table on next page).
Among these minor holdings Panth-Piploda is peculiar, being held
directly from the British Government, without the intervention of any
Native State. The holders possess no land, but receive a cash assign-
ment levied on the income derived from ten villages situated within
the territory of various Thakurs, five of these villages being in Piploda.
The grantees have no proprietary rights whatever, receiving their cash
assignment through the Political Agent, who holds the jurisdiction over
these villages.
The Ajmer-Khandwa branch of the Rajputana-Malwa Railway, the
Ujjain-Ratlam-Godhra branch of the Bombay, Baroda, and Central
India Railway, and the Ujjain-Bhopal Railway serve the Agency. The
Agra-Bombay, Ujjain-Agar, Mhow-Nimach, Ujjain-Sehore, Agar-Sarang-
pur, Dewas-Ujjain, and Dewas-Bhopal metalled roads also traverse it.
The Political Agent exercises the usual general control over all the
States, and is a Court of Sessions for the cantonment of Nimach. He
is also the District Magistrate and Judge and Court of Sessions for
the Rajputana-Malwa, Ujjain-Nagda, and Ratlam-Godhra sections of
the Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway, from Fatehabad to
Kesarpura stations and from Ratlam to the east of the Mahi.
The Agency comprises the States, portions of States, and estates
shown in the table on the next page.
Malwa (1).— A high-level region, with an area of 7,630 square miles,
forming the greater part of the western section of the Central India
Agency, which, as one of the most fertile and habitable parts of the
Peninsula, has figured prominently in the ancient and mediaeval
periods of Indian history.
The term Malwa has at different periods been applied to somewhat
varying tracts, though Malwa proper has always constituted its main area.
Malwa proper, as understood by Hindus, consists solely of the plateau
MALWA AGENCY
9S
Name.
Title.
Caste, clan, tS;c.
Areain
square
miles.
Population,
1 901.
Total
revenue.
i. Dewas, Senior
Rs.
Branch, portion
H. H. Raja . Ponwar Maratha .
385
51,708
2,85,000
2. Dewas, Junior
Branch, portion
H.H.Raja
l . 1 Ponwar Maratha .
378
44,4IQ
2,95,000
3. Jaora
H.H.Naw,
ib '< Pathan Musalman
56S
84,202
8,50,000
4. Ratlam
H. H. Raja
t . Rathor Rajput
902
83,773
5,oo,coo
5. Sitamau .
H. H. Raja . 1 Rathor Rajput .
350
^,863
1,26,000
6. Sailana.
H. 11. Raja . Rathor Rajput
45°
25,73!
1,50,000
7. Piploda
Thakur
. Doria Rajput
60
11,441
95,000
8. Ajraoda .
Thakur
. Ponwar Maratha .
*
*
336
9. Bagli
Thakur
. Rathor Rajput
108
14.049
1,00,000
10. Bardia (Barra) .
Rao .
. Chauhan Rajput .
7
568
15,000
11. Barkhera Deo
Dungri .
Thakur
.
Rathor Rajput
4
225
2,800
12. Barkhera Panth .
Thakur
.
Rathor Rajput
5
375
4,800
13. Bhatkheri .
Rawat
i
Chandrawat Raj-
put .
1 35
1,878
15,000
14. Bhojakheil
Rao .
. Sondhia
6
250
2,000
15. liichraud I
Thakur
. ■ Chauhan Rajput .
*
*
1,200
16. Bichraud II
Thakur
.
Chauhan Rajput .
♦
*
1,500
17. Bilaud
Thakur
I
Muhammadan
Saiyid
|rt
204
6,500
18. Borkhera .
Thakur
Rathor Rajput
8
870
13.900
19. Dabri
Thakur
. Chauhan Rajput .
*
*
180
20. Datana
Thakur
. ' Jadon Rajput
♦
%
186
31. Dhulatia .
Thakur
. Khichi Rajput
*
%
1,221
I Goval Sesodia
j
418
22. Jawasia
Rao .
i
Rajput
\ \
10,000
23. Kalukhera
Rao .
.
Khichi Rajput
6
932
7,000
i Karaudia and
[ Thakur
1
jadon Rajput
10
1,469
8,000
2 4' { KheriRajapnr
Chauhan Rajput .
6
630
4,180
25. Kherwasa .
Thakur
. Rathor Rajput
5
716
1 1 .000
26. Khojankhera
Thakur
. Solanki Rajput .
5
549
6,000
27. Lalgarh
Diwan
. Chauhan Rajput .
14
1,838
18,000
28. Narwar
Rao .
. Jhala Rajput
16
1 ,4°5
19,000
29. Naugaon .
Thakur
. Jadon Rajput
*
*
114
30, Panth-Piploda .
Pandit
I I Karade DakshanI
\ Brahman .
! ■»
3,544
15,000
31. Patharl
Thakur
,
Chauhan Rajput .
15
i,436
16,000
32. PIplia
Rawat .
.
Khichi Rajput
s
600
4,000
33. Sadakherl ^Sheo-
garh)
Thakur
.
Rathor Rajput
2
445
42,000
I 34. Sanauda .
Thakur
•
Rathor Rajput
9
J43
2,200
35. Sarwan
Thakur
.
Rathor Rajput
71
4,056
42.000
36. Shujaota .
Thakur
.
Solanki Rajput .
7
319
10,000
37. Sidri .
Thakur
I
Nima Mahajan
Bania
! ■
184
3,000
38. Sirs! .
Thakur
Rathor Rajput
15
',352
25,000
39-Tal .
Rawat .
. I Doria Rajput
10
1,122
10,000
40. Unl .
Thakur
•
Doria Rajput
5
494
1,800
41. Uparwara .
Thakur
.
Solanki Rajput .
10
1,186
20,000
Portions of
42. Gwalior .
• • • • ■ •
... ...
5.246
638,290
33,49>00°
43. Indore
• •■
... ...
37
12,404
10,000
44. Tonk
• • • • # ■
... ...
248
25,2S6
1,40,000
Railways, canton
ments, and
stations .
23,77J
—
Total
8,919
1,054,753
62,38,917
Note.— The area and population of numbers 10-14. 17, iS, 2.', 25, 26, 30, 32, and 41, have
been included in their parent State. * No villages.
also
ioo MAL WA
lying between 23' 30' and 240 30' N. and 740 30' and 780 10' E., which
is terminated on the south by the great Vindhyan range, on the east
by the arm of this same range that strikes north from Bhopal to
Chanderi (the Kulachala Parvata of the Puranas), on the west by the
branch which reaches from Amjhera to Chitor (in Rajputana), and
on the north by the Mukandwara range which strikes east from Chitor
to Chanderi. Under Muhammadan rule the Subah of Malwa. included,
in addition to the tract mentioned, the Nimar district on the south,
between the Vindhya and Satpura ranges, Mewar (now in Rajputana)
on the west, Haraoti (the Hara States of Bundi and Kotah in Rajputana)
on the north, and much of the present Central Provinces on the south-
east, including even Garha Mandla.
Sindhia's possessions on this plateau, which comprise the Ujjain,
Shajapur, Mandasor, and Amjhera zilas, are known collectively as the
Malwa prant.
Malwa is always divided by natives into six divisions : Kauntel,
the country of which Mandasor is the centre ; Bagar, of which Bans-
wara State in Rajputana is the centre, and in which part of Ratlam
State lies ; Rath, the country in which the greater part of Jhabua and Jobat
States are situated ; Sondwara, the country of the Sondia tribe, of which
Mehidpur is the centre ; Umatwara, the country of the Umat Rajputs,
now represented at Rajgarh and Narsinghgarh ; and Khlchiwara, the
land of the Khichi Chauhans, of which Raghugarh State is the centre.
The plateau is mainly composed of a vast spread of basaltic rock,
which forms great rolling downs, dotted over with the fiat-topped hills
peculiar to that geological formation. The country
Physical js hjgi^y fertile, being principally covered by the soil
here called mar or kail by the natives, and ' black
cotton soil ' by Europeans. The plateau has a general slope towards
the north, the great Vindhyan scarp to its south forming the watershed.
The chief rivers are the ChaiMbal, Sipra, greater and lesser Kali
Sind, and Parbati. The people are skilful and industrious cultivators.
The principal crops are wheat, gram, Jozvdr, cotton, and poppy. Jowar
occupies about 44 per cent, of the cropped area, poppy about 6 per
cent. The annual rainfall averages 30 inches. The Rajasthani dialect
called Malwi or Rangri is spoken by nearly half of the population.
The name of the tract, more correctly Malava, was originally the
designation of a tribe, which is mentioned in the Mahabharata and
the Ramayana ; but the earliest reference to their habitation is a some-
what vague statement in the Vishnu Purana that the Malavas lived in
the Pariyatra mountains, or western Vindhyas, while the name Malava-
desa, ' country of the Malavas,' is not mentioned in any Sanskrit work
before the second century B.C., and then refers to an entirely different
locality, probably held by another section of this tribe. From these
HISTORY ,oi
rather involved accounts, it appears that the tract now known as Malwa
was not so called till the tenth century a. d., or even later. The Brihat
Sanhita, written in the sixth century, does indeed mention a country
called Malava ; but the name is not applied to the present Malwa, which
is called AvantI in the same work, while its inhabitants were known
as Avantikas or Ujjayantikas. The latter country, of which AvantI
(Ujjain) was the chief town, comprised the tract lying between the
Vindhyas on the south, Jhalrapatan (in Rajputana) on the north, the
Chambal river on the west, and the Parbati on the east. To the east
of the Parbati lay the country of Akara, or Eastern Malwa. of which
Vidisha, now Bhilsa, was the recognized capital. In the seventh
century Malwa and Ujjain were described as separate principalities
by the Chinese traveller Hiuen Tsiang, who placed the former to the
west of the latter, possibly in Gujarat. Another branch of the Malavas
appears to have occupied the country round Nagaur in Rajputana,
45 miles north of Kotah, where large numbers of their coins have been
found, dating probably from not later than the fourth century a. d.
The Malavas seem to have been at first a nomadic tribe composed
of separate units, each under its own headman, but subsequently they
formed a regular tribal constitution. They also inaugurated an era
which has long been in use among Hindus north of the Narbada, and
is now known as the Vikrama Samvat, the initial year corresponding
to 57 B.C. Till the tenth century, however, the word Vikrama is never
employed with dates given in this era, which are always designated
as of the Malava era, the era of the lords of Malava, or of the tribal
constitution of the Malavas. No historical event can be connected
with its initial year, or with the adoption of the title Vikrama,
which certainly has no connexion with any king of that name living
in 57 B.C., as is popularly supposed. All the earliest records in this
era come from Rajputana, north-west of Malwa, and the first inscrip-
tion in Malwa proper is that at Mandasok, dated in the year 493 of
the tribal constitution of the Malavas, or a. d. 436.
According to the early Buddhist books, Avantidesa was one of
the sixteen powers of India in Buddha's lifetime, its chief town, Ujjain,
being important as one of the principal stages on
the great route from the Deccan to Nepal, which
passed through Mahissati or Mahishmati, now Maheshwar, and Vidisha
or Bhilsa. The Maurya dynasty held Malwa among their western pro-
vinces, Asoka being governor during his father's lifetime, with his
head-quarters at Ujjain. On his accession he erected the great stupa
at Sanchl, where a fragment of one of his edicts has been found.
Early in the Christian era the Western Satraps extended their rule
over Malwa. The Kshatrapa, or Satrap, Chashtana is mentioned by
Ptolemy (a.d. 153), who calls him Tiastenos king of Ozene (Ujjain).
io2 MALWA
From Chashtana onwards a regular succession of Satraps ruled Malwa,
the most famous being Rudradaman, who added greatly to his domi-
nions, and whose record at Junagarh in Kathiawar (a.d. 150) mentions
that he possessed Akara and Avanti, or Eastern and Western Malwa, he
himself ruling fromUjjain, while his other provinces were held by viceroys.
As the rule of the Satraps died away, the Guptas of Magadha rose
to power. Samudra Gupta (326-75), in his Allahabad pillar inscription,
mentions the Malavas as a frontier tribe. His successor Chandra
Gupta II (375-413) extended his dominions westwards and, driving
out the Kshatrapas, annexed Malwa about a.d. 390, as his records
at Sanchi and Udayagiri show. In the next century the Gupta
empire broke up ; and, though some of the family still held petty
principalities, the greater part of the tract fell to the White Hun
adventurers, Toramana and his son Mihirakula. The White Huns
probably entered India towards the end of the fifth century, and, after
occupying the Punjab, forced their way southwards. During Skanda
Gupta's lifetime they were kept in check ; but on his death Toramana
occupied the districts round Gwalior, where an inscription put up
by his son Mihirakula has been found. Advancing farther southwards,
Toramana and his son soon obtained a footing in Malwa, which by
500 was entirely in their power, the petty Gupta chiefs Budha Gupta
and Bhanu Gupta, of whom records dated 484 and 510 exist, becoming
their feudatories. On Toramana's death about 510, Mihirakula suc-
ceeded ; but his harsh rule caused a revolt, and about 528 he was
defeated by a combination of native princes under Nara Sinha Gupta
Baladitya of Magadha, and Yasodharman, a chief who seems to have
ruled at Mandasor, where the battle was fought. Yasodharman erected
two pillars at Mandasor, recording his victory, and appears then to
have become one of the principal chiefs in Malwa.. In the seventh
century the famous king Harshavardhana of Kanauj (606-48) held
suzerainty over Malwa.
It is uncertain when the Malavas actually entered the tract. From
the second to the seventh century, while the country was under the
strong rule of the Kshatrapas, the Guptas, and Harshavardhana of
Kanauj, they must have held a subordinate position ; but on the fall
of the brief empire of Kanauj they probably acquired greater inde-
pendence, and rising in importance gave their name to the region.
What exactly happened is uncertain ; but it would appear that the
Malavas became gradually Hinduized, possibly from contact with
the Brahman rulers of Ujjain, and being a hardy race of warriors, and
as such desirable allies, were promoted to Kshattriya rank, and finally
absorbed into the great Rajput families which then began to be evolved
out of the heterogeneous elements of which the population of India
was composed.
HISTORY 103
In the tenth century the names of the Rajput clans begin to appear,
and Malwa fell ultimately to the Paramaras (800-1200), a section
of the Agnikula group, who fixed their head-quarters first at Ujjain
and later at Dhar. They rose to considerable power, so that ' the
world is the Paramara's ' became a common saying. The Paramara
lists give a line of nineteen kings whose known records range from
the tenth to the thirteenth century, and of whom several were famous
for their patronage of literature. The most notable was Raja Bhoja
(1010-53), who was both a great scholar and a great warrior. His
renown as a patron of literature and as an author still survives, and
he is now looked on as the Augustus of India, while many ancient
writers of note and works of merit are assigned to his period. He
was finally driven from his throne by a combination of the Chalukyas
of Anhilvada in Gujarat and the Kalachuris of Tripuri. From this
time the Paramara power declined, his successors being little more than
local chiefs.
In 1235 the Muhammadans first appeared under Altamsh, who took
Ujjain, demolishing the renowned temple of Mahakal, and sacked
Bhllsa, thus destroying the two principal towns of Malwa. From this
time the country was held in fief, with occasional lapses, by officers
of the Muhammadan court, till in 1401 Dilawar Khan assumed the
insignia of royalty.
From 1 40 1 till 1531, when it was annexed to Gujarat, the province
of Malwa or Mandu, as it was often called after the famous fortress
which became its capital under these rulers, remained an independent
State. Its princes were incessantly at war with those of Gujarat, with
the Bahmani kings of the Deccan, and with other neighbouring chiefs.
Dilawar Khan Ghori (140 1-5) had originally received Malwa as a fief
under Flroz Shah ; but during the confusion that followed the invasion
of Tlmur he became independent, making Dhar the capital of his
kingdom. He was succeeded by his son Alp Khan, better known
as Hoshang Shah (1405-34), the founder of Hoshangabad, who lies
buried in a magnificent marble tomb in the fort at Mandu, to which
place he moved the capital. He left a minor son, Muhammad Ghazni
Khan, whom his guardian, Mahmud KhiljT, promptly murdered, seizing
the throne for himself. Under Mahmud Khilji's rule (1436-75) Malwa
reached the zenith of its power. His activity was unceasing, so that
it was said of him that his tent became his home and the field of battle
his resting-place, and yet his administration was marked by the absence
of all enmity between Hindus and Muhammadans. Mahmud extended
his dominions in all directions, seizing among other places Ajmer and
Ranthambhor in Rajputana, and Ellichpur in the Deccan ; and in
1440, at the invitation of certain nobles, he even advanced against
Delhi, but was successfully opposed by Bahlol Lodi. In 1440 he
to4 MALWA
attacked Rana Kumbha of Chitor. Both sides claimed the victory,
and the Rana erected the famous Tower of Victory, still standing in
the fort, in honour of his success. Mahmud was succeeded by his
son, Ghiyas-ud-dln (147 5-1 500). Having undergone much toil and
anxiety during his father's lifetime, Ghiyas-ud-din soon handed over the
reins of government to his son, Nasir-ud-dln, and retired to his harem.
Nasir-ud-din (1500-10) has left a reputation infamous for cruelty.
He is said even to have poisoned his father, an act which roused such
indignation in the emperor Jahangir that, when visiting Mandu in
16 1 6, he had the king's remains taken out of the tomb and thrown
into the Narbada. Nasir-ud-din was drowned in a tank in the Kaliadeh
palace, near Ujjain, into which he had fallen in a drunken fit, no one
daring or caring to pull him out. He was succeeded by Mahmud II
(1510-31). Of him the historian relates that he imagined that king-
doms were ruled by the sword, and that he attempted to put this
maxim into practice with dire results. Distrusting his own people,
he introduced a Rajput, Medini Rai, into his State as minister. In
1517, scared by the increasing power of this man, he called in Sultan
Muzaffar Shah of Gujarat to assist in his expulsion. Later on, in
a fight with Medini Rai and Rana Sanga of Chitor, he was taken
prisoner, but was magnanimously released. This, however, did not
deter him from attacking the Rana's successor some years later, when
he was again taken prisoner by the Rana's ally, Bahadur Shah of
Gujarat, and put to death while attempting to escape. The Malwa
dynasty thus came to an end, the kingdom being annexed to Gujarat
(i53i)-
In 1535 Humayun attacked Bahadur Shah and drove him out of
Malwa, defeating him successively at Mandasor and Mandu. During
the rule of the Suri dynasty (1540-55), Malwa was held by Sher Shah's
right-hand man Shujaat Khan, known locally by the name of Shujawal
Khan, the founder of Shujalpur, and on his death by his son Baz
Bahadur, chiefly famous for his musical talent, and his romantic attach-
ment to the beautiful and accomplished Rupmatl of Sarangpur. In
1562 Baz Bahadur was forced to submit to Akbar, and Malwa became
a Mughal province, continuing so until the eighteenth century. Abul
Fazl deals with the province at some length in the Ain-i-Akban. The
Silbah varied considerably in extent at different times. In 1594 it
contained twelve sarkars (districts), but in 1665 it had only nine.
Malwa possessed special importance from its position on the great
Mughal route, along which armies marched from Delhi to the Deccan,
the road passing by Dholpur, Gwalior, Narwar, Sironj, and Hindia.
Among the numerous governors of Malwa during this period were
prince Murad (1591), the first Nizam-ul-mulk (17 19), and Maharaja
Sawai Jai Singh of Jaipur (1734).
MAMANDUR 105
The Maratha period of Malwa history forms the subject of Sir fohn
Malcolm's Central India, where it is treated in great detail. Briefly,
the Marathas gained a permanent footing in Malwa about 1743, when
the Peshwa was made deputy-governor of the Subah. By degrees the
whole country fell to the great Maratha generals, whose descendants
still hold most of it — Sindhia of Gwalior, Holkar of Indore, and the
Ponwars of Dhar and Dewas.
In the middle of the eighteenth century the British appeared as
actors on this scene; and Malwa from 1780 onwards, for a quarter
of a century, was a vast battle-field where Maratha, Muhammadan, and
European struggled incessantly, until the supremacy of the British was
finally established in 1818. During the next forty years the history
of Malwa was comparatively uneventful ; but in connexion with the
Mutiny of 1S57 risings took place at Indore, Mhow, Nlmach, Agar,
Mehidpur, and Sehore. In 1 899-1 900 Malwa suffered from a severe
famine, such as had not visited this favoured spot for more than thirty
years. The people were unused to, and quite unprepared for, this
calamity, the distress being aggravated by the great influx of immigrants
from Rajputana, who had hitherto always been sure of relief in this
region, of which the fertility is proverbial. In 1903 a new calamity
appeared in the shape of plague, which has seriously reduced the
agricultural population in some districts.
[For Malavas and Kshatrapas, see Journal of the Royal Asiatic
Society, 1890, p. 639, 1897, p. 17, and 1899, p. 357 ; for Guptas and
Hunas, J. F. Fleet's ' Gupta Inscriptions,' vol. iii of the Corpus Inscrip-
tionum Indicarum ; Journal Asiatique, 1883 ; Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society, 1893, p. 77, and 1897, pp. 19, 421, 850, and 882 ; for
Paramaras, Epigraphia Indica, vol. i, p. 222 ; for Muhammadan dynasty,
L. White-King, Numismatic Chronicle (1904).]
Malwa (2). — Tract in the Punjab, lying between 290 and 310 N.
and 740 30' and 770 E., and comprising the area south of the Sutlej
occupied by the Sikhs. It includes the Districts of Ferozepore and
Ludhiana, and the Native States of Patiala, Jind, Nabha, and Maler
Kotla. The tract is a great recruiting ground for Sikh regiments,
being in this respect second only to the Manjha. It is said that the
name is a modern one, the title of Malava Singh having been conferred
on the Sikhs of the tract for their valour by Banda, Bairagi, who pro-
mised that it should become as fruitful as Malwa..
Mamandur. — Village in the Arcot taluk of North Arcot District,
Madras, situated in I2°45/ N. and 790 40' E. Population (1901), 1,884.
It is chiefly remarkable for its rock-caves. The embankment of the
large tank to which the village gives its name rests upon two low hills,
and in the eastern face of the more southerly of these are the
excavations. They were probably the work of the Jains ; and possibly
io6 MAMANDUR
a party of monks from Conjeeveram, which is only 7 miles distant, may
here have hollowed out for themselves a retreat with narrow cells into
which each might retire to indulge in solitary meditation.
Mamdapur. — Historic village in the District and tahika of Bijapur,
Bombay, situated in 160 32' N. and 750 36' E., 6 miles north of the
Kistna and about 22 miles south-west of Bijapur town. Population
(1901), 2,232. The story goes that Muhammad (1626-56), the sixth
Bijapur Sultan, wished to know what the Konkan was like. His prime
minister, the celebrated Jagad-Murari, built ponds, laid out fields, and
planted trees and vegetables from the Konkan on the site of Mamda-
pur, which so pleased the Sultan that, about 1633, he united the
villages of Antapur, Barigi, Khasbagh, and Chavdapur, and named
the new village after himself, fulfilling the prophecy of a saint, Kamal
Sahib of Chavdapur, who had foretold the event. The saint's tomb
is in the middle of the market and is highly honoured. In the shrine
is the grave of another saint, Sadie Sahib of Mecca, who died here and
in whose honour a fair is held yearly. There are numerous temples.
Mamdapur contains two lakes made by Sultan Muhammad, when
the town was built. The great lake is probably the largest existing
reservoir of native construction in the Bombay Presidency. When full,
its surface area is 864 acres, or \\ square miles; the dam is 2,662 feet
long, or just over half a mile, and its greatest height is 27 feet 9 inches.
Except in seasons of unusual drought the water in this lake lasts
throughout the year. The smaller lake, to the east of the large lake,
when full has a surface area of 428 acres and a greatest depth of
12 feet; the dam is 1,180 feet long. The inscriptions cut on the
dams show that both were built in 1633 at a cost of about 2 lakhs
(50,000 pagodas) by Sultan Muhammad.
Mamdot Estate {Muhammadof). — Estate in the Ferozepore,
Muktsar, and Fazilka tahslls of Ferozepore District, Punjab. Area,
83 square miles of proprietary land, with 309 held in jagir. It is held
by the minor Nawab of Mamdot, Ghulam Kutb-ud-din Khan, a Pathan,
whose ancestor Kutb-ud-din Khan held the principality of Kasur, but
was expelled from it by RanjTt Singh in 1807 and retired to Mamdot,
which he had conquered from the Raikot chief in 1800. His son •
Jamal-ud-dln Khan held Mamdot as a fief of the Lahore kingdom
till 1848, when he received the title of Nawab, with the powers of
a ruling chief, from the British Government ; but the powers thus
conferred were abused by Jamal-ud-dln Khan, and were therefore
withdrawn, the State being annexed to British territory in 1855. It
was, however, subsequently conferred as an estate on the Nawab's
younger brother Jalal-ud-din Khan, who had rendered good service
in 1848 and 1857. Jalal-ud-din died in 1875, leaving a minor son,
by name Nizam-ud-dln Khan, and the estate was managed by the
MAN io7
Court of Wards until 1884, when the ward came of age and took
charge of it. He died in 1891, leaving an infant son and the estate
heavily involved in debt. It is now again under control of the Court
of Wards, and the young Nawab is being educated at the Aitchison
College, Lahore. The gross income of the estate, which is the finest
in the Punjab, is now Rs. 3,80,000. It owes its prosperity mainly to
the Grey Canals.
Mamdot Village.— Village in Ferozepore District, Punjab, and
former capital of a State, situated in 300 53' N. and 740 26' E., on the
open plain, about 2 miles south of the Sutlej. Population (1901),
2,631. The walls rise to a height of 50 feet, and have a rectangular
form, with a round tower at each corner and in the middle of each
face. More than two-thirds of the fort was carried away in 1877-8 by
the Sutlej, and a branch of that river now flows under the walls of the
remainder. Anciently known as Muhammadot, it formed the centre
of an ilaka, which became depopulated during the Mughal period and
was occupied by the Dogars about 1750. Shortly afterwards, the
Dogars made themselves independent, but were reduced to subjec-
tion by Sardar Subha Singh, a Sikh chieftain. With the assistance of
the Rai of Raikot, they expelled the Sikhs ; but the Rai made him-
self supreme at Mamdot, and the Dogars then revolted with the aid of
Nizam-ud-dm and Kutb-ud-dln of Kasur. Nizam-ud-dTn was murdered
by his three brothers-in-law, whom he had ousted from their jaglrs.
Kutb-ud-dln eventually submitted to Ranjit Singh, relinquishing Kasur,
but retaining Mamdot in jagir subject to the service of 100 horse.
Nizam-ud-dln's son received a corresponding jagir in Gogaira, but laid
claim to Mamdot. With the Dogars' aid he expelled Kutb-ud-dln, but
was finally recalled by the Maharaja, who confirmed Jamal-ud-din, son
of Kutb-ud-dln, in the succession. Jamal-ud-din sided openly with the
Sikhs in 1845, Dut rendered certain services towards the close of the
campaign to the British Government, which requited him by maintain-
ing him in possession of Mamdot as a protected chief with the title
of Nawab. Jamal-ud-din, however, was guilty of serious misgovern-
ment, and the Dogars especially, having incurred his resentment,
suffered grave oppression. The British Government therefore, after
an inquiry, deposed him in 1855, and annexed his territory. His
estates were in 1864 conferred on his brother Jalal-ud-din, to the exclu-
sion of his sons. The present Nawab, Ghulam Kutb-ud-dln, wtio
succeeded in 1891, is the grandson of Jalal-ud-din .
Man. — Tahika of Satara District, Bombay, lying between 170 27'
and 17° 56' N. and 740 17' and 740 53' E., with an area of 629 square
miles. It contains one town, Mhasvad (population, 7,014), and
76 villages. The head-quarters are at Dahivadi. The population
in 1901 was 64,889, compared with 62,857 in 1891. It is the most
VOL. XVII. n
10S MAN
thinly populated tdluka in the District, having a density of only
103 persons per square mile. The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 92,000, and for cesses Rs. 7,000. The climate is
decidedly hotter than the rest of the District, which is chiefly due to
the low level of the tdluka and the fact of its being shut in on three
sides by hills. Towards the north-west the hills form picturesque
groups, their highest peaks crowned by the Varugarh and Tathvada
forts, and to the east of Dahivadi is a fine gorge, traversed by streams ;
but, except for a sparsely-wooded tract near the Man river, the country
is barren, rocky, and desolate. The annual rainfall, which averages
20 inches at Dahivadi, is variable and scanty, and hardly suffices for
the proper cultivation of the small area of black soil in the tdluka.
Mana. — Village in Garhwal District, United Provinces, situated in
310 5' N. and 790 26' E., on the Saraswati, an affluent of the Bishan-
ganga, 10,560 feet above sea-level. It lies close to a pass of the same
name, also known as Chirbitya-la or Dungri-la, which has an elevation
of 18,650 feet. Though very lofty, it is one of the easiest passes into
Tibet from the south, and is therefore much used by Hindu pilgrims
to Lake Manasarowar. The village is chiefly inhabited by Bhotia
traders with Tibet.
Manaar, Gulf of. — A portion of the Indian Ocean, bounded on the
west by Tinnevelly and Madura Districts in the Madras Presidency, on
the north by the ridge of rock and islands known as Adam's Bridge,
and on the east by the coast of Ceylon. It lies between 8° and 90 N.
and 7 8° and 8o° E. Its extreme breadth from Cape Comorin, the
southernmost point of India, to Point de Galle, the southernmost point
of Ceylon, is about 200 miles. The gulf abounds in dangerous shoals
and rocks at the northern extremity, and is exposed to the fury of both
the monsoons, being quite open towards the south-west and only
partially protected by the Ceylon coast on the north-east.
Manabum. — Range of hills on the extreme eastern frontier of
Lakhimpur District, Assam, lying between 270 30' and 270 47' N. and
950 54' and 960 18' E. These hills are an outlying spur of the mountain
country occupied by the Singphos and Khamtis, and mark the eastern
limit of the administrative jurisdiction of the British Government.
Manantoddy. — Village in the Wynaad taluk of Malabar District,
Madras, situated in ii° 49' N. and 760 E. Population (1901), 2,000.
It is the head-quarters of the divisional officer and tahsilddr, and of
one of the two Forest officers of the District.
Manar, Gulf of. —Gulf between India and Ceylon. See Manaar,
Gulf of.
Manargudi. —Subdivision, taluk, and town in Tanjore District,
Madras. See Mannargudi.
Manas. — River of Assam, which rises in the Bhutan hills and
MANAVADAR log
enters the valley of the Brahmaputra at the point where the Districts of
Kamrup and Goalpara meet. It once formed the boundary between
these, but its channel is subject to frequent changes, and the greater
part of its present course lies within Goalpara. The principal tribu-
taries are : on the right bank, the Makra, Dulani, Ai, Pomajan,
Bhandura, and Koija; and on the left bank, the Chaulkhoa. The
banks are, as a rule, covered with jungle ; and the river is not much
used as a trade route above its junction with the Chaulkhoa, though
boats of 4 tons burden could probably go as far as Mowkhoa at all
seasons of the year. Some damage is caused by the floods of an
old channel known as the Mora Manas. The total length of the
Manas is about 200 miles.
Manasa. — Town in the Rampura-Bhanpura district of Indore State,
Central India, and head-quarters of the pargana of the same name,
situated in 24° 29/ N. and in 750 n' E., 1,440 feet above sea-level.
Population (1901), 4,589. The town is said to have been founded
by Mana Patel of the Mina tribe. From an inscription in the temple
to Kherapati, it must have been in existence in .the twelfth century.
In 1749 it was held by Raja Madho Singh of Jaipur, falling to Holkar
in 1752 with the Rampura district. Besides the pargana offices,
a school, a dispensary, a State post office, and an inspection bunga-
low are situated in the town.
Manauli. — Estate in the Kharar and Rupar tahslls of Ambala
District, Punjab, with an area of 1 1 square miles. It was the prin-
cipal jagir held till recently by a member of the Faizullahpuria or
Singhpuria family, which was one of the twelve great Sikh misls or
confederacies. Founded early in the eighteenth century by Kapur
Singh, a Jat of Amritsar District, the family played a great part in
the Jullundur Doab under his great-nephew, Budh Singh. In 181 r,
however, the Singhpurias were expelled from their territories north
of the Sutlej by Ranjit Singh's generals, and confined to the estates
south of that river, which they still hold. From 1809 to 1846 the
family ranked as independent protected chiefs, but they lost their
status in the latter year. The last owner, Sardar Raghubir Singh,
held 81 villages in jagir. These yield a net revenue of Rs. 36,000,
and the Sardar had also other estates. After his death in 1904, the
jagir was divided among a number of his relatives.
Manaung. — Island forming part of Kyaukpyu District, Lower
Burma. See Cheduba.
Manavadar (or Bantva-Manavadar). — State in the Kathiawar Politi-
cal Agency, Bombay, lying between 210 23' and 210 41' X. and 700
2' and 700 23' E., with an area of 90 square miles. The population
in 1901 was 14,478, residing in 23 villages. The revenue in 1903-4
was Rs. 2,35,447, and S3 square miles were cultivated. Manavadar
h 2
no MANAVADAR
ranks as a third-class State in Kathiawar. The ruling family is Musal-
man, and is descended from a younger son of the second Nawab of
Junagarh, to whom the Bantva territory was made over in 1740.
Engagements to keep order and remain at peace were entered into
with the British Government in 1807. There are two sharers with
the ruling chief, both holding the title of Babi, one of whom re-
sides at Sardargarh and the other at Bantva.
Manavan. — Petty State in Kathiawar, Bombay.
Manbhum.— District in the Chota Nagpur Division of Bengal,
lying between 220 43' and 240 4' N. and -85° 49' and 86° 54' E.,
with an area of 4,147 square miles. It is bounded on the north
by Hazaribagh and the Santal Parganas ; on the east by Burdwan,
Bankura, and Midnapore ; on the south by Singhbhum ; and on
the west by Ranch! and Hazaribagh. The whole of the northern
boundary is marked by the Barakar river; on the north-east, the
Barakar and Damodar rivers separate the District from Burdwan ;
while the Subarnarekha flows along the boundary for short distances
on the west and south.
Manbhum District forms the first step of a gradual descent from
the table-land of Chota Nagpur to the delta of Lower Bengal. The
undulation so characteristic of Chota Nagpur here
Physical becomes less pronounced, and level tracts of con-
3.SD6CtS
siderable extent are of frequent occurrence. In
the north and east the country is open, and consists of a series of
rolling downs, dotted here and there with isolated conical hills.
During the hot season the scarcity of trees gives to this part of the
country a scorched and dreary appearance ; but in the rains the fresh
green of the young rice and the varying foliage of the low jungle
form contrasts of colouring with the soil, and the scenery assumes
a park-like aspect. In the west and south the country is more broken
and the scenery far more picturesque. Here the Baghmundi range
striking out from the plateau of Chota Nagpur, and farther to the
south the Dalma range dividing Manbhum from Singhbhum, stand
up as commanding features in the landscape. These hills are covered
almost to their summits with large and heavy forest. The principal
hills are Dalma (3,407 feet), the highest peak of the range of that
name; Panchkot or Panchet (1,600 feet), situated to the north-east
of Purulia ; and Gangabari or Gajburu, the highest peak of the Bagh-
mundi plateau, situated about 20 miles south-west from Purulia.
The principal river is the Kasai, which flows through the District
from north-west to south-east and then turns almost due south as
it passes into Midnapore; the total length of its course is about
171 miles. Just above Raipur the Kasai forms rapids and several
picturesque waterfalls of no great height. The Damodar flows
MANBHUM rrr
through Manbhum in an easterly direction with a slight inclination
to the south. Its chief tributary, the Barakar, has already been
mentioned as forming part of the north-eastern boundary of the
District, and the Subarnarekha as dividing it on the west and south
from Ranch! and Singhbhum. The only other rivers of any impor-
tance are the Dhalkisor, which rises in the east of Manbhum and
after a short south-easterly course enters Bankura; and the Silai,
also rising in the east of the District and flowing south-east into
Bankura.
The geological formations are the Archaean and the Gondwana.
The Archaean rocks consist of gneiss and crystalline schists, the
gneiss occupying by far the largest portion of the District. It be-
longs principally to the group known as Bengal gneiss, which is
remarkable for its varied composition, consisting of successive bands
of intermixed granitic, granulitic, and dioritic gneisses, and micaceous
chloritic and hornblendic schists, with a laminated or foliated structure
striking usually east and west. About the centre of the District is
a great belt of unfoliated or only slightly foliated granitic intrusions,
also striking east and west, and extending westwards into the adjacent
District of Ranchl. Crystalline limestones occasionally occur. Along
the southern boundary there exists a group of rocks resembling the
Dharwar schists of Southern India, which were originally sedimentary
and volcanic, but have been altered into quartzites, quartzitic sand-
stones, slates of various kinds, hornblendic mica, and talcose and
chloritic schists, the latter passing into potstones, green stones, and
epidiorites.
Quite close to the southern boundary of Manbhum the schists
are invaded by a gigantic dike of basic igneous rock, forming an
imposing east and west range which culminates in the lofty Dalma
hill. The schists are here more metamorphosed than elsewhere, with
a considerable development of iron ores ; in this neighbourhood,
moreover, the rocks are richest in gold.
The Gondwanas, whose age as determined by fossil plants is partly
upper palaeozoic and partly mesozoic, are the principal rocks from
an economic point of view. They occur along the Damodar river
and form the Ranlganj coal-field, the western portion of which lies
in Manbhum, and the rich Jherria coal-field almost entirely situated
within the District. The Gondwana rocks comprise the Mahadeva,
Panchet, Ramganj, ironstone shales, Barakar, and Talcher divisions,
of which all but the first belong to the Lower Gondwanas. The
series consists throughout almost exclusively of shales and sand-
stones. The coal seams are restricted to the Barakar and Ranlganj
divisions.
The coal-fields owe their preservation from denudation and their
1 1 2 MANBHUM
present situation to a system of faults that has sunk them amidst
the surrounding gneiss. The faults are easily recognized along their
boundaries, especially on the south, and sulphurous hot springs are
often situated in their neighbourhood. Innumerable fissures are occu-
pied by intrusive dikes of basalt and of mica-apatite-peridotite, the
latter being frequently detrimental to the coal seams, which have often
been burnt away by it. These intrusions are of the same age as the
volcanic rocks of the Rajmahal hills1.
The narrower valleys are often embanked for rice cultivation, and
the rice-fields and their margins abound in marsh and water plants.
The surface of the plateau land between the valleys, where level, is
often bare and rocky, but where undulating is usually clothed with
a dense scrub jungle, in which Dendrocalamus strictus is prominent.
The steep slopes of the higher hills are covered with a dense forest
mixed with climbers. Sal (Shorea robustd) is gregarious ; among the
other noteworthy trees are species of Buchanania, Semecarpus, Ter-
minalia, Cedrela, Cassia, Butea, Bauhinia, Acacia, and Aditia, which
these forests share with similar ones on the lower Himalayan slopes.
Mixed with these, however, are a number of characteristically Central
India trees and shrubs, such as Cochlospermum, Soymida, Boswellia,
Hardwickia, and Bassia, which do not cross the Gangetic plain. One
of the features of the upper edge of the hills is a dwarf palm, Phoe?iix
acaulis ; while the wealth of scarlet blossom in the hot season pro-
duced by the abundance of Butea frondosa and B. stiperba is also
striking.
Tigers, leopards, bears, wolves, hyenas, deer, and wild dogs were
formerly common, but are now decreasing in numbers, tigers being
very rare visitors. The short-tailed Indian pangolin {Manis penta-
dactyld), which owing to its peculiar habits is one of the least-known
quadrupeds in India, is occasionally found in the jungles bordering
on Singhbhum.
Temperature is moderate, except during the hot months of April.
Ma}', and June, when the westerly winds from Central India cause
great heat with very low humidity. The mean temperature increases
from S20 in March to 890 in April, May, and June, the mean maximum
from 950 in March to 1010 in May, and the mean minimum from
68° to 760. The annual rainfall averages 53 inches, of which 8-9 inches
fall in June, 13-4 in July, 13-2 in August, and 7-8 in September.
1 The Archaean series has been described by V. Ball, Memoirs, Geological ' Swvey of
India, vol. xviii, pt. ii ; the Ranlganj coal-field by W. T. Blanford, Memoirs, vol. iii,
pt. i ; the Jherria coal-field by Th. Hughes. Memoirs, vol. v, pt. iii, and by Th. "Ward,
Records, Geological Survey of India, vol. xxv, pt. ii ; the mica-apatite-peridotites by
T. H. Holland, Records, vol. xxvii, pt. iv.
The above account was contributed by Mr. E. Vredenburg of the Geological Survev
of India.
HISTORY n3
The distinctive tribe of the District is the Bhumij, who are closely
allied to the Mundas and have been identified with the Bajra Bhumi
of Jain legendary history. The ancient Jains have
left their traces in the ruins of temples near Purulia
and several places along the course of the Kasai and Damodar rivers ;
but we have no authentic records of this part of the country till
Muhammadan times, when it was regarded as part of the Jharkand
or 'forest tract," which is the name given in the Akbarnama to the
whole region from Blrbhum and Panchet to Ratanpur in the Central
Provinces and from Rohtasgarh in South Bihar to the frontier of Orissa.
In the Badshahnama the zavundar of Panchet is shown as a com-
mander of horse under Shah Jahan, and his zamlndari was subject
to a fixed peshkash. The territory comprised in the present District
of Manbhum was acquired by the British with the grant of the Dlwani
of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa in 1765. Up to 1805 the estates con-
tained in it were attached, some to Birbhum and some to Midnapore ;
but in that year they were formed with a few others into a separate
District called the Jungle Mahals. In 1832 one Ganga Narayan,
a claimant to the Barabhum estate in this District, rose in rebellion,
but was driven to Singhbhum, where he died. As a result of these
disturbances, a change of administration was determined upon, and
by Regulation XIII of 1833 the District of the Jungle Mahals was
broken up ; the estates of Senpahari, Shergarh, and Bishnupur were
transferred to Burdwan, while the remainder, with the estate of Dhal-
bhum detached at the same time from Midnapore, were formed into
the present District of Manbhum, which was withdrawn from the
regular system of administration and placed under an officer called
the Principal Assistant to the Agent to the Governor-General for the
South-West Frontier. Subsequently, by Act XX of 1854, his title
was changed to Deputy-Commissioner, and that of the Governor-
General's Agent to Commissioner of Chota Xagpur. Dhalbhiim had
again been transferred to Singhbhum eight years previous to this,
and the District of Manbhum was reduced to its present area by
further transfers of minor importance in 187 1 and 1S79. When the
District was first constituted, the civil station was fixed at Manbazar,
but it was transferred to Purulia in 1838. During the Mutiny of
1857 the military garrison at Purulia, which consisted of 64 sepoys
of the Ramgarh battalion and 12 sowars, all Hindustanis, plundered
the treasury, released the prisoners in the jail, burnt the records,
and then marched off towards Ranch!.
The District contains several interesting archaeological remains.
The most ancient of these are ascribed to the Jain Saraks, including
ruins at Palma, Charra, Pakbira, where a temple, belonging probably
to the seventh century, contains a statue of the Jain hierarch ArnanSth,
' 14
.WAXfiffU.V
and Deoli, where there is a group of temples, one containing a fine
Jain figure now also known as Arnanath. Instances of early Brah-
manical architecture occur in the villages of Para and Katras. A group
of temples at TelkupT on the Damodar belongs apparently to the early
part of the Muhammadan period. Other interesting ruins exist at
Dalmi, Boram, and Panchet.
The population increased from 820,521 in 1S72 to 1,058,228 in 18S1,
to 1,193,328 in 1891, and to 1,301,364 in 1901. This rapid growth is
due mainly to the healthiness of the climate and
the fecundity of the aboriginal tribes who form the
majority of the inhabitants ; in 1881 it was also due in part to better
enumeration, while recently the natural increase has been assisted by
the opening up of the country by railways and the growth of the coal
industry. Blindness and leprosy are exceptionally common.
The principal statistics of the Census of 1901 are shown below : —
Population.
Subdivision.
V
I*
rt
a
V
t-
<
Number of
Population.
Population per
square mile
0 c c o
0
0 -Ji-i
a
Villages.
Percentag
variation
populatic
between I
and iqo
Number
persons ab
read am
write.
Pnrulia
Gobindpur .
District total
3-344
803
3
4,273
1,248
1,024,242
277,122
306
345
+ 5.4 I 42,323
+ 25-1 10.104
4>i47
3
5.52 1
I;30I,364
314
+ 9.1
52,427
The three towns are Purulia, the head-quarters, Jhalida, and
Raghunathpur. The density is greatest in the alluvial tract along
the banks of the Damodar ; in the broken country in the north-west
and south the inhabitants are fewer, except in the neighbourhood
of the Jherria coal-field, where the .mines attract large numbers of
coolies. The Jherria and Topchanchi thanas in the north-west, which
contain the greater number of the collieries, grew by 75 and 30 per
cent, respectively during the decade ending 1901, accounting between
them for over 45 per cent, of the total increase. A large number of
immigrants, chiefly from Hazaribagh, Bihar, and the United Provinces,
come to work in the mines ; but the emigrants, more than half of
whom were enumerated in Assam, exceed the immigrants by over
74,000. The vernacular of the District is the western dialect of
Bengali known as Rarhi boli. Along the western border this merges
into Hindi, the dialect spoken being locally known as Karmali or
Khotta, or even Khotta Bangala. SantalT is spoken by 182,000 persons.
Hindus number 1,132,619, or 87 per cent, of the total; Animists,
103,011, or 7-9 per cent. ; and Muhammadans, 62,799, or 4'°* Per cent.
The aboriginal element is strongly represented, the most numerous
tribes being the Santals (195,000, of whom 96,000 were returned as
AGRICULTURE
1 1 1
Hindus, and 99,000 as Animists), Bhumijs (109,000), and K<
(22,000). Many of the lower Hindu castes consist to a great extent of
aboriginal elements; such are the Bauris (99,000), Bhuiyas (37,000),
Raj wars (32,000), and Doms (19,000), and probably also the Kurmis
(241,000), the most numerous caste in the District. Agriculture sup-
ports 67 per cent, of the population, industries 11-7 per cent., and the
professions 1-3 per cent.
Christians number 2,910, of whom 2,599 are natives. The German
Evangelistic Lutheran Mission, which began work in 1864, maintains
schools and also works among the lepers ; while a mission of the Free
Church of Scotland in the Gobindpur subdivision has a community
of 700.
The surface consists of a succession of rolling uplands with inter-
vening hollows, along which the drainage runs off to join the larger
streams. The soil is for the most part composed of
hard, dry, ferruginous gravel, which has been furrowed
into countless small channels by the discharge of surface drainage ; but
many of the lower levels are filled with good alluvial soil. The lower
slopes of these uplands, and the swampy ground between, supply the
only land on which a wet rice crop can be grown without elaborate
levelling and embanking. The hill-sides, when terraced for rice cul-
tivation, present the appearance of a series of steps varying from 1 to 5
feet in height. In some cases the beds of streams are banked up at
intervals and made into long narrow rice fields.
The chief agricultural statistics for 1903-4 are shown below, areas
being in square miles : —
Agriculture.
Subdivision.
Total.
Cultivated.
Cultivable
waste.
Forest.
Purulia
Gobindpur
Total
3-344
803
1,48a
47°
161
51
I I
4
4.-'47
1.955
212 15
It is estimated that 10 per cent, of the cultivated area is twice
cropped. The most important staple is rice, which covers an area
of 1,428 square miles. Two principal crops are grown : the nuan or
aus, which is sown broadcast as soon as possible after the first good
fall of rain and reaped at the end of September ; and the haimantik or
dman, which is sown in a nursery about the end of Ma}- and afterwards
transplanted and finally reaped from November to January. A third
but less important crop, the summer rice or gorddhaiK is sown broad-
cast in May on table-lands and tops of ridges, and is reaped in August.
The first two crops are grown only on lands where there is a good
supply of water. Other important cereals are maize grown mi
n6 MANBHUM
172 square miles, marud, bdjra, wheat, and barley. Green crops and
pulses — including gram, mung, kalai, rahar, peas, kkesari, beans, kurthi,
and masuri — are cultivated on 245 square miles. Among oilseeds rape
and mustard are grown on 52 square miles, and ///on about t6 square
miles. Some sugar-cane, cotton, and tobacco are also grown. Rota-
tion of crops is practised to a very limited extent. Manure is used for
all crops to which the cultivator can afford to apply it. It usually con-
sists of cow-dung, ashes, decayed leaves and grass, and black mud
mixed with decayed vegetable matter gathered from the bottoms and
sides of stagnant pools and tanks.
There is an ever-increasing demand for land; and, in spite of the
unusual amount of labour required to bring fresh fields under culti-
vation, reclamation is steadily proceeding under the tenures known as
naydbadi and jalsasan. The proportion of uncultivated waste is still
high, but it is estimated that during the decade ending 1901-2
there was an increase of 60 per cent, in the area under crops. Little
advantage is taken of the provisions of the Land Improvement and
Agriculturists' Loans Acts, but during the lean years 1896-8 about
Rs. 86,000 was advanced under the provisions of these Acts.
The local cattle are small, but a larger variety is sometimes obtained
by cross-breeding with large Hazaribagh bulls. Regular pasture-
grounds are rare ; but sufficient rice straw is kept in stock by the
ryots for fodder during the hot months, and after the break of the
rains the extensive waste lands of the District afford ample pasturage.
Fairs are held annually at Chakultor, south of Purulia, in September
for a month, and at Anara on the Purulia-Barakar road for about twenty
days in April.
The surface drainage is rapid and the soil dries up quickly ; irrigation
of some kind is thus essential for most crops. There are no canals or
other artificial water-courses, but there is a very large number of tanks
and dhars. The latter are reservoirs, often of considerable size, con-
structed by running a dam across a ravine or dip, thereby holding
up the natural surface drainage. The fields below the dam are kept
continually moist by the percolation of the water.
There are two small ' protected ' forests, but no revenue is derived
from them. The predominant tree is sal (Shorea robustd). The
principal minor jungle products are lac, catechu, sabai grass, and tasar
silk cocoons. Lac rearing forms the occupation of a large section
of the population. The best variety is produced on hi sum trees
(Sch/eichera trijuga), and inferior qualities on ber (Zizyphus Jujuba)
and palds (fiufea frondosa). The chief edible jungle products are
the flowers of the mahud (Bass/a latifolid) and the fruits of the ber
and singhara (Trapa bispinosa).
The most important mineral in Manbhum is coal, which is mined
MINERALS ti;
on a large scale in the Gobindpur subdivision. The Therria coal-field
occupies an area of about 180 square miles, and a portion of the
Ranlganj-Barakar field also extends into the District.
Coal had long been known to exist in Manbhum, Mlnerals.
but as recently as 1891 only two mines were being worked, with an
output of 78,000 tons. The Jherria field was tapped by the railway
in 1894; and the output of coal from the collieries of the District
rose from 129,000 tons in that year to 1,281,000 tons in 1895, nearly
the whole of the increase coming from the Jherria field. After a short
period of depression in the two following years the industry has grown
steadily, and in 1903 as many as 141 collieries were at work : namely,
115 in the Jherria field and 26 in the Raniganj field, with outputs
of 2,746,000 tons and 246,000 tons, and giving employment to 28,000
and 3,000 persons respectively. The most important concerns are
those of the Barakar Coal Company, Jardine Skinner & Co., the
Standard Coal Company, Agabeg Brothers, MacLeod & Co., Turner
Morrison & Co., the Raniganj Coal Association, the Bengal Coal
Company, and the Bengal-Nagpur Coal Company.
Steam-power is generally used in the Raniganj field, but only in
twenty-four collieries in the Jherria field, where good coal is often
found very near the surface and the roof in many instances is of hard
stone, and the system of working by means of inclines is practicable.
Shafts are never of the depths common in most collieries in England,
and the mines are consequently free from the danger arising from gas ;
the deepest shaft in the Jherria field is one of 320 feet belonging to
the Bhaga colliery.
Many of the labourers employed are local residents, but a large
number also come from Hazaribagh ; they generally belong to the
aboriginal tribes or low Hindu castes. The relations between capital
and labour appear to be on the whole satisfactory, and as the demand
for labour is very great, a colliery manager has every inducement to
treat his miners well : they are generally paid by piece-work at rates
varying from 12 annas to Rs. 1-4 per 100 cubic feet of coal raised, the
wages earned usually amounting to 7 or 8 annas a day.
About three-fourths of the coal produced is purchased by large
European firms who carry it by rail to Calcutta. A small quantity
is used by mills and steamships there ; but by far the greater portion
is shipped to Bombay, Karachi, Madras, Penang, Singapore, and
other ports. About one-fourth of the output is consumed by different
railways and by mills in the Upper Provinces.
A clay ironstone, constituting a large proportion of the ironstone
shales, is especially rich and plentiful in the Raniganj coal-field, where
it is sometimes associated with carbonaceous matter forming a black
band iron ore. Among the gneissose and schistose rocks there arc
n8 MlNBHUM
magnetic and titaniferous iron ores. Red hematite occurs in the
siliceous fault breccias of the same areas, and lateritic iron ores also
exist. The rocks on the southern boundary of the District constitute
part of the northern edge of the auriferous tract of Chota Nagpur.
They are traversed by innumerable gold-bearing quartz veins, from
which has been derived the alluvial gold obtained in all the rivers that
drain the schist area. The Patkum prospecting syndicate attempted
to work the gold on an extensive scale, but failed, and the careful
investigation to which the area has been subjected of late years leaves
very little hope of extracting the gold at a profit. A vein of argenti-
ferous galena occurs about a mile east of Dhadka, in the south-east
of the District. Several small soapstone quarries are worked, and
rubble, quartz, kankar, sandstone, trap, and basalt are also quarried.
Shellac is largely manufactured, especially in the Jhalida and Bala-
rampur thanas, and 54 factories employing 1,400 hands were at work
in 1903-4. The manufacture of tasar silk is carried
lraaeand on g^jgfjy jn ^g Ra^hunathpur thana, and was
communications. - ? ' .
formerly an important industry ; but in 1903-4 the
estimated out-turn was only 16,000 yards. Coarse cotton cloths are
woven all over the District, and are preferred by the lower classes
to the imported machine-made article on account of their superior
durability. Brass and bell-metal utensils and rough brass ornaments
are also manufactured in several places. Soapstone found in the
Chandil thana is made into cups, images, &c, but the industry is
small. An inferior quality of rope is made from sabai grass, which
grows extensively in the Patkum, Baghmundi, Barabhiim, and Hesla
parganas. Cutlery and guns are made at Jhalida.
The chief exports are coal and coke ; and the chief imports are salt,
rice, gram, pulses, kerosene oil, cotton twist and cotton piece-goods,
molasses, sugar, and tobacco. Most of the imports come from Calcutta
and Burdwan, with the exception of gram, pulses, tobacco, and molasses,
which come chiefly from Bihar. The coal exported by rail in 1903-4
amounted to over 2,000,000 tons, of which nearly three-quarters was
sent to Calcutta and Howrah. The principal trade centres are Purulia,
Jhalida, Chas, Raghunathpur, Chandil, Chirkunda, Gobindpur, Man-
bazar, Ichagarh, Barabazar, Dubra, and Nirsa. Most of the external
trade is carried on by rail ; bullock-carts are extensively used for local
traffic. The greater part of the trade is carried on by Marwaris and
Gandhabaniks.
The Bengal-Nagpur Railway traverses the head-quarters subdivision
from north-east to south-west. The Jherria extension of the East
Indian Railway with its numerous sidings connects the coal-fields of
the Gobindpur subdivision with Asansol and Calcutta, and has been
carried on to Bankura and Midnapore, intersecting the Bengal-Nagpur
ADMINISTRA TION 1 1 9
Railway at Adra station. Another line recently constructed links up
Jherria with Gaya. The District contains 818 miles of road, of
Avhich 682 miles are under the control of the District board and the
remainder are Provincial, 59 miles being maintained by the District
board and 77 being in charge of the Public Works department. The
Provincial roads, of which 119 miles are metalled, include 41 miles of
the grand trunk road in the Gobindpur subdivision, 42 miles of the
Purulia-Barakar road, and 36 miles of the Purulia-Ranchl road. Of
the District board roads 363 miles are metalled, the principal being
those from Purulia to Chaibasa, Manbazar, and Bankura, and from
Raghunathpur to Raniganj. The District board maintains six ferries
on the more important roads.
The undulating character of the surface and the consequent rapid
drainage render Manbhum peculiarly liable to drought, and it suffered
severely during the general famines of 1866, 1874,
and 1897. The distress in 1866 was felt over
almost the whole District. Rice rose to the excessively high price
of 3! seers to the rupee in the month of August, and in the affected
area as many as 33,296 persons, or 6-55 per cent, of the population,
died from starvation and its indirect effects. In 1874 the north and
north-east of the District suffered most. In addition to a cash expen-
diture of 2-7 lakhs, more than 8,000 tons of grain was distributed
by Government, and thus the price of rice never exceeded the rate
of 12 seers to the rupee. The famine of 1897 was felt over the greater
part of the District, but was most intense in the Gobindpur subdivision.
The price of grain was highest in July, when rice sold at 7 seers to the
rupee. The total expenditure on relief works amounted to 2-8 lakhs,
and Rs. 42,000 was spent in advances for village works. The aggregate
number of persons relieved on works, expressed in terms of one day,
was 1,311,569, and 1,456,105 persons received gratuitous relief.
For administrative purposes the District is divided into two sub-
divisions, with head-quarters at Purulia and Gobindpur. Subor-
dinate to the Deputy-Commissioner at Purulia is a ,
staff of five Deputy-Magistrate-Collectors ; the sub-
divisional officer of Gobindpur is assisted by a Sub-Deputy-Collector.
The chief civil court is that of the Judicial Commissioner of Chota
Nagpur. For the disposal of civil work a Subordinate Judge and two
Munsifs sit at Purulia, and a Munsif each at Raghunathpur and
Gobindpur. The Munsif of Raghunathpur also tries rent suits under
Act X of 1859, and exercises the powers of a third-class magistrate.
Deputy-Collectors try rent suits under Act X of 1859 at Purulia and
Gobindpur. The Deputy-Commissioner exercises special powers under
section 34 of the Criminal Procedure Code. As Additional Sessions
Judge of Chota Nagpur, the Sessions Judge of Bankura tries all
i2o MANBHUM
sessions cases and criminal appeals arising within Manbhum and
Singhbhum ; for the disposal of sessions cases he sits at Purulia, and
for the hearing of appeals sometimes at Purulia and sometimes at
Bankura. Of late years Manbhum has been notorious for the number
of dacoits it shelters ; in 1905 more dacoities were committed than in
any other Bengal District. These crimes are confined mainly to the
coal-fields, and are the work of up-country criminals who congregate
there.
At the time of the Permanent Settlement the smaller chiefs in
Manbhum were considered to be independent landholders and were
admitted to separate settlements. Succession to land follows the cus-
tom of primogeniture ; there has thus been no subdivision of property,
and in 1903-4 there were in all only 29 revenue-paying estates with
a current demand of Rs. 84,000 ; of these all but two are permanently
settled, the largest being Panchet with a demand of Rs. 58,000. The
Permanent Settlement was extended to the District at a time when
it was unprepared for such a measure, and the assessment is therefore
disproportionately light, amounting to only R. 0-1-1 per cultivated
acre. Special tenures are the ghdtwali and other service tenures,
maintenance grants to the younger members of a zaminddr's family,
and mdnki and murdri tenures, a survival of the aboriginal village
system (see Kolhax). The ghdtwdis hold a certain quantity of land
on a quit-rent, as a remuneration for police duties which they are
required to perform on behalf of Government. Other service tenures
are those of the jdgirddrs in Panchet, who retain one-third or more of
the produce of the villages included in their holdings ; goraiti tenures,
or grants made to the gorait or village messenger ; and laydli grants
made to layas or priests of the aboriginal deities. Petty service, or
ihdkrdn, grants with no specific name are often made to barbers,
potters, washermen, smiths, and others performing menial services for
their landlords : as a rule, they are given free of rent.
Maintenance tenures granted for the support of the younger members
of a Rajas or zam'indar's family are of two kinds, khorposh and hiki-
mdli. The latter, which are confined to the Barabhiim and Manbhum
parganas, are grants of land assigned for the maintenance of the hikim
or second brother and the kunwdr or third brother of the zamlnddr for
the time being. On the death of the zami/iddr, the brothers of his
successor take up the lands attached to the office of hikim or kunzudr,
and perform the services in consideration of which those lands are
held. A hikimali tenure is thus dependent on the life of the zamlnddr
and not on that of the tenure-holder. But each zamlnddr, when he
succeeds to the estate, is bound to make suitable provision in the
form of ordinary khorposh grants for the hikims who have vacated the
hikimali grants derived from their relationship to his predecessor.
A DMINISTRA TIOX 1 2 1
Such maintenance grants are held during the life of the grantees, and
are liable to lapse at their death to the parent estate. The incidence
of r.ental for the whole District is estimated at Rs. 1-12-3 per culti-
vated acre : but owing to the fact that land is seldom assessed on
measurement, any statement of rates is only an approximation. In
Barabhum the generally accepted rates of rent payable by the cultivator
to his landlord are Rs. 4-12-9 per acre of bahdl or low-lying rice-land ;
Rs. 3-9-7 per acre of kanali or moderately high rice-land ; Rs. 2-6-5
per acre of baid or high land ; Rs. 1-3-2 per acre of gord or the worst
class of land. A substantial cultivating ryot pays about Rs. 2-2 for
his bastu or homestead land, a non-cultivating ryot Rs. 1-1, and
a ryot of the poorer class about 8^ annas. Similar rates prevail in
the other parganas in the south of the District, but in Panchet and
in other estates in the north they are from 50 to 100 per cent, higher.
The following table shows the collections of land revenue and total
revenue (principal heads only), in thousands of rupees :—
1880-1.
1S90-1. 1900-1. 190^-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
83 82 • So
3>°7 4»25 6,97
84
8,91
Outside the municipalities of Purulia, Jhalida, and Raghunath-
pur, local affairs are managed by the District board, with a subordinate
local board at Gobindpur. In 1903-4 its income was Rs. 1,42,000,
half of which was derived from rates ; and the expenditure was
Rs. 1,19,000, including Rs. 74,000 spent on public works and
Rs. 32,000 on education.
The District contains 24 police stations or thdiias and 3 outposts.
In 1903 the force subordinate to the District Superintendent consisted
of 3 inspectors, 36 sub-inspectors, 24 head constables, and 297 con-
stables. In addition, there was a rural police force of 4,360 chaukiddrs,
of whom 1,720 held service tenures, and 1,972 gkafced/s of different
grades. The District jail at Purulia has accommodation for 276
prisoners, and a subsidiary jail at Gobindpur for 32.
The District is very backward in respect of education, and in 1901
only 4-0 per cent, of the population (7-7 males and 0-3 females) could
read and write. The number of pupils under instruction increased
from 10,563 in 1883 to 15,578 in 1892-3 and to 20,535 in 1900-1.
In 1903-4, 24,751 boys and 2,058 girls were at school, being respec-
tively 25-2 and 2-i per cent, of the children of school-going age. The
number of educational institutions, public and private, in that year was
799, including 26 secondary, 761 primary, and 12 special schools.
The expenditure on education was Rs. 1,28,000, of which Rs. 14,000
was met from Provincial funds, Rs. 32,000 from District funds, Rs. 600
122 MANBHUM
from municipal funds, and Rs. 51,000 from fees. The chief educational
institution is the Purulia Government school.
In 1903 the District contained 8 dispensaries, of which 5 had
accommodation for 64 in-patients. The cases of 41,000 out-patients
and 641 in-patients were treated during the year, and 1,623 operations
were performed. The expenditure was Rs. 12,600, of which Rs. 800
was met from Government contributions, Rs. 2,000 from local and
Rs. 6,100 from municipal funds, and Rs. 5,300 from subscriptions.
A leper asylum 2 miles south-west of Purulia town is managed by
the German Evangelical Lutheran Mission. Its grounds cover about
400 acres and it has 509 inmates, including 83 children. Untainted
children of leprous parents are received in a special home at some
distance from the asylum.
Vaccination is compulsory only in municipal areas. In 1903-4 the
number of persons successfully vaccinated was 39,000, or 30-7 per
1,000 of the population.
[Sir W. W. Hunter, Statistical Account of Bengal, vol. xvii (1877);
F. B. Bradley-Birt, Chola Nagpur (1903).]
Manchar. — Village in the Khed taluka of Poona District, Bombay,
situated in 190 N. and 730 57' E., on the right bank of the Ghod,
about 12 miles north of Khed town. Population (1901), 5,300. The
place is surrounded by a wall and belonged to Holkar till 1868-9, when
it became British by exchange. To the west, beyond a watercourse,
is a fine Hemadpanti reservoir about 25 yards square, with two flights
of steps leading to the water. Except the west wall, which has a small
niche with carved sideposts and sculptured foliage, the walls of the
reservoir are plain. Within the niche is a much-worn inscription.
Manchar appears to have been a Musalman town of some importance,
and has a small mosque at its south-west entrance. The mosque is
entered by a fine single arch, surmounted by a projecting and bracketed
cornice with a small minaret at each of the four corners. The village
contains a school with 176 boys and 10 girls.
Manchhar. — Lake in the Sehwan taluka of Larkana District, Sind,
Bombay, lying between 260 22" and 26° 28' N. and 670 37' and
670 47' E. It is formed by the expansion of the Western Nara and the
Aral streams, and is fed by hill-torrents. The first flows into it from
the north, and the latter from the Indus westward at a distance of
about 1 2 miles ; but the supply from the Nara is trifling in quantity
when compared with that from the Aral. It is, however, this latter
stream which affords a means of discharge for the redundant waters
of the lake. During the period of inundation the Manchhar may be
estimated at from 15 to 20 miles in length, with a breadth of about
10 miles; but when the water is low, this area is greatly contracted,
and is then probably not more than 10 miles in length. The space
MANDALAY DIVISION I23
left uncovered by the receding water is sown with grain, especially
wheat, yielding magnificent crops.
Although shallow at the sides, the lake has a considerable depth of
water in the middle ; and so great is the quantity of fine fish that
hundreds of men and boats are employed. The fish are taken chiefly
by spearing, but also in nets. In the season when the lotus is in
blossom the lake presents a very beautiful appearance, as its surface,
farther than the eye can reach, is covered with an unbroken succession
of flowers and leaves.
The fisheries of the lake, which are let out on contract, yielded an
average annual revenue of Rs. 5,091 during the five years ending
1905-6. The principal fish are: the dambhro (or chelri), a reddish-
coloured fish often attaining an enormous size, and ranking, according
to native taste, next to the palla in excellence ; the mordko ; the gajidan,
a long, sharp, and very bony fish, of a silver colour, in length from 3 to
5 feet ; the shakar, the ' murrel ' of the Deccan ; Xhejerkho or fresh-water
shark, the largest fish in Sind ; goj and lor, or eels ; khaggo, or catfish ;
the fiopri, the dalu, the theli ; ga/igat, or prawns ; the danur, and the
singdri.
Manda. — Village in the Naogaon subdivision of Rajshahi District,
Eastern Bengal and Assam, situated in 240 46' N. and 88° 39' E., on
the west bank of the Atrai river. Population (1901), 356. It is the
site of an annual fair held in March or April on the occasion of the
Hindu festival, Sri Ram NabamI, in honour of Ram (the seventh
incarnation of Vishnu). The fair is attended by about 25,000 people
from all parts of the District.
Mandal. — Town in the Viramgam taluka of Ahmadabad District,
Bombay, situated in 230 17' N. and 710 55' E., 15 miles north-west
of Viramgam station on the Bombay, Baroda, and Central India
Railway. Population (C901), 5,091. The municipality, established in
1889, had an average income during the decade ending 1901 of
Rs. 5,000. The income in 1903-4 was Rs. 5,230. The town contains
some mosques of archaeological interest : notably, the Jama Masjid,
the Saiyid Masjid, the Kazi Masjid, and the Ganjni Masjid. It also
contains a dispensary, and three boys' and one girls' school, attended
respectively by 255 and 54 pupils.
Mandalay Division. — North-eastern Division of Upper Burma,
lying between 2i°42r and 270 20' N. and 950 6' and 980 20' E., with
an area of 29,373 square miles. It is composed of five Districts
(all abutting on the Irrawaddy) : Mandalay and the Ruby Mines on
the east of the river, and Katha, Bhamo, and Myitkyina astride of it.
On the north it is bounded by unadministered territory ; on the east
by China and the Northern Shan States ; on the south by the Kyaukse
District of the Meiktila Division ; and on the west by the Sagaing
VOL. XVII. 1
124
MAN DA LA V DIVISION
Division, from which it is separated by the Irrawaddy and the water-
shed severing the basins of the Irrawaddy and the Chindwin. The
head-quarters are at Mandalay City in the extreme south of the
Division; but all the District head-quarters, with the exception of
Mogok, are readily accessible by rail and river. The Commissioner
exercises a nominal control over the Hkamti Long (Shan) States- on
the upper reaches of the Malikha. The population of the Division
was returned at 592,625 in 1891 and 777,33s in l9°*- The earlier
Census, however, excluded a large part of Katha District, then forming
the Wuntho State, and also portions of Bhamo and Myitkyina Districts.
The distribution of the population in 1901 is shown in the table
below : —
District.
Area in square
miles.
Population,
1901.
Land revenue
and thatJmmeda,
•903-4, ,
in thousands
of rupees.
Mandalay
Bhamo .
Myitkyina
Katha
Ruby Mines (includ-
ing Mongmit)
2,117
4,146
10,640
6,994
5.476
366,507
79,515
67,399
176,2 23
87,694
8,42
1,31
93
5,34
90*
Total
29,373
777,338
16,90
* Excluding revenue of Mongmit.
The Division contains seven towns — Mandalay (population,
183,816), Amarapura (9,103), Maymyo (6,223), Bhamo (10,734), and
Mogok, Katha, and Myitkyina; and there are 5,413 villages.
Mandalay, Mogok, and Bhamo are important industrial and trade
centres. Burmans predominate largely, numbering 451,161 in 1901.
They form almost the whole population of Mandalay District, and the
larger part of that of Katha, and are well represented in the Ruby
Mines and Bhamo, but are comparatively scarce in Myitkyina. The
Shans numbered 110,728 in 1901, distributed over all the five Districts,
but nowhere in the majority. In Mandalay District they are confined
to the hilly Maymyo. township. The number of Kachins in 1901 was
87,790. They form the greater part of the population of Myitkyina
District, are the prevalent race in Bhamo, and are common in Katha
and the Ruby Mines. A portion of the north-western area of Katha is
peopled by the Kadus, who numbered 34,521 in 1901. Danus to the
number of 6,276 inhabit the hills in Mandalay District. Chinamen
are numerous in all the Districts excepting Katha, and aggregated
9,463 at the last Census. Natives of India are distributed all over
the Division, for the most part in or near the towns and District
head-quarters. They include 25,391 Musalmans, 21,894 Hindus, and
MANDALAY DISTRICT 125
2.149 Sikhs. Of the indigenous races, the Bur mans and Shans profess
Buddhism, which had 634,000 adherents in 1901, while the Kachins
for the most part are to be reckoned among the Animists, who
numbered about 88,000. Christians numbered 5,663.
Mandalay District (Burmese, Mandate). — District of the Mandalay
Division of Upper Burma, lying between 210 42' and 220 46' N. and
950 54' and 960 46' E., with an area of 2,117 square miles. It is
bounded on the north by the Ruby Mines District ; on the south by
the State of Lawksawk and by Kyaukse and Sagaing Districts ; on the
east by the State of HsTpaw : and on the west by the Irrawaddy, which
divides it from Sagaing and Shwebo Districts.
The main feature of the District is the wide plain, about 700 square
miles in extent, which occupies about one-third of the area, spreading
from the Irrawaddy eastwards to the foot of the
Shan plateau, and gradually increasing in width from ysica
north to south. This wedge-shaped level slopes both
southward and westward, and is, with the exception of portions that
are irrigated by canals or tanks, liable to drought by reason of the
uncertainty of the rainfall. The area flooded by the rivers during
the rains is about 150 square miles. To the north and east of the
plain are the hills forming the western edge of the Shan plateau, which
run for the most part in broken parallels north and south. Those
in the north, however, taking off from the Ruby Mines mountain group,
end abruptly north of the Sagyin hill, and cover about one-half of
the northernmost township. The highest points in this system are
from 2,000 to 3,600 feet above the sea. The elevated ground to the
east takes in the whole of the Maymyo subdivision. It rises very
steeply from the plain, and develops into a picturesque plateau, 3,000
feet high, bounded on the east by a deep steep-sided gorge. Con-
spicuous hills in this plateau tower to a height of 4,000 and 4,700 feet.
From the level plain in the Irrawaddy valley rise isolated limestone
hills, of which the best known are the Sagyin hill (800 feet), famous
for its alabaster quarries ; Mandalay hill (954 feet), at the north-east
corner of the city, of which it commands a noble view ; and the
Yankin hill, due east of the city, interesting for its images of fish,
carved in a natural cave, which are worshipped in times of scarcity
of rain.
The main rivers are the Irrawaddy, the Myitnge, and the Madaya.
The two latter are tributaries of the former, which skirts the western
boundary of the District throughout its entire length (75 miles), and
is studded with rich alluvial islands, whose movements from one side
of the channel to the other give considerable trouble to the officials
coneerned in the administration of the Districts abutting on the stream.
The Myitnge (or Doktawaddy), known as the Nam Tu by the Shans.
1 2
i26 M AND A LAY DISTRICT
forms part of the eastern and practically the whole of the southern
boundary of the District, sweeping round in a narrow canon from south
to north-west, and emerging from the hills at the foot of a striking
bluff, about 2,000 feet high, locally known as Kywetnapa, or ' rat's
snout.' It is navigable only to the foot of the hills, its course above
being full of rapids and falls. The Madaya river, known by the Shans
as the Nam Pi, and locally as the Chaungmagyi, rises in the Shan
States and flows at first southwards, forming part of the eastern
boundary of the District, after which it turns westwards, and joins the
Irrawaddy about 25 miles above Mandalay. Close to its debouchure
from the hills are the head-works of the new Mandalay Canal, which
distributes its waters over the eastern part of the plain almost to the
Myitnge river.
Of lakes proper there is none, though several large areas are inun-
dated to a considerable depth in the rains, the chief being the
Aungbinle lake east of Mandalay, the Nanda lake 21 miles north-
north-east of the city, the Shwepyi in the north of the District, and
the Taungthaman close to Amarapura. The Mandalay Canal is,
however, fast converting the first two into paddy-fields. The last two
are lagoons fed from the Irrawaddy, which are dammed for fishing
and cultivation when the river falls.
The plain is to a great extent covered with alluvial deposit from
the Irrawaddy. The isolated hills are of crystalline limestone, belong-
ing to the period of Mogok gneiss. In the Sagyin Hills rubies are
found in the debris resulting from the denudation of the limestone.
The hilly tract, the edge of the Shan plateau, is composed of palaeozoic
rocks, probably faulted down against the crystalline limestone. A
fringe of Devonian limestone extends along the outer edge of the
plateau, followed by a zone of Silurian sandstone, shales, and lime-
stones, which occupy most of the broken country below its crest. The
Silurians rest unconformably upon a series of quartzites and slaty
shales which are probably of Cambrian age. Near Zibingyi (on the
Lashio railway), a narrow band of black shaly limestone is found at
the base of the Devonian limestone, containing graptolites and fossils
of Upper Silurian age. The surface of the plateau extending from
Zibingyi to beyond Maymyo is covered with Devonian limestones, the
denudation of which has exposed the Silurian rocks beneath in the
hilly country north of Maymyo. The shales of the Lower Silurian
formation are highly fossiliferous, containing large numbers of detached
plates of cystideans and fragments of crinoid stems.
The forest produce is described below. The Maymyo plateau is
extraordinarily productive of flora both indigenous and foreign. Many
kinds of orchids and lilies grow wild ; English blooms of every
description flourish; and the padauk (Pterocai-pus i/idicus), the ingyin
HISTORY 127
(Pentacme siameiisis), the saga-wa and saga sein (Mkhelia C/iaiiipaia),
the gangaw {Mesita firrea), and the sabe arc all met with.
The fauna does not greatly differ from that of Upper Burma
generally. The elephant, the bison, and the tsine or hsaing {Bos
sondaicus) are met with in the hilly tracts in the north and east. The
barking-deer (gyi) is ubiquitous, and the sambar and hog deer (daye)
are fairly common. The serow (Burmese, tawseik or ' wild goat ') is
occasionally met with in the hills. Tigers and leopards are common
both in the hills and on the plain. Wild hog cause a good deal of
destruction to the crops at the foot of the slopes, and two species
of black bear (Malay and Himalayan) frequent the hills of the Maymyo
subdivision.
The climate is dry and healthy. From April to August strong winds
prevail. In the plains the thermometer rises frequently in the hot
season to 1050 or 1070 in the shade, and the minimum, in December,
is about 550. Occasionally temperatures of 1120 have been recorded
in April. In the hills the range is from 320 to 900. The Maymyo
plateau is, except at the beginning and end of the rains, very healthy,
and is at all seasons temperate. The average minimum at Maymyo
in December is 380 and the maximum in May is 86°, though six
degrees of frost and temperatures exceeding 900 have been recorded.
The rainfall in the plains is meagre, and somewhat capricious. It
is least in the south, where it averages 30 inches, increasing to about
40 inches in the extreme north. In the hills it is considerably heavier,
with a mean of about 58 inches, while as much as 75 inches have been
recorded. In November, 1899, an extraordinary fall of rain caused
great damage, breaching the railway and flooding a large part of
Mandalay city ; several bridges were swept away, and a village was
destroyed with a loss of seven lives. Such storms are frequent at
the beginning and end of the rains, though as a rule the havoc they
work is inconsiderable.
The District has from very early times been a part of the kingdom
of Burma. The history of the foundation of Mandalay City is con
tained in a separate article, and the account of the
,. , t. • • , f, -ii- History,
negotiations ot the British Uovernment with king
Thlbaw at Mandalay is given in the article on Burma. We are
concerned here with the settling of the District after the fall of
Mandalay in November, 1885. Though about 1,000 troops were
quartered in Mandalay itself after the annexation, the District was
for some time overrun and practically administered by three or four
dacoit leaders, who gave themselves out as acting for the Myingun
prince, and who were kept together by a relative of his. Dacoitie^
continued throughout 1S86, but in 1887 their perpetrators wore hunted
down. In August, 1SS7, a rising took place in the Maymyo sub-
128 MANDALAY DISTRICT
division under the Setkya pretender, and the Assistant Commissioner
at Maymyo was killed. Two dacoit leaders, Nga To and Nga Yaing,
at that time held the islands of the Irrawaddy and made raids right
up to the walls of Mandalay ; and a third, known as Nga Zeya,
occupied the hilly country in the north and north-east of the District.
However, these leaders were either driven out of the country or
executed in 1888 and 1889, and their gangs were broken up. The
last dacoit band, led by Kyaw Zaw, a lieutenant of the Setkya pre-
tender, was dispersed in 1889-90. It had till then harried the Maymyo
subdivision and the neighbouring hilly tracts of Kyaukse District.
Pagodas of all sizes are dotted over the plain, crowning the low
limestone hills that rise out of it. Some of the most interesting of
these lie in or close to Mandalay itself, and are described under
Mandalay City. In the Madaya township are the Sutaungbyi and
Sutaungya pagodas. The former was built in the eleventh century
by king Anawrata, on his return from China, to commemorate his
victories there. The latter was erected by king Mindon in 1874 for
the use of the royal family, it is said, lest any among them who aspired
to the throne should obtain the fulfilment of their prayers which
the more venerable shrine was believed to ensure. At Tawbu in
the same township is an old pagoda where a great festival is held
in February. An impressive sight is the Shwegyetyet group of shrines,
about 600 years old, on the bank of the river at Amarapura. Large
crowds assemble annually to witness the feeding of the fish which
come up in shoals to be fed at the great Tabaung feast of the Shwe-
/ayan pagoda on the Myitnge river, built by Shinmunhla, the queen
of Anawrata. The fish are so tame that they are called up by the
voice and are fed by hand, pious worshippers decorating their heads
with gold-leaf. In the north of the District, 8 miles east of Singu,
is the Shwemale pagoda. According to an inscription, it was built
about 1,000 years ago by king Vamaingsithu, who gave up certain
lands to be worked by payakyuns (pagoda slaves) and their descen-
dants, the revenue to go to repairs of the pagoda. The receipts are
at present spent for the most part on festivals, as may be inferred
from the neglected appearance of the shrine.
Little is known regarding the population under native rule, but it
is clear that it was smaller in 1891 than before annexation. In 1891
. the inhabitants numbered 375,055, of whom 188,815
belonged to Mandalay city. By 1901 the total
had fallen to 366,507, the residents of the city having dwindled to
183,816.
The chief statistics of area and population for 1901 are given in
the table on the next page.
The principal town is MANDALAY, the headquarters, and formerly
POPULATION
129
the capital of independent Burma. The attractions of the Burmese
court, and the comparative security against dacoities that its presence
ensured, were doubtless responsible in pre-annexation days for the
existence of a larger population than the District was able economi-
cally to support. The waning of the former and the extension of
the latter throughout Burma have had the effect of drawing off the
surplus not only from the city, but also from the adjacent townships
of Amarapura and Patheingyi. The census figures show that the
flow of emigrants has been mostly towards Ma-ubin, Pvapon, and
Hanthawaddy Districts, and to Rangoon, which together contain
nearly 30,000 persons born in and about Mandalay. The rural
population in 1901 was 172,300, rather less than half the total, and
the average density in the rural areas was 82 persons per square
mile. Buddhists predominate ; but in 1901 there were 20,300 Musal-
mans, 13,400 Hindus, and 1,000 Sikhs, mostly residents of the city.
Burmese is the language of 91 per cent, of the people.
square
es.
Num
ber of
c
CO
u
— u
|1
age of
on in
ron be-
1891
—
Township.
.E'3
V
u
<
25
B
B
0
H
I
; | Village
3
a.
0
ts v
rt t- ,
"5 rt
5. a
Percenl
variati
populat
tween
and 1
Numl
persons
read
wr
Mandalay City .
183,816
7>353
- 3
64-938
Amarapura
85
I
227
43,884
516
- '3
9,694
Patheingyi .
213
...
I52
28,546
!34
— IO
3,857
Madaya
321
217
53-212
166
+ 4
1 3,443
Singu
712
146
35.670
5°
- 4
10,251
Pvintha
I9O
54
4- -=95
23
- '3
543
Maymyo
396
I
101
•3,730
35
+ 7-
2,230
\\ etw in
District total
175
2.1 17
...
37
3-354
19
+ r9
357
3
934
366.507
'73
— 2
'05-313
In 1901 Burmans numbered 306.300; Shans (for the most part
in the hilly Maymyo subdivision), 5,400 ; and Danus, a mixture of
the last two races, 6,300. Natives of India are numerous. There
were 7,900 Indian immigrants in 1891, and this number had increased
in 1901 to 15,400, of whom 12,000 lived in Mandalay city. The
oldest foreign settlers are the Kathes and Ponnas, a large number
of whom are descended from Manipuri prisoners of war. They now
number nearly 9,000, and are mostly domiciled in the city and its
environs, though the Ponnas have their own villages in the Amarapura
township. The percentage of Indian women is exceptionally high,
a fact which points to a large permanent Indian colony. Chinamen,
for the most part traders and artisans in Mandalay and Maymyo,
number 1,600. The European community in 1901 numbered 2,200
(composed largely of the British troops in cantonments). The
, 3o .)/. iNDALA ) ' DISTRICT
number of persons directly dependent on agriculture in lyoi was
84,698, or less than half the rural population and a quarter of the total.
More than 37,000 persons living in the hills in the north and east
are dependent on taungya (shifting) cultivation alone.
Christians in 1901 numbered 4,389, of whom 2,062 were natives
(mostly Madrasis). Mandalay city is the see of a Roman Catholic
bishop, under whom nine priests are at work in the District, but rather
among the Indian Christians than the indigenous folk. The mission
possesses thriving schools and an important asylum for lepers. The
American Baptists have three pastors at work among the Burmans
and natives of India. The Anglican Church is represented by the
S.P.G. Mission in Mandalay city, where also the Wesleyan Mission
has its head-quarters, and controls a leper asylum.
Owing to the scanty rainfall, the greater part of the plain is at
present uncultivable. Agricultural conditions have, however, been
improved by the opening of the new Mandalay
Canal, which should eventually result in a con-
siderable expansion of cultivation. The settlement of 1892-3 divided
the District into five soil tracts. The first is composed of a thick
absorptive clay, commanded by the Shwetachaung Canal, taking off
from the Madaya river. The second is a stiff paddy clay or cotton
soil, formerly irrigated by the Aungbinle tank, but now by distribu-
taries from the Mandalay Canal. The third is a free and friable
kind of sandy loam, and in some places a stiff paddy clay or cotton
soil, formerly commanded by the Shwelaung Canal, the place of
which has practically been taken by the Mandalay Canal. The fourth
is alluvial land inundated during the rains. The fifth consists of
rough broken land, composed largely of cotton soil with patches
of sandy loam, where cultivation depends entirely upon a timely
rainfall. There is very little variety in the systems of cultivation ;
rice is the chief crop, and the plough and harrow are the main agri-
cultural implements. Taungya, or shifting, cultivation prevails in
the Maymyo subdivision, though here too a certain amount of irri-
gated rice is grown in terraced rice-fields in the bottoms of the
valleys.
About three-fourths of the cultivated land is state land (chiefly
a/wiudansa, or land held on a service tenure). The non-state lands
are mostly lands acquired in the latter days of the monarchy by
purchase, or presented to junior members of the royal family and
others. The table on the next page exhibits the main agricultural
statistics for 1903-4, in square miles.
Exclusive of the Maymyo subdivision, for which no statistics exist,
273 square miles were under cultivation in 1890-1, 196 square miles
in 1900-1, and 246 square miles in 1903-4. The increase in the
AGRICULTURE
131
cultivation and a diversion of about 9,000 acres from 'dry crops'
to rice are due to the opening of the Mandalay (anal, which has
also reduced the area of current fallows by nearly 7,000 acres. The
.irea under rice had risen in 1903-4 to 136 square miles, of which
98 were irrigated. Of the total rice crop, about 27 square miles were
mayin or hot-season rice. A large share of this is twice-cropped
irrigated land in the Shwetachaung Canal tract. Pulse of various
kinds, pegyi being the most popular, covers 56 square miles, mainly
in the northern or Madaya subdivision. Gram and wheat each occupy
about 3,500 acres, chiefly in the Patheingyi township. The areas
under both these crops, as well as those under various fodder crop>
and sesamum, the last covering 14 square miles, have all decreased
of late, owing to the land being converted into irrigated paddy-fields.
Tobacco is cultivated to the extent of about 3,500 acres on the allu-
vial deposits in the Irrawaddy islands. Onions, tomatoes, and chillies
are grown to a smaller extent. The area under garden cultivation
is 16 square miles, including mango groves, nearly 2,000 acres of
which clothe the bank of the Myitnge river and areas in the Amara-
pura township, and 4,600 acres of plantain groves. There are very
valuable gardens at Madaya, watered by the Shwetachaung Canal,
in which large quantities of coco-nuts, plantains, betel-vines, pine-
apples, mangoes, papayas, and custard-apples are grown. Grapes have
been tried in Amarapura, and strawberries do well in Maymyo. A
certain amount of homestead garden cultivation is attached to every
Shan village in the Maymyo subdivision. There is a considerable
amount of bobabaing or non-state land in the District. In all, 52 estates
exceed 100 acres in extent, and one has an area of 670 acres. The
average size of a rice or mixed crop holding is 5^ acres, that of other
holdings is 2 acres.
Township. 1 otal area.
Cultivated.
7
43
65
81
5°
Irrigated
2
12
29
39
18
Forests.
Maudalay City .
Amarapura
Patheingyi
Madaya .
Singu
Pyintha .
Maymyo .
Wetwin
Total
25
85
213
3^
712
190
3915
J 75
1
'" 805
2,117
246
100 805
The cultivation of tobacco and wheat from imported seed is
gradually spreading. Indian wheat and Havana and Virginia tobacco
seed have given satisfactory results, producing better crops than the
indigenous varieties. The local cultivators seldom avail themselves
132 M AND ALA Y DISTRICT
of the benefits of the Land Improvement and Agriculturists' Loans
Acts, preferring to obtain advances from money-lenders, who are less
particular as to security, and are quite content with the production of
a land revenue receipt.
There are no local breeds of cattle or ponies. Bullocks are used for
ploughing very much more commonly than buffaloes. Ponies are
brought from the Shan States, as well as from Pakokku and other
Districts down the river. The area of reserved grazing ground ex-
ceeds 1,000 acres, and the large uncultivated areas and broad kazins
or field embankments will render further reservation unnecessary for
some time to come.
At the time of annexation the District contained several canals of
considerable size. The Shwelaung Canal took off from the Madaya
river at Zehaung, close to the headworks of the new Mandalay
Canal, and, crossing the District diagonally for about 30 miles, joined
the Irrawaddy at Amarapura. On the foundation of Mandalay, it was
directed so as to supply the city moat, but it was never very reliable,
and failed absolutely in 1880. The Shwetachaung Canal was 26 miles
in length, taking off from the Madaya stream near Madaya, and running
south to join the Irrawaddy below Mandalay. From the dam just
above Mandalay (below which the canal is empty) to its head it is still
navigable by country boats. It is a valuable source of supply, irrigating
about 50 square miles. Between these two is the Dinga stream,
supplying the Nanda lake north of Mandalay. The present Mandalay
Canal takes the place of the Shwelaung Canal and of the Aungbinle
and Nanda lakes, which are being converted into paddy-fields. The
area annually irrigable by this work is estimated at 80,000 acres, and
that irrigable by the Shwetachaung Canal at 28,000 acres ; the area
actually irrigated in 1903-4 by the former was 30,000 acres, that by
the latter 24,000 acres. In the same year 2,300 acres were irrigated
from wells, and 1,500 acres from tanks. The total irrigated area of
the District in 1903-4 was 100 square miles. More than one-third
of this total lies in the Madaya, and more than a quarter in the
Patheingyi township.
The fisheries are mainly situated near the Irrawaddy, their success
depending upon the nature of the rise and fall of the river. The
season begins in October, when the river falls and
Fisheries
the outlets of the lagoons and connecting channels
are closed with yins (bamboo screens). In the Amarapura township
the most important fishery is the Taungthaman lake, which brings in
about Rs. 8,000 annually. There are two valuable fisheries in the
Madaya township, the larger, the Kyi- in fishery, yielding an annual
revenue of about Rs. 9,500. In the Singu township, where the river
spreads out over a considerable area in lagoons and backwaters, seven
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 133
large fisheries realize more than Rs. 5,000 each. In 1903-4 the
fisheries yielded a total revenue of 1*2 lakhs.
The forests are of various types, depending on climatic conditions,
which vary considerably in different parts. In the plains the jungle
growth consists of open scrub, increasing in height
and density as the rainfall increases. The principal
species here are si (Zizyphus Jujubd) and kan (Carissa Carandas),
overtopped here and there by a tanaung {Acacia leucophlaea), nabc
(Odin a Wodier), or sit (Albizzia procera). On the lower slopes, facing
the plain, the forest is of the type known as 'dry,' in which the princi-
pal species are sha (Acacia Catechii), dahat {Tectona Hamiltoniana),
than {Terminalia O/ireri), ingyin (Pentacme siamensis), and myinwa
{Dendrocalamus strictus), or the common bamboo. With increasing
rainfall this gradually merges into mixed forest in which teak, padauk
(Pterocarpus indicus), and pyingado (Xylia dolabriformis) are found.
In the north are mixed forests with belts of indaing on laterite soil. In
these tracts the principal species, besides teak, padauk, pyingado, and
in (Dipterocarpus tuberculatus), are thitya (Shorea obtusa) and thitsi
(Me/anorrhoea usitata), with various species of Sterculia and bamboo.
Oaks and chestnuts begin to appear at an elevation of about 2,800
feet, and on the Maymyo plateau these are among the most common
species. A small patch of pine forest (Pinus Khasya) exists on a hill
about 12 miles east of Maymyo. Besides teak, the trees yielding the
most valuable timber are padauk and pyingado ; thitya, ingyin, and in
are also employed in building. The other trees of economic importance
arc the sha, yielding the cutch of commerce : the thitsi, producing
a black varnish ; and the various species of Sterculia (Burmese, share),
the bark of which yields a strong fibre.
The area of 'reserved' forest in 1903-4 was 335 square miles, and
that of 'unclassed' forest 470 square miles, principally in the Maymyo
subdivision. The only plantations that have been formed are those in
the Singu and Lower Madaya Reserves, in which 61 acres had been
planted up to the end of 190 1 on the teak taungya system. The forest
revenue in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 13,000.
The Sagyin Hills near Madaya produce spinels and rubies, plum-
bago, graphite, and alabaster. Copperas is met with at Kainggyithamin
and Yegyi, and lead at Onhlut. Mica has been found at Shwegyin.
9 miles north of Singu, and an inferior kind of coal, of little use for
fuel, has been dug near Wetwin on the Mandalay-Lashio railway.
Most of the arts and manufactures of the District are carried on in
Mandalay and are described in the city article. In
a , • , , • r ■ 1 / • 1 r Trade and
Amarapura township the chief industry is that ot communications.
silk-weaving, in which whole villages are often
occupied. The beautiful ackeik tannins (skirts) come from the Kathe
i34 MANDALAY DISTRICT
(Manipuri) villages of this township. A little cotton is woven in the
rural areas, but only for local use. An important manufacture of
Amarapura is that of kammawa writing slips. These measure 18 inches
by 2, and are made of four folds of chintz stuck together with black
ihitsi and overlaid with vermilion. They form the material on which
kammawa, or Buddhist religious texts, are written in Pali.
About three-fourths of the total population being non-agricultural,
a large internal trade is carried on between the city of Mandalay and
the District. The through trade is also considerable, imports from the
Shan States being shipped for ports down the river in the steamers of
the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company, together with the main products
of the District, such as hides and skins, grain, and silk goods. These,
and the rubies, stick-lac, rubber, and cutch that come from up country,
are exchanged for imports, mostly manufactured goods from Rangoon.
The latter include hardware, metals, cotton and woollen piece-goods,
and general stores from Europe ; silks and dyes from Japan and
China; and ngapi and salted fish from Lower Burma. These are
brought by rail and river from Rangoon, and are to some extent
re-exported to the Shan States and Western China. The total value
of the imports from the Northern Shan States amounted in 1903-4 to
6| lakhs by caravan and 21 \ lakhs by rail. By far the most important
commodity brought in is pickled tea (valued at 21 lakhs) from the
Hslpaw and Tawngpeng hills. The exports to the Northern Shan
States were valued in 1903 -4 at 5-f lakhs by caravan and 22^ lakhs
by rail. They included cotton piece-goods (7^ lakhs), dried fish
(if- lakhs), cotton twist and yarn (2^ lakhs), salt (2 lakhs), and
petroleum (1^ lakhs). Maymyo is a registering station for trade to
and from both the Northern and Southern Shan States. The imports
from the Southern States in 1903-4 were valued at a lakh, and the
exports at a lakh and a half. Trade with ^Yestern China along the
Maymyo route is registered, but it is very small and shows no signs of
increasing.
The main railway from Rangoon enters the District 10 miles south
of Mandalay city on the bank of the Myitnge, which it crosses by a
fine girder-bridge, and passes through the Amarapura township to the
terminus in the city. From Myohaung, 3 miles south of the terminus>
there are two branches. One runs westwards through Amarapura to
a point on the bank of the Irrawaddy 12 miles from Mandalay, where
a ferry connects it with the Sagaing terminus of the line to Myitkyina.
The other turns abruptly eastwards, and after a level run of 16 miles
across the plain climbs up the Maymyo plateau, and, passing Maymyo,
leaves the District near Wetwin about 55 miles from Mandalay. The
city will probably before long be connected with Madaya by a light
railway.
. / DMINISTR. I TIOX , , -
The District is fairly well provided with roads. Of these, the most
important outside municipal limits are the Mandalay-Lashio road,
metalled in part, passing through Maymyo and quitting the District at
Wetwin ; the Mandalay-Madaya road along the Shwetachaung Canal
embankment : and the Mandalay-Lamaing road, the two last being
each about 16 miles long. These three are maintained by the Public
Works department. The District fund is responsible for the upkeep
of a considerable number of inter-village tracks, which include the
Madaya-Singu road (32 miles), continuing for another 19 miles to
the Ruby Mines District boundary, and 3 miles of the metalled road
from Mandalay to Amarapura. There is an electric tramway in
Mandalay city.
The Irrawaddy is navigable at all seasons by large river steamers,
while country boats navigate the Madaya and Myitnge rivers all the
year round, the former up to Sagabin, about 20 miles, and the latter
for 16 miles, and in the rains for another 30. The Shwetachaung
Canal is navigable from the dam just above Mandalay to its head.
Government launches ply constantly between Mandalay and other
stations on the river ; and the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company runs, in
addition to some cargo-boats, one mail steamer a week to Bhamo,
two to Thabeikkyin (for the Ruby Mines), and two down the river to
Rangoon, calling at the several river-side stations, and one daily
to Myingyan. The tolls levied on the Shwetachaung Canal and the
six ferries that the District contains bring in respectively Rs. 6,000 and
Rs. 8,000 a year.
The District is divided into five subdivisions : the eastern and
western subdivisions of Mandalay City, the former including the can-
tonment ; the Amarapura subdivision in the south-
. • ., A , ^ Administration,
west, comprising the Amarapura and Patheixgyi
townships ; the Madaya subdivision in the north, comprising the
Madaya and Singtj townships ; and the Maymyo subdivision in
the south-east, comprising the Pyintha, Maymyo, and Wetwin town-
ships. The subdivisions and townships are under the usual executive
officers. The three township officers in the Maymyo subdivision,
however, are little more than myothugyis, and the myo-oks at Wetwin
and Pyintha have third-class powers, but cannot take cognizance of
cases and never try any. There were 449 village headmen in 1903.
The District falls within three Public Works divisions. The greater
part forms a portion of the Mandalay division, with head-quarters at
Mandalay city. Maymyo and its environs form, with the Lashio
subdivision, the Maymyo division under an Executive Engineer at
Maymyo, and the Mandalay Canal constitutes a third charge. There
are two Deputy-Conservators of Forests, one in charge of the depot
division at Mandalay and one at Maymyo, who in addition to the
1 3 6 MANDA LA Y DIS TRICT
Mandalay forests has charge of the forests in Kyaukse, Meiktila, and
Myingyan Districts, and in the Northern Shan States. At the port
of Mandalay are two officers of the Royal Indian Marine, one being
Marine Transport officer for Upper Burma, the other the Superintend-
ing Engineer for Government vessels and launches.
Mandalay is the head-quarters of the Judicial Commissioner, Upper
Burma, as well as of the Commissioner of Mandalay, who is Sessions
Judge. There is a whole-time District Judge, who is also additional
Sessions Judge of the Mandalay Division and Judge of the Mandalay
Small Cause Court. In criminal work the Deputy-Commissioner is
assisted by the head-quarters Assistant Commissioner (senior magis-
trate). Violent crime is most prevalent in the Amarapura subdivision,
and theft of stray cattle is common in Maymyo. On the whole, how-
ever, the crime of the District presents no special features.
Under native rule the District was divided administratively into
eight parts, one comprising the city and one the islands in the Irra-
waddy, while the rest were under salaried officials called ne-oks. The
actual collection of revenue was done by the myothugyis and sub-
ordinate thugyis, who were paid by a 10 per cent, commission on the
revenue collected, and whose office was as a rule hereditary. Appeals
lay first to the Akundaw Tana (revenue court), and second appeals
were allowed to the Hlutdaiv (high court) ; but in cases relating to
royal lands appeals lay to the Leyondaiv (land court), and thence to
the Hlutdaw. Thathameda, at the average rate of Rs. 10 a house-
hold, was assessed by thamadis, elders of the village specially appointed
for the purpose, but not in the city itself, where instead of the tha-
Ihameda, imposts were levied on goods sold. No land revenue was
collected over the greater part of the District on bobabaing or non-state
lands, unless they were irrigated, in which case a tax of Rs. 2 per pe
(1-75 acres) was levied. On state lands a rate theoretically equivalent
to one-fourth of the gross produce was assessed, but in practice the
amount was fixed by custom.
Three attempts at a regular settlement were made in the District
soon after annexation. The first two were confined to limited tracts ;
but in 1 89 1, after a cadastral survey had been completed, a regular
settlement of the plain was undertaken. The rates proposed in 1893
were crop rates fixed at one-eighth of the gross produce on state land,
and two-thirds of that rate on non-state land. These proposals were,
however, revised, and in 1896 new rates on state land were introduced
as follows : for kaukkyi rice, Rs. 2 to Rs. 7-6 per acre ; for may in
(or hot-season) rice, Rs. 2-4 to Rs. 4 per acre. Gardens paid from
Rs. 5 to Rs. 25 ; miscellaneous crops on islands and alluvial lands,
Rs. 2-8 to Rs. 7-8; and ra, or upland holdings, Rs. i-S to
Rs. 4 per acre. These changes brought in a revenue of 3 lakhs in
ADMINISTRA TIOX 1 3 7
1897-8, as compared with \\ lakhs realized in the year before their
introduction. In 1899- 1900 rates were levied on non-state land, the
old water rate being abolished, while irrigated lands paid seven-eighths
of the state land rate and non-irrigated three-fourths ; at the same time
the thathameda rate was readjusted. The result was a slight increase
of revenue. Since 1901 these rates have been resanctioned from year
to year, and are still in force, except in the new Mandalay Canal tract,
where tentative land revenue and water rates came into force in
1903-4. The rates, however, still require readjustment, especially in
the Shwetachaung tract, and settlement operations are now being
carried out with a view to their revision. No land revenue is
collected in the three townships of the Maymyo subdivision.
The table below shows, in thousands of rupees, the fluctuations in
the land revenue and total revenue since 1 890-1. At present an impor-
tant item of receipt is thathameda, which amounted to Rs. 2,59,600
in 1890-1, Rs. 2,59,400 in 1900-1, and Rs. 2,78,000 in 1903-4.
1890-1.
1900-1.
1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
1.77
6,54
4,17
13,14
5,64*
15,21
* Inclusive of Rs. 12,000 collected in Mandalay city.
The District fund, administered by the Deputy-Commissioner for
the provision of various local needs, had an income of Rs. 42,600 in
1903-4. The chief item of expenditure was public works (Rs. 40,000).
Mandalav City is the only municipality, but Maymyo is administered
by a town committee.
The District garrison, which is divided between Mandalay and
Maymyo, consists of a British battalion, a Gurkha battalion, and two
Punjabi regiments, a Native mountain battery, and a transport column.
The head-quarters of the Burma division, formerly at Rangoon, are
now at Maymyo, while Mandalay is the head-quarters of a military
district.
The District Superintendent of police is aided by four Assistant
Superintendents (one at head-quarters, the others in charge of the
two urban subdivisions and the Maymyo subdivision), 6 inspectors,
19 head constables, 68 sergeants, 625 Burman and 335 Indian
constables, distributed in 21 police stations and 15 outposts. South
of the city are large barracks for the Mandalay military police
battalion, the strength of which is one commandant, two assistant
commandants, and 1,356 native officers and men. One assistant
commandant and 889 men are stationed at Mandalay itself. The
only other military police posts in the District are at Maymyo
(60 men) and Madaya (25 men).
138 MANDALAY DISTRICT
There is a Central jail in the north-west corner of Fort Dufferin at
Mandalay, with accommodation for 1,141 prisoners, who are engaged
in gardening, carpentry, smithy and cane-work, carriage -building and
repairing, &c. Large orders for furniture for Government offices are
carried out by means of prison labour.
The proportion of literate persons in the District in 1901 was
28-7 per cent. (49-9 males, 7-6 females). The total number of pupils
under instruction in the District as a whole was 13,773 in 1891,
18,375 in T9or, and 21,720 in 1904. The principal schools are in
Mandalay and Maymyo.
It will be found convenient to give separate educational figures for
Mandalay city and for the District. Mandalay city contained in
1903-4, 142 special, 22 secondary, 91 primary, and 927 private
schools, with 10,710 male and 3,260 female pupils. These schools
were maintained at a total cost of Rs. 96,000, towards which muni-
cipal funds contributed Rs. 38,000 and Provincial funds Rs. 16,000.
The District, excluding the city, contained in the same year 4 special,
7 secondary, 92 primary, and 749 private schools, with 6,590 male
and r,i6o female pupils. These schools are maintained largely from
Provincial funds, which provided Rs. 21,000 in 1903-4.
There are four hospitals and a dispensary, with accommodation for
191 in-patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 5^508,
including 2,987 in-patients, and i,86r operations were performed.
The Mandalay municipal hospital accounted for 2,482 of the in-
patients and 17,271 of the out-patients. The total income of these
institutions amounted to i-i lakhs, towards which the Mandalay
municipality contributed Rs. 68,000, the Maymyo town committee
Rs. 11,300, and Provincial funds Rs. 21,600. In addition to the
hospitals, two institutions for lepers are maintained at Mandalay.
Vaccination is compulsory only within municipal limits and in
cantonments. In 1903-4 the number of persons successfully vac-
cinated was 10,432, representing 28 per 1,000 of population.
[Symes, Eftibassy to Ava (1795) ; Crawford, Mission to Ava (1826) ;
Colonel Yule, Narrative of the Mission sent to the Court of Ava (1857) ;
M. Laurie, Seit/ement Report (1894).]
Mandalay City.— Head-quarters of the Division and District of
the same name in Upper Burma, and capital of the Burmese kingdom
from 1858 to 1885. The city lies in 210 59' N. and 960 6' E., and
occupies part of a plain, here about 8 miles wide, on the east bank
of the Irrawaddy, between the river and the Shan range, the dead
level of which is broken only by a hill 954 feet in height. To the
south-west of this hill, a mile and a half from the river, are the
moat and walls of the old city, nearly 6 miles in circumference.
The cantonments include the hill with the old city and a space
MAX DA LAY CITY ,39
to the north and cast of it, about 6 square miles in all. West
and south of the cantonments is the present native city, which
stretches to the river on the west, and to the walls of the old fort
of Amarapura on the south. The entire area of the municipality and
cantonments is 25 square miles, but this includes large unoccupied
spaces at the four corners. Religious buildings are scattered over the
whole, covering with their precincts 2 square miles. The European
quarter is on the south of the fort, and the business quarter is on the
west. Masonry buildings are general in the latter, but over the rest
of the city the houses are sometimes of wood, more commonly of
bamboo. Paddy-fields occupy the country near the river to the north
and south ; and towards the south-east, where the royal gardens of
Mindon once were, is a piece of land now given over to the St. John's
Leper Asylum and to rice Cultivation. As the city lies below flood
level, it is protected by an embankment, which runs all round the
municipality and cantonments, and is in some places doubled.
A canal, called the Shwetachaung, gives water connexion with
Madaya on the north. Along the river bank are some backwaters
cut off by the embankments and gradually filling up.
Mandalay dates only from the accession of king Mindon, who is
said to have been induced by a dream to abandon for it the old
capital of Amarapura, immediately south of the .
present municipal limits. The walls and moat of
the new city and the palace were constructed with paid labour
between February, 1857, and May, 185S. Jars full of oil, buried in
masonry pits at each of the four corners, are said to have taken the
place of the human sacrifices which had once been customary. The
whole area to be occupied, both within and without the walls, was laid
out in square blocks separated by broad roads, along most of which
tamarind and other shade trees were planted. Many of these blocks
were occupied in the centre by a high official, whose retainers dwelt
along the edges.
Mindon's reign was peaceful, except for an attempt at rebellion by
his son the Myingun prince, who in 1866 killed the heir apparent, and
eventually fled to Rangoon. Mindon was succeeded in 1878 by his
son Thibaw, the history of whose reign is one of palace intrigue varied
by massacre. A year after his accession about eighty of his kindred
men, women, and children — were murdered in the palace precincts,
and their bodies thrown into a trench. In 1884 occurred a further
massacre of about 200 persons, suspected of being concerned in a plot
on behalf of the Myingun prince. In 1885 came the rupture with the
British ; an expeditionary force was dispatched into Upper Burma,
and towards the end of November of that year General Prendeigast's
flotilla appeared off Mandalay. No resistance was offered, and the
VOL. XVII. K
1 4o M AND ALA Y CITY
king received Colonel Sladen in a summer-house in the palace gardens
and formally surrendered himself. For some months after this dacoi-
ties and robberies were frequent in and about Mandalay, but the city
was eventually reduced to order. About a tenth of the urban area was
burnt down during the hot season of 1886, and in August of that year
an abnormally high flood burst an embankment built by king Mindon,
and caused some loss of property. In 1887 a municipal committee
was formed and the metalling of the main roads taken in hand, a
telephone system was introduced, and a survey partly carried out.
Before the introduction of municipal government the stockade round
the palace and the bamboo houses in the old city were removed, com-
pensation being paid for the sites, and new land being given to the
expropriated.
The old city now forms part of the cantonments, and is known as Fort
Dufferin. The walls form a perfect square, with a side a mile and
. . a quarter long. They are built of brick and pro-
vided with battlements, the total height being 29 feet.
Picturesque watch-houses with many-storeyed roofs rise above them
at regular intervals, thirteen on each side, the largest over the gates,
which are twelve in number. Outside the walls is a strip of grass
land, and beyond this the moat, more than 200 feet across, and
bridged opposite the central gate on each side, and also opposite the
gates on the south-west and north-east.
In the centre of the square, with roads converging on it from the
four main gates, is a platform n feet high, 1,000 feet long, and about
half as wide, on which the palace is built. It was surrounded in the
Burmese kings' time by a brick wall and stockade 2,000 feet square,
but these have been removed. Within this space, north and south
of the palace, are shady pleasure gardens with lakes and grottoes.
The garden on the south contains the summer-house where king
Thlbaw surrendered. On the east is the bell-tower where the watches
were sounded, and north of it the glittering tomb of king Mindon,
covered with glass mosaic. Opposite the bell-tower, on the south side
of the road, is another tower enshrining a tooth of Buddha ; and farther
south a small monastery of glass mosaic on the site of an older one,
where Thlbaw was living in retreat with shaven head and yellow robe,
in accordance with Burmese custom, when called to the throne.
The principal throne-room, surmounted by a nine-roofed .spire
200 feet high, is near the east end of the platform. In front of it
is an open hall 285 feet long. Its golden roof is supported by gilded
teak pillars, some of them 60 feet high. The building was repaired,
and the gilding renewed, at a cost of more than a lakh, after Lord
Elgin's visit in 1898. The throne is approached through a gate ol
gilded iron open-work from a flight of steps at the back. To the west
DESCRIPTION i4,
is another throne-room in which foreign representatives were received.
Next in line to the west are the hall of the body-guard ; a waiting-room
for readers and others, with the pages' quarters to the north of it ;
another throne-room used for royal marriages ; and a lofty room with
an open veranda on two sides that was used by king Mindon as
a sleeping-chamber. Thibaw's queens slept in the last room of the
series, when nut in the royal apartments to the south. On the west
of this are sitting-rooms with the usual gilded pillars and roof, and
south of them a room from which plays were witnessed. To the east
of the entrance hall is a brick building with a tank (now filled in),
where the king and queen amused themselves at the annual water-
festival by watching the pages and maids-of-honour throw water at each
other. On the north of this is the king's treasure chamber and a room
where he held informal levees, and on the east the council-chamber where
the ministers held their secret deliberations. The Hlutdaw, where they
met in public for judicial and other business, was to the east of the
platform and has been pulled down. Close to the council-chamber is
a watch-tower, 78 feet high, exclusive of its decorative roof, from which
a fine view is obtainable. On the north side of the platform is a gilded
entrance hall similar to that on the south. Both contained throneSj
which have been removed. To the west of this hall are the large
apartments occupied by Sinbyumashin (' Lady of the White Elephant '),
mother of Thibaw's three queens ; and here the neglected Supayagyi,
by right the chief queen, was obliged to live in practical confine-
ment. Most of the buildings on the western half of the platform
have been demolished ; but the beautiful Lily throne-room, where
the wives of officials were received in state twice a year by the
king and queen, remains, and till recently was used as part of the
Upper Burma Club.
The most important Buddhist shrine in Mandalay is the Payagyi
or Arakan pagoda, 4 miles from the palace and 2 miles south ot the
Zegyo bazar. Its terraced roof of gilded stucco is of recent con-
struction, the original roof having been burnt in 1884. The building
was erected to hold the great brass image of Buddha brought from
Arakan by king Bodawpaya after his victorious campaign in 1784.
It is said to have been cast by king Sandathuriya of Arakan, who
ascended the throne in a.d. 146. Gautama is seated on a pedestal
7 feet high, and measures 12 feet 7 inches from the platform to the
tip of the magaik, or tiara, on his head. The image was dragged over
the mountains by Burmese soldiers, and was accompanied by numerous
captives of war, who afterwards settled in Mandalay. Long galleries
approach the building from each side, partly decorated with paintings —
some, on the north side, descriptive of the bringing of the image trom
Arakan. The galleries are lined with stalls on which gongs, marionettes,
K 2
M2 MANDALAY CITY
and the usual bazar goods arc displayed, and are thronged in the cold
season, especially during a festival, with a gay crowd of many races.
In the court on the north-east is a stone inscription, recording the
manner in which the image was brought from Arakan. To the south-
cast is a large tank filled with turtles, and in the north-west court are
two colossal bronze images of good execution, but now dilapidated,
also brought from Arakan. On the south-west are 575 stone inscrip-
tions— Burmese, Pali, and Talaing — the originals of which were col-
lected by king Bodawpaya and copied by his orders. On the east bank
of the Shwetachaung Canal, a little to the south of the Zegyo bazar, is
the Setkyathiha pagoda, built in 1884 over a brass image even larger
than that from Arakan. It was cast by order of king Bagyidaw in
1824, and followed the court from Ava to Amarapura and Mandalay.
Close to it on the east is a small pagoda built on the site of her
old home by Shinbome, a famous beauty who was the wife of five
successive kings.
Across the Shwetachaung is the Eindawya pagoda, built in 1847
by king Pagan on the site of a summer-house used by him when
a prince. Being on a spacious platform, from which it rises to a height
of 114 feet, it is seen to better advantage than the other pagodas in
Mandalay. On the west side is the Mahuya Paya, or ' corundum '
image, of black stone, brought by an emissary of king Bagyidaw from
Gaya in 1833.
To the west of the fort, between the roads leading from the two
gates on that side, is the Shwekyimyin pagoda, built in 1852 over an
older one said to have been erected in a.d. 1104, and containing
several images of great sanctity, in addition to the great brazen Buddha
for which it was built. One of these, the Shwelinbin, represents
Gautama standing in royal robes, and has been moved from
one capital to another since it was placed in a pagoda of the same
name by king Narapadisithu of Pagan (a.d. 1 167-1204). The
Anyathihadaw, which is kept in a vault near the great image, has
been so plastered with gold-leaf by devotees that it is now a mere
shapeless lump.
Close by to the north is the Payani or ' red ' pagoda, so named from
the colour of one of its predecessors, built on the site of a shrine
erected in 1092. It is interesting chiefly on account of the presence
of the Naungdawand Nyidaw images, dating from the time of Anawrata,
which were stolen from Mandalay hill in the troubles following the
annexation and, after being stripped of the mass of gold with which
they were covered, thrown into the valley, where they were found by
a monk and regilded by the town people.
The Yadanamyizu pagoda is beyond the Shwetachaung on the north
side of C Road, three-fourths of a mile from the south-west gate. It
DESCRIPTION i43
was built in 1478 by king Maha Thihathura, and is said to have
retained its original shape.
On the north side of the fort, in an unfinished building at the foot
of Mandalay hill, is a Buddha 25 feet high, hewn out of a single block
of Sagyin marble at the beginning of king Mindon's reign. To the
east of it is the Sandamani pagoda, containing an iron image of Buddha
cast by king Bodawpaya.
Farther east is the Kuthodaw, the most splendid monument of
king Mindon, consisting of a pagoda 100 feet high surrounded by
729 others, in each .of which is a marble slab inscribed with a part
of the Buddhist scriptures in Burmese and Pali. Great care was
taken to collate the various manuscripts so as to arrive at the most
correct version, and the whole stands as a complete official record of
the sacred writings.
South of the Kuthodaw are the walls of a vast monastery built by
the same king and called the Atumashi, or ' incomparable.' These
and a forest of blackened pillars are all that is left of the building,
which was burnt in 1892. Just to the east of it is the Shwegyaung,
or 'golden monastery,' built by Mindon's chief queen after his death
with the materials of the house in which he died. The interior is
a blaze of gold.
Close to the east gate of the fort is the Taiktaw, a large monastery
surrounded by others, all finely carved, which served as the residence
of the Thathanabaing, or head of the Buddhist Church, from 1859 to
the annexation. The Myadaung monastery, situated on A Road, a
mile to the south-west of the fort, is also profusely carved and gilded,
though the gilding on the outside is now nearly worn off through
exposure to the weather. The builder was Thlbaw's favourite queen
Supayalat. The Salin monastery, near the racecourse to the north
of the fort, contains what is probably the finest carving in Burma. It
was built in 1873 by the Salin princess.
On the highest point of Mandalay hill is a pagoda which once
contained the Naungdaw and Nyidaw images referred to above.
A little lower, at the southern end of the ridge, stood, until it was
burnt in 1892, a great wooden image called Shweyattaw, erected by
king Mindon on the foundation of Mandalay. It represented Buddha
pointing to the palace as the future site of the capital. Preparations
are being made to erect a new figure in place of that burnt.
An interesting morning may be spent on the top of the hill with a
good glass. The whole of Mandalay lies at one's feet, and every building
of importance may be identified. Conspicuous to the south-east are
the Kuthodaw and the walls of the Incomparable Monastery. Far
beyond them to the south, at the edge of a cultivated plain, the white
pagodas on Kyaukse hill may be seen, backed by the Shan range.
M4 MANDALAY CTTY
Maytnyo lies due east, hidden by several ranges of hills. On the
north a conical hill marks the marble quarries of Sagyin, and far
beyond are the mountains of the Ruby Mines District. West, across
the broad Irrawaddy, the huge mass of brickwork erected by king
Bodawpaya at Mingun may be seen, with innumerable white pagodas
dotted over the hills southward to Sagaing. On the east bank, opposite
Sagaing, the pagodas of the old city of Ava, and farther to the left
those of Amarapura, rise above the trees.
Half a mile to the west of the south-west corner of the fort is the
main bazar, called the Zegyo. The buildings of this huge mart, which
covered 12 acres, were erected under king Mindon, and utterly
destroyed by fire in 1897. They have since been replaced by a
masonry bazar, costing 8 lakhs, where almost everything obtainable
in Mandalay may be bought. The bazar sellers are mostly women :
and unmarried Burman girls of all classes may be seen displaying
their good looks as well as their wares, and sharpening their wits in
competition with natives of India, against whom they can hold their
own much better than their men-folk.
Within the fort walls are barracks and officers' quarters for one
British and two Native infantry regiments. The jail is in the north-
west corner, and near it Government House overlooks the moat from
the north wall. To the north of the fort, skirting Mandalay hill, are
the Burma Sappers' lines, and quarters for a mountain battery. To the
south, outside the walls, lie the courthouses, municipal office, and
rircuit-house ; and farther west the hospital, the rtfo£-bungalow, and the
railway station. On the west, in the business quarter of the city, are
the post and telegraph offices, and the main bazar. There are twelve
markets besides the Zegyo within municipal limits, and seventeen
police stations and outposts.
Of European religious buildings the chief is the Roman Catholic
cathedral, situated in the business quarter. It was completed in 1898,
the entire cost being borne by a wealthy Burman convert. The
Society for the Propagation of the Gospel has a church and school,
built by king Mindon, across the Shwetachaung in the west ; the
mission of the English Wesleyans is south of the fort, and that of
the American Baptists a mile to the south-west. The St. Joseph's
Orphanage, opened in 1904, gives free board and teaching to 150
Chinese boys. The St. John's Leper Asylum, a Roman Catholic
institution, was built in 1902 at a cost of 3 lakhs through the energy
of the late Father Wehinger. It contains seven wards accommodating
50 patients each, and in T904 had 323 inmates. The asylum is main-
tained at a cost of Rs. 34,000 a year. Expenses are met by a Govern-
ment grant of about Rs. 6,000 a year, contributions from municipal
and other Local funds amounting to over Rs. 10,000, and private
rorr/.ATiox i.,5
subscriptions. A little to the west are the wards of the Mission to
Lepers in the East, of which the local superintendent is at present
a Wesleyan missionary. In 1904 there were 138 inmates in this
asylum, besides 1 1 untainted children of lepers kept separately. The
annual cost of maintenance is Rs. 15,000, defrayed from a Government
grant of Rs. 3,300, municipal and Local fund contributions (Rs. 4,000),
the mission fund (Rs. 2,200), and local subscriptions (Rs. 6,000). The
mission has been at work in Mandalay since 1890. The city con-
tains over a hundred Buddhist monasteries and schools, and several
mosques.
The population of Mandalay in 1901 was 183,816, a decrease of
4,999 since the first Census taken in 1891. Of this number, 166,154
persons were living within municipal limits and
17,662 in cantonments. Half of the decrease was
in cantonments, and was due mainlv to the reduction of the garrison,
the falling off in the city itself being little more than 1 per cent. Of
the people living within municipal limits, 91 per cent, were returned
as speaking Burmese, 4^ per cent. Hindustani, less than 1 per cent.
English, and 3^ per cent, other languages, mostly Indian. A large
proportion, however, of the Burmese-speaking people have Indian
blood in them. While the number of those speaking Indian languages
cannot exceed 8 per cent, those returning themselves as Muham-
madan or Hindu in religion are no less than 13 per cent, of the total
population : consequently, it would seem that at least 5 per cent, of
the Burmese speaking people must be partly Indian in race. The
proportion is possibly greater, for there are many Buddhists of mixed
descent. The Chinese in the District numbered 1,365 males and
211 females in 1901, and probably nearly all these were in Mandalay
city. The city has several colonies of Manipuris and Hindus from
Manipur, Assam, and Arakan. brought as captives after the invasions
of those countries, and now called indiscriminately Ponnas. They
are all of the Hindu religion, and do not as a rule intermarry with
Burmans, but their women wear Burmese dress. Of the 0.000 Ponnas
enumerated in the District in 1901. the majority were residents of the
citv. Christians numbered 2,470. or \\ per cent, of the total popula-
tion. Roman Catholic missionaries have been established in Upper
Burma since the eighteenth century : the Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel has had a school in Mandalay from the time of king
Mindon ; and the American Baptists and English Wesleyans also have
churches and schools. Of the cantonment population, nearly two-
thirds were returned as Burmans.
The census returns show that unskilled labourers and their depen-
dents in 1901 numbered 18.000, religious devotees (monks, &c.)
11,000, and Government servants, including the troops, q.ooo.
I46 MANDALAY CITY
Nearly S,ooo persons were connected with agriculture, and about
10,000 with personal services of various kinds. Of the industries,
cotton-weaving ranked first, with close upon 11,000 representatives.
Tailors and sempstresses, with their dependents, numbered 10,000.
Next came sawyers, carters, and workers or dealers in the precious
metals, each with 7,000, sandal-makers with 6,000, and silk-weavers
with 5,000. Tanners and lacquerers accounted for more than 2,000,
and blacksmiths for a similar number.
The arts and crafts of Mandalay include nearly everything that the
Burmese race is capable of producing. The use of machinery is
almost unknown ; and with the exception of a
Industries. Drewery belonging to a European firm, and a few rice
and timber-mills, almost all the industries are carried on in the home.
Among the arts may be included hammered silver-work, wood-carving,
iron-work, painting, and a kind of embroidery, called shwechido, of
gold and silver thread and spangles. The silver-work now consists
mostly of bowls with figures in relief. It is of unequal merit, but good
work can be got if demanded. The wood-carving, though the most
national of all the arts practised, is in its decadence. The work of the
old craftsmen was intended for the open air, where it was exposed to
the elements and needed to be effective at a distance. The best work
still shows its origin in its bold free lines and vigour of execution.
The ironwork chiefly consists of Ms, intended to ornament the tops
of pagodas. The painting produced in the city is not of a high order,
but the work on silk is in demand among Europeans. The shivechido
work is the most characteristic of all. It is gorgeous and effective,
being used for the palls at the cremation of monks and for the dresses
of royal personages on the stage ; but it does not last well, nor does it
lend itself to fine detail. Equally rich in effect is a rough kind of
gold lacquer interspersed with coloured glass, a favourite material for
monastic furniture. The ordinary lacquer-work is inferior to that
of Pagan, and is used mostly for platters, the designs on which are
effective but wanting in variety. The material used is not lac but
thitst, the gum of the Melanorrhoea usitata. The patterns of the
silk pasos and tameins, including the beautiful acheik work, are con-
stantly varying, and the fashions change as quickly as in any European
capital. The making of brass and marble images of Buddha can
hardly be called an art, as there is no variation in the type. Brass-
work is moulded by the cire perdu process. The figure is modelled in
wax and encased in a shell of clay. It is next subjected to an intense
heat, which expels the wax. The molten brass is then poured in and
takes the place of the wax. A pure white marble is obtained from the
quarries at Sagyin, 20 miles to the north ; and the images made of it,
sometimes of great size, are sent all over Burma. Among the minor
A DMINISTRA TIOX , 4 7
industries of the city may be mentioned the making of gongs, circular
or three-cornered, and the preparation of sacred writings with orna-
mental lettering on brass or lacquer.
A municipal committee was formed in Mandalay in 1887, and has
members representing the European, Burmese, Muhammadan, Hindu,
and Chinese communities. The principal sources of
revenue are the house and land tax, which has risen mims ra 10n-
steadily from i-6 lakhs in 1888-9 to 2-4 lakhs in 1903-4, and market
dues, which yielded 1-4 lakhs in 1888-9, 2-7 lakhs in 1902-3, and
2-1 lakhs in 1903-4. Of this amount the Zegyo bazar contributed
1-5 lakhs in 1902-3, and 1-2 lakhs in 1903-4, the falling off in the
latter year being due to a fire in 1903. Slaughter-houses yielded
Rs. 44,000 in 1903-4. Other sources of income are the cart tax and
toll, which has increased in the last five years from Rs. 23,000 to
Rs. 31,000; and the hackney-carriage tax, which has fallen off from
Rs. r 1,000 to Rs. 9,000. The principal item of expenditure is con-
servancy, which cost i-i lakhs in 1903-4, while Rs. 14,000 was received
as conservancy fees. Roads are a varying item of expenditure. The
average for the past five years is Rs. 1,30,000, besides Rs. 26,000 for
establishment. The maintenance of the hospital costs about Rs. 65,000
yearly, the fees received being about Rs. 5,000. About Rs. 50,000
a year is devoted to education. There is no municipal school, but the
Educational department divides the grant among mission and other
schools. The lighting of the town costs Rs. 43,000, which amount
is just covered by a tax levied for the purpose. The expenditure on
general administration rose from Rs. 28,000 in 1899-1900 to Rs. 36,000
in 1903-4, and that on the collection of taxes from Rs. 15,000 to
Rs. 19,000. The survey costs about Rs. 16,000 a year, and the fire
brigade Rs. 20,000. Vaccination and registration of births and deaths
each cost about Rs. 4,000. Other items are Rs. 20,000 payable to
Government to defray the annual cost of the embankment surround-
ing the city, and grants of Rs. 10,000 to the cantonment fund and
Rs. 10,800 to the leper asylums. The total income and expenditure
during the ten years ending 1901 averaged 5-4 lakhs. In 1903-4 they
were respectively 15 lakhs and 12 lakhs. The incidence of taxation
in the city is Rs. 1-8-4, or about 2s. per head. Income tax is levied
by Government, but not thatliameda, so that persons with incomes
of less than Rs. 1,000 are more lightly taxed than in the villages
outside municipal limits. The length of roads within the municipality
is 117 miles, of which, however, only 5r are metalled. An electric
tramway, opened in 1904, runs along 12 miles of road ; and it is pro-
posed to light the city, or part of it, by electricity, in place of oil.
Both conservancy and water-supply are capable of great improvement.
Night-soil is removed in carts, but only when the houseowner chooses
i48 M AND ALA Y CITY
to pay a fee. In the business quarter, however, a tax has been sanc-
tioned. The water-supply is from the moat and river, and from wells.
A scheme for sinking new wells at a cost of 3^ lakhs is under con-
sideration. The average death-rate during the five years ending 1903-4
was 38-2, and the birth-rate 40-72 per 1,000. The hospital, which was
built in 1891, had 2,482 in-patients in 1903-4, and medicines were
dispensed in over 17,000 cases. In addition to the hospital, there
is a dispensary near the Zegyo bazar, at which a somewhat larger
number of cases were attended to.
The cantonment fund is chiefly maintained by grants-in-aid from the
Government and the municipality, amounting in 1903-4 to Rs. 54,000.
These are supplemented by house, conservancy, and other taxes, yield-
ing in all about Rs. x 6,000, a sum of Rs. 7,000 from market dues, and
other collections amounting to about Rs. 4,000. The chief items of
expenditure are conservancy (Rs. 31,000), police (Rs. 17,000), and
hospital (Rs. 8,000). There are 26 miles of metalled roads within
cantonment limits, maintained from Imperial funds. The Upper Burma
Volunteer Rifles, 560 strong, have their head-quarters at Mandalay.
Statistics regarding the educational institutions of the city (vernacular
and Anglo-vernacular) are given in the District article. Of Anglo-
vernacular schools, there are eight secondary and
three primary. Of these, the principal are St. Peter's
high school and St. Joseph's (Roman Catholic), the American Baptist
Mission high and European schools, the Royal school of the Society
for the Propagation of the Gospel, and the high school of the Euro-
pean Wesleyan Mission. Special schools include a survey school and
a normal school for teachers.
Mandalay Canal. — An irrigation canal in Mandalay District,
Upper Burma, running north and south, parallel to the Irrawaddy,
and watering a level plain in the centre of the District, which is
bounded on the north by the Madaya stream, on the south by the
Myitnge river, on the east by the Shan Hills, and on the west by the
Irrawaddy. The canal, which derives its water from the Madaya
stream, is 39 miles in length, has 86 miles of distributaries, and is
capable of irrigating 80,000 acres of land. It was commenced in
1896 and was opened in 1902, its cost having been nearly 51 lakhs.
It irrigated 30,000 acres in 1903 4. It waters much the same country
as a canal dug for irrigation during Burmese rule, which, owing to
faulty alignment and the inability of the Burmans to deal with the
iross-drainage from the Shan Hills in the east, failed of its object.
The revenue derived from the work in 1903 4 was nearly a lakh.
Mandalgarh. — Head-quarters of a zila or district of the same
name in the State of Udaipur, Rajputana, situated in 250 13' N.
and 750 7' E., about 100 miles north-east of Udaipur city. Popu-
MANDATOR ZILA M,,
lation (1901), 1,462. To the north-west is a fort about half a mile
in length, with a low rampart wall and bastions encircling the crest
of the hill on which it stands ; it is strong towards the south, but
assailable from the hills to the north. The fort is said to have
been constructed about the middle of the twelfth century by a chief of
the Balnot clan of Rajputs (a branch of the Solankis). According to
the Musalman historians, it was taken by Muzaffar Shah of Gujarat
at the end of the fourteenth century, and twice by Mahmud Khilji of
Malwa in the middle of the fifteenth century. Subsequently, it be-
longed alternately to the Ranas of Udaipur and the Mughal emperors.
In or about 1650 Shah Jahan granted it in jdg'ir to Raja Rup Singh
of Kishangarh, who partially built a palace there, but Rana Raj Singh
retook it in 1660. Twenty years later, Aurangzeb invaded Mewar
and captured Mandalgarh, and in 1700 he made it over to Tujhar
Singh, the Rathor chief of Pisangan (in Ajmer District), from whom
it was recovered by Rana Amar Singh in 1706: and it has since
remained in the uninterrupted possession of his successors. In the
town are a primary school, attended by about 60 boys, and a dispen-
sary. Iron mines are still worked at Blgod and other places in the
district.
Mandapeta. — Town in the Ramachandrapuram taluk of Godavari
District, Madras, situated in 160 51' N. and 8i° 55" E. Population
(1901), 8,380. Local affairs are managed by a Union panchayat.
Mandargiri. — Hill about 700 feet high, in the Banka subdivision
of Bhagalpur District, Bengal, situated in 240 50' X. and 870 2' 1'..,
about 40 miles south of the town of Bhagalpur. The hill, which
consists of a huge mass of granite overgrown near the summit with
low jungle, is a sacred spot to the Hindus, who consider it the
mythological mountain Mandar, which was used in churning the
ocean. The oldest buildings are two ruined temples near the top
of the hill, which are ascribed by local tradition to a legendary
Chola king who was cured of his leprosy by bathing at a tank
here. There are two inscriptions and some rude carvings on the
rock, and numerous artificial tanks have been cut in the side of the
hill, some of which go back to the time of Aditya Sen (a. d. 675).
The largest of these, known as the Sltakund, is 100 feet long by 500
feet wide and stands 500 feet above the surrounding plain.
[M. Martin, Eastern India, vol. ii, pp. 60-3. )
Mandasor Zila.— District of the (Iwalior State, Central India,
lying between 230 $7,' and 250 19' N. and 740 n' and 750 54' E.,
with an area of 1,721 square miles. The population in iqoi wa>
196,434, giving a density of T14 persons per square mile. The
district contains three towns — Mandasor (population, 20,936), the
head-quarters, Nimach (including the cantonment, 21,588), and
ISO MANDASOR ZILA
Jaw AD (8,005) — and 775 villages. It is divided into seven parganas,
with head-quarters at Mandasor, Nlmach, Bhaogarh, Jawad, Nahargarh,
Singoli, and Gangapur. The land revenue is Rs. 9,03,000. Mandasor
lies on the Malwa plateau, and, except for the range which runs
east and west to the north of Nlmach, consists of a level plain
covered with black cotton soil. Poppy is largely grown.
Mandasor Town. — Head-quarters of the district of the same
name in Gwalior State, Central India, situated in 240 4' N. and
750 5' E., on the bank of the Siwana (Seuna or Sau) river,
a tributary of the Sipra, and on the Ajmer-Khandwa branch of the
Rajputana-Malwa Railway, 1,516 feet above sea-level. The popula-
tion fell from 25,785 in 1891 to 20,936 in 1901. The town is
a centre of the opium trade, one of the Government depots at
which duty is levied on the drug being established here. Another
industry of some importance is the manufacture of coloured cloth
for quilts and ckunris (a piece of printed cloth worn by women
to cover the arms and upper part of the body). Local affairs are
managed by a municipality constituted in 1902. The income amounts
to Rs. 1,300, derived mainly from octroi. Besides the usual offices,
a combined British post and telegraph office, a State post office,
a police station, a dispensary, a school, and an inspection bungalow
are situated here.
Mandasor is a place of considerable antiquity and of historical
and archaeological importance. Its name in former days was Dasha-
pura, or the 'township of ten hamlets,' and it appears to be referred
to in an inscription found at Nasik, which dates from early in the
Christian era. An inscription near Mandasor refers to the erection
of a temple of the Sun in 437, during the rule of Kumara Gupta I,
which was repaired thirty-six years later. As the town stands now,
it is entirely Muhammadan, though Hindu and Jain remains are
numerous. The fort on the east of the town is said to have been
founded by Ala-ud-dln Khilji in the fourteenth century, but it was
considerably increased and made a place of importance by Hoshang
Shah (1405-34) of Malwa. Many of the stones used in the con-
struction of the wall seem to have been brought from Afzalpur,
n miles to the south. Owing to its position, Mandasor figures
continually in history. Near the big tank, outside the city, Humayun
surrounded the camp of Bahadur Shah in T535 and defeated him,
driving him out of Malwa. When Malwa was taken by Akbar in
1562, Mandasor became the head-quarters of the Mandasor sarkar
of the Subah of Malwa. In the eighteenth century it fell to Sindhia,
in whose possession it has since remained. After his defeat at
Mehidpur, Holkar came to terms with the British, and the treaty
by which Malwa was settled was signed at Mandasor early in 181 8.
MANDAWAR 151
In the Mutiny of 1S57 one Sahibzada Flroz Shah, a member of the
Delhi house, raised his standard here and collected a considerable
following, among whom were a large number of Rohillas. As their
presence endangered the safety of Nimach, the Malwa field force
made a rapid advance on the fort, which was captured on November
21, 1857. A fierce fight took place three days later at the village
of Guradia, 5 miles north-west of Mandasor, in which the Rohillas
fought bravely ; but their defeat broke up the forces of Flroz Shah
and completely cleared this part of the country.
In Mandasor itself and in the neighbourhood there are numerous
remains of archaeological interest. The village of Sondani (or
Songnl), 3 miles to the south-east, contains two magnificent mono-
lithic sandstone pillars with lion and bell capitals. An inscription
incised on both of them records that Yasodharman, king of Malwa,
defeated at this spot the Huna adventurer Mihirakula, probably
in 528. Great importance attaches to these for their use in settling
the commencement of the Gupta era.
[J. F. Fleet, Indian Antiquary, vol. xv. I
Mandawa. — Town in the Shekhawati nizamat of the State of
Jaipur, Rajputana, situated in 280 4/ N. and 750 9' E., about 90 miles
north-west of Jaipur city. Population (1901), 5,165. A combined
post and telegraph office and several schools are maintained here.
Mandawar. — Town in the District and talis! I of Bijnor, United
Provinces, situated in 290 29' N. and 78° 8' E., 8 miles north
of Bijnor town. Population (1901), 7,210. It was identified by
Si. Martin and by General Cunningham with the Motlpura visited
by Hiuen Tsiang in the seventh century ; but this identification
rests entirely on its distance from various places, and no excavations
have been made1. According to tradition, some Agarwal Banias
settled here in the twelfth century, when they found the place
deserted. The town was captured by Timur in 1399, and was the
capital of a malial or pargana under Akbar. In 1805 it was' pillaged
by Amir Khan, the Pindari, and during the Mutiny it suffered at the
hands of Jat marauders. A mound half a mile square rises some
10 feet above the rest of the town, containing large bricks. The
Jama Masjid stands on this, constructed from the materials of a Hindu
temple. North-east of the town is another large mound, and there-
are two tanks in the neighbourhood. Mandawar is administered
under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about Rs. 1,200. There
is a small industry in papier mache ; and boxes, pen-trays, paper-
knives, &c, are made. A primary school has 126 pupils, and two
aided schools have 85 pupils. The American Methodist Mission
has a branch here.
1 Archaeological Survey Reports, vol. i, p. J4*.
152 MANDHATA
Mandhata. — Village in the Khandwa tahsil of Nimar District,
Central Provinces, situated in 220 15' N. and 760 9' E., 32 miles from
Khandwa and 7 miles east of Mortakka station on the Rajputana-
Malwa Railway. Population (1901), 832. It stands on the Narbada
river and is a well-known Hindu place of pilgrimage, as it contains one
of the twelve celebrated litigants of Siva. The village of Mandhata is
built partly upon the south bank of the Narbada and partly upon an
island in the river, and is exceedingly picturesque with rows of houses,
temples, and shops, and the Rao's palace conspicuous above the rest,
standing on terraces scarped out of the sides of a hill on the island.
Between the island and the southern bank the Narbada forms a deep
pool, which is full of large tame fish. Upon the summit of the hill are
signs of a once flourishing settlement, in the shape of ruined fortifica-
tions and temples. The most interesting is the temple of Siddhanath.
It stands on a raised platform, whose plinth is supported by elephants
in various positions. The temple of Onkar on the island is a com-
paratively modern structure, but the great columns supporting it have
been taken from some older building. On the north bank of the river
are some Vaishnava and Jain temples. The Rao of Mandhata, the
hereditary custodian of all the modern temples, is a Bhilala, claiming
descent from a Chauhan Rajput who is said to have taken Mandhata
from a Bhil chief in 1165. A large fair is held annually in October,
at which in former times devotees of Bhairon threw themselves from
the cliffs and were dashed to pieces on the rocks in the river. The
last sacrifice of this kind was witnessed by a British officer in 1824.
It is the practice at the fair to present horses as offerings at the shrine
of Siva : and as the frugal worshippers are inclined to consider that any
horse will pass muster for an offering as long as it is alive, it has come
to be a proverb, when describing an absolutely worthless horse, to say
that it is good enough to be offered at the shrine of Mandhata.
Mandi State. — Native Statu in the Punjab, under the political
control of the Commissioner, Jullundur Division, lying between 310 2^'
and 320 4' N. and 761 40' and 77° 22' E., in the upper reaches of the
Beiis. It is bordered on the north by Chhota Bangahal ; on the east
by the Nargu range, which divides it from the Kulu valley, and by
the Beas, Tlrthan, and Bisna streams ; on the south it adjoins Suket,
and on the west Kangra District. It is 54 miles long and 2>2> broad,
with an area of 1,200 square miles of mountainous country. The
Beas enters at the middle of its eastern border, and
Physical • ....
as cts leaves it near the north-west corner, thus dividing it
into two parts; of which the northern is the smaller.
This is trisected by two parallel ranges, of which the higher and
eastern, the Ghoghar-ki-Dhar, is continued south of the Beiis and
extends into the south-west of the State. The south-eastern corner,
MANDI STATE 153
the Mandi Saraj, or ' highland,' is formed by the western end of the
Jalauri range.
The State lies partly on roeks belonging to the central Himalayan
zone, of unknown age, and partly on Tertiary shales and sandstones.
The rocks of the central zone consist of slates, conglomerates, and
limestones, which have been referred to the infra-Blaini and Blaini
and Krol groups of the Simla area. The sandstones and shales of
the sub-Himalayan zone belong to the Sirmur series, of Lower Tertiary
age, and to the Siwalik series (Upper Tertiary). The most important
mineral is rock-salt, which appears to be connected with the Tertiary
beds \
Wild flowers — such as the anemone, dog-violet, and pimpernel — grow
abundantly in the hills in March and April. The best timber trees are
the deodar, blue pine, chil {Pi/uts longifolid), spruce, silver fir, and box.
The forests abound in game, leopards, bears (especially black), hyenas,
barking-deer, gum/, and musk deer being common. Feathered game
are also abundant, and fish in the larger streams.
The autumn months are unhealthy, except in the upper ranges, the
lower valley being malarious. The temperature is generally cool even
in summer, except at Mandi, the capital, which is shut in by hills, and
in the west of the State, which is only about 2,000 feet above sea-level.
The rainfall in the upper ranges of the Nargu and Ghoghar-ki-Dhar
hills is heavy.
Mandi formed part of Suket State until in the reign of Sahu Sen,
the eleventh of the Chandarbansi Rajas of that kingdom, Bahu Sen.
his younger brother, left Suket and settled at Mang-
laur in Kulu. His descendant, Karanchan, was
killed in a battle fought with the Raja of Kulu, and his Ra.ni, who
was pregnant, fled to her father's house at Seokot. On the way a son
was born to her under an oak-tree (ban), who succeeded the Rana of
Seokot under the title of Ban Sen. Han Sen enlarged his possessions
and transferred his capital to Bhin, 4 miles above Mandi town ; and hi>
son, Kalyan Sen, purchased Batauhli opposite Mandi on the other side
of the Beas. Little is known of their successors until the time of
Ajbar Sen, who founded the town of .Mandi in 1527. The ambition
of a later chief, Suraj Sen, brought disaster upon the principality.
Having attacked Bangahal, he was defeated by Man Singh, the Raja's
brother-in-law, lost the salt-mines of Guma and Drang, and was
compelled to sue for peace and pay a war indemnity : yet he built the
strong fort of Kamla in. 1625 and the Damdama palace at Mandi. All
his eighteen sons having died in his lifetime, he had an image made ol
silver which he railed Madhava Rao, and to it he bequeathed his
1 Medlicott, ' The Sub-Himalayan Range between the Ganges and Ravi,' Memoirs,
Geological Survey of India, vol. iii, pt. ii.
i54 MANDI STATE
kingdom in 1648. He was succeeded in 1658 by his brother Shyam
Sangh, who built the temple of Shyami Kali on the Tama ridge in
Mandi town. His successor, Gur Sen, brought the famous image
preserved in the Padal temple from Jagannath ; and his illegitimate son,
Jippu, reorganized the revenue of the State on a system still in force.
Raja Sidh Sen, who succeeded in 1686, a great warrior supposed to be
possessed of miraculous powers, conquered Xachan, Hath, and Daled
in 1688, and Dhanesgarh, Raipur, and Madhopur from Suket in 1690 ;
but he treacherously murdered Pirthi Pal, the Raja of Bangahal, at
Mandi. He adorned his capital with a temple of Ganpati, and also
built the Shivapuri temple at Hatgarh in 1705. It is said that Guru
Gobind Singh was hospitably entertained by him at Mandi, an occasion
on which the Guru blessed him. Sidh Sen is recorded to have died at
the age of 100 in 1729. His grandson and successor, Shamsher Singh,
conquered Chuborai, Ramgarh, Deogarh, Hastpur, and Sarni from
Kulu. His son, Isri Sen, succeeded when only five years old ; and
Sansar Chand, the Katoch Raja of Kangra, seized the opportunity to
invade Mandi. He took Hatli and Chohar, which he made over to
Suket and Kulu respectively, and Anantpur, which he retained. Isri
Sen was kept a prisoner in Kangra fort, and his ministers paid tribute
to the conqueror. In 1805 Sansar Chand attacked Rahlur, and its
Raja invoked the aid of the Gurkhas, who had already overrun the
country from the Gogra to the Sutlej. The allies defeated the Katoch
Raja at Mahal Mori in 1806; and Isri Sen, released from captivity,
paid homage to the Gurkha Amar Singh and was restored to his
kingdom. But in 1809 the Sikhs, under Ranjit Singh, drove the
Gurkhas back across the Sutlej, and in 18 10 Desa Singh Majithia was
appointed nazim of all the Hill States including Mandi. Its tribute,
at first Rs. 30,000, was raised to a lakh in 18 15, reduced again to
Rs. 50,000 a year or two later, and fixed at Rs. 75,000, in addition to
a succession fine of one lakh, on the accession of Zalim Sen in 1826.
On the death of Ranjit Singh in 1839, the Sikh government determined
to complete the reduction of Mandi, as a stepping-stone to the projected
conquest of Chinese Tartary. In 1840 General Ventura occupied
Mandi, and Kamlagarh capitulated after a siege of two months. The
Raja, Balbir Singh, was sent a prisoner to Amritsar, but was released
in 1 84 1 by Maharaja Sher Singh and returned to Mandi. The
oppression of the Sikhs drove him into negotiations with the British ;
and after the battle of Sobraon his proffered allegiance was accepted,
and the relations between the Raja and the paramount power were
defined in a sanad dated October 24, 1846. By that date the Sikh
garrisons had already been expelled by the unaided efforts of the
Raja and his subjects. Balbir Singh died in 1851, and was succeeded
by his four-year-old son, Bije Sen. A Council of Regency was formed
AGRICULTURE ,55
under the presidency of Wazir Gusaon. Dissensions among the
members compelled Government in 1852 to entrust all the real power
to the Wazir, and during the remaining years of the Raja's minority
the State was well governed. The training of the Raja was, however,
neglected until too late, and his accession to the throne in 1866 was
followed by confusion in the State. During the rest of his long reign
the administration was carried on only with the perpetual assistance
and advice of the British Government. Bije Sen died in 1902, and
his illegitimate son, Bhawani Sen, was recognized as his successor.
He was educated at the Aitchison College, Lahore, and for the first
two years after his installation in 1903 had the assistance of an officer
of the Indian Civil Service as Superintendent of the State. The Raja
of Mandl is entitled to a salute of 1 1 guns.
Besides MandI Town, its capital, the State contains 146 villages.
The population at the last three enumerations was : (1881) 147,017,
(1 891) 166,923, and (1901) 174,045. The State is
divided into 24 waziris, and each of these was
formerly divided into mahrais or groups of hamlets {gmon or basi\
with head-quarters at a garh or fort in which the revenue in kind was
stored. Hindus number 170,304, or about 98 per cent, of the
population; and there are 3,187 Muhammadans and 510 Buddhists.
The State is sparsely populated. The language is Mandiali, but Saraj
has a distinct dialect called Paharl. By far the most numerous caste
is that of the Kanets, who number 82,000, and are essentially agricul-
turists. After them come the Brahmans (19,000), Dumnas (Dums or
low-castes, 14,000), Kolls (14,000), and Chamars (leather-workers,
11,000). The Rajputs (6,000) form a territorial aristocracy under the
Rnja. Of the total population, 84 per cent, live by agriculture, supple-
mented by pasture and rude home industries. The industrial castes
are few, and numerically small.
The principal autumn crops are rice, maize, mash (Phaseolus
radiatus), millets, and potatoes ; the principal spring crops arc wheat,
barley, tobacco, and sugar-cane. The Raja is the .
sole proprietor of all the land in the State. Lands
are leased to malguzdrs by written leases, which specify the revenue
and beg&r (if any) due on the holding and its extent, and stipulate
that an enhanced rate is to be paid if additional land is brought under
cultivation. On the other hand, a mdlguzdr can be ejected only for
disloyalty or failure to pay rent, and he is forbidden to sell or
mortgage his holding, though he may transfer its possession for
.i period not exceeding fifteen years. Under the malguzdrs tenants
cultivate, usually on payment of half the produce.
The area for which particulars are on record is 1,130 square miles,
of which 550 square miles, or 48 per cent., are forests; 112, or
VOL. XVII. 1.
156 MANDl STATE
10 per cent., not available for cultivation ; 68, or 6 per cent., cultivable
waste other than fallows ; and 400 square miles, or 36 per cent., are
cultivated. The staple food-crops are rice, maize, pulses, millets, and
potatoes, the last introduced some years ago. Cotton and turmeric are
also grown. In spring, wheat, barley, and gram are the main crops in
the lowlands. Poppy is grown in the highlands, and inferior sugar-
cane in the Ballh valley. Mandl opium, like that made in Kashmir
and the Simla Hill States, pays a duty of Rs. 2 per seer on import
into the Punjab. Tea, introduced in 1865, is now grown in two State
gardens, which produce about 60,000 lb. per annum.
The cattle, though small, arc fairly strong. Buffaloes are kept
only by the Gujars, who are mostly immigrants from Jammu, and
by a few landholders. Ponies and mules are scarce ; but an attempt
is being made to encourage mule-breeding, and two Syrian donkeys
have been imported by the State. Sheep are generally kept, and
blankets and clothing made of the wool, while goats are still more
numerous.
Artificial irrigation is carried on by means of kuhh (cuts) from the
hill streams. The channels are made by private enterprise, and their
management rests entirely with the people.
Nearly three-fifths of the State is occupied by forest and grazing
lands. The southern hills bordering on Kulu abound in deodar and
blue pine, while spruce and chll trees are found on
the lower hills in the Beas valley. Boxwood and
chestnut occur in some localities, and the common Himalayan oak
grows nearly everywhere. The tun (Cedrela Toond) and khirk (Celtis)
are found in numbers near villages. A forest department is now
being organized. The revenue from forests in 1903-4 was Rs. 15,000.
The Ghoghar-ki-Dhar is rich in minerals. Iron is found through-
out the Saraj zvaz/ri in inexhaustible quantities, and is collected
after rain, when the veins are exposed and the
minerals schist is soft. Owing, however, to the lack of coal,
it can only be smelted with charcoal, and the out-
turn is small and unprofitable. Salt is worked at Guma and Drang,
being quarried from shallow open cuttings. It is of inferior quality,
but is in demand for the use of cattle, and a considerable quantity
is exported to Kangra District and the neighbouring Hill States.
Its export into British territory is permitted under an arrangement
between the Government of India and the Raja, by which the former
receives two-thirds and the latter one-third of the duty levied on the
total quantity of salt sold at the mines, the Raja being authorized
to charge, in addition to the duty of 4^ annas per maund, io| annas
as the price of the salt. The revenue derived by the State from
this source in 1903-4, when the duty was 6 annas a maund, amounted
ADMINISTRATION 157
to Rs. 96,693, while the British Government's share of the duty was
Rs. 31,639.
With the exception of the ordinary manufactures of iron-ware, brass
utensils, woodwork, dyeing, and weaving, there are no industries ; and
the trade of the State is confined to the export of
rice, wheat, potatoes, tea, salt, and ghi, with timber ra e. a°
' ' ^ . , communications,
and other forest produce. Piece-goods, utensils, and
ornaments are imported largely, with sugar, oil, and Khewra salt in
small quantities.
The principal route to Mandi town is the road from Pathankot
on the North-Western Railway. This is metalled from Pathankot to
Baijnath (82 miles) in Kangra District, and the State has undertaken
to metal the remaining 47 miles in Mandi territory. The Beas is
crossed at Mandi town by the Empress Bridge, built by the State
in 1878 at a cost of a lakh. Prom Mandi two roads lead into Kulu :
one, the summer route, over the Bhabu pass (9,480 feet), and the
other over the Dulchi pass. Minor roads, open all the year round,
connect Mandi town with Jullundur (124 miles), Doraha (via Rupar,
106 miles), and Simla (via Suket, 88 miles).
The Raja is assisted in the administration of the State by the
Wazlr, who is entrusted with very extensive powers, both executive
and judicial. As a judicial officer, his decisions
, . , . ,, t,_._ , . Administration,
are subject to appeal to the Raja ; and sentences
of death passed by him are submitted to the Raja for concurrence,
and further require confirmation by the Commissioner of the Jullundur
Division, who is the Political Agent to the Lieutenant-Governor for
the State. As a revenue officer, the Wazir controls the two tahsllddrs,
whose judicial decisions are also subject to appeal to him. Though
there are only two officers with the rank of talisilddr, the State is
divided into four tahsils, Xagar-Mandi, Chichot, Gopalpur, and
Harabagh, which comprise 8, 3, 3, and 10 of the old waziris re-
spectively.
The total revenue in 1903-4 was 4-4 lakhs, of which 23 lakhs
was land revenue. The tribute payable to the British Government
is one lakh.
The State is divided into eight police circles, each under a deputy-
inspector {thanadar), and there are 137 constables. The whole force
is under an Inspector. The jail at Mandi town has accommodation
for 50 prisoners, and there is a lock-up at each police station. The
military forces consist of 20 cavalry and 152 infantry, including
gunners and police, and 2 serviceable guns.
Mandi stands low among the Districts and States of the Punjab
as regards the literacy of its population, only 2-4 per cent, oi the
total (4-6 males and 01 females) being able to read and write in
l 2
158 MANDI STATE
1901. The number of pupils under instruction was 121 in 1880 -1,
138 in 1890-1, 201 in 1900-1, and 180 in 1903-4. In the last
year there were eight schools.
The only hospital is the King Edward VII Hospital at Mandi
town, built in 1902, with accommodation for 12 in-patients. It is in
charge of an Assistant Surgeon; and 25,154 cases, including 1,777
in-patients, were treated at it in 1904, and 306 operations performed.
The expenditure in that year was Rs. 3,615, all from State funds.
Vaccination is becoming fairly popular, and since 1902 the State
has entertained a vaccinator of its own.
[State Gazetteer (in press); L. H. Griffin, The Rajas of the Punjab
(second edition, 1873).]
Mandi Town. —Capital of the Mandi State, Punjab, situated in
310 43' N. and 760 58' E., on the Beas, 131 miles from Pathankot and
88 from Simla. Population (1901), 8,144. Founded in 1527 by Ajbar
Sen, Raja of Mandi, the town contains several temples and other
buildings of interest. These include the Chauntra or court where the
Chauntra Wazir or prime minister is installed, and the Damdama
palace, built in the seventeenth century. The Beas, which passes
through the town, is spanned by the handsome iron Empress Bridge,
and the Suket stream, which joins that river below the town, by the
Fitzpatrick Bridge. The town possesses an Anglo-vernacular middle
school and a hospital. It has a considerable trade, being one of the
chief marts for commerce with Ladakh and Yarkand.
Mandla District. -District in the Jubbulpore Division of the
Central Provinces, lying between 220 12' and 230 23' N. and 79° 58'
and 8ic 45' E., with an area of 5,054 square miles. Mandla is the
most easterly of the Satpura plateau Districts, and occupies a stretch
of wild, hilly country forming part of the main eastern range of the
Satpura Hills, and culminating in the plateau of Amarkantak just
beyond the border in Rewah. It is bounded on the north-west by
Jubbulpore District ; on the north-east by the State of Rewah; on the
south and south-west by Balaghat and Seoni ; and on the south-east by
Bilaspur District and the State of Kawardha. The Narbada river,
rising at Amarkantak, flows first to the north-west,
aspects separating Mandla from Rewah, and then turning
to the west crosses the District and curves tor-
tuously through the central range of hills. When rather more than
half-way across, it makes a sudden bend to the south, thrown back by
a long spur running out from the central range as far as Mandla town,
and after almost enclosing the town in a loop, again turns and flows
north and north-west to Jubbulpore, bounding the District for some
distance on its western border. The Narbada is the centre of the
drainage system, and during its passage through the District receives
MANDLA DISTRICT 159
tin- waters of numerous tributary streams from the south and north.
The larger and richer portion of Mandld lies south of the Narbada, and
consists of a succession of hill ranges running down to the river, and
separated by the valleys of a number of its affluents. The principal of
these are the valley of the Banjar on the west, those of the Burhner
and its tributaries in the centre, and those of the Kharmer and
a number of smaller streams to the east. The valley of the Banjar
contains the best cultivated tract in the District, called the Haveli,
which extends on both sides of the river for some miles south of its
junction with the Narbada at Mandla. South of the Haveli, the Banjar
valley is covered with forest. This is the lowest part of the District,
and has an elevation of about 1,500 feet. East of the Banjar runs
a lofty range of hills approaching the Narbada at Ramnagar, and
separating the valley or plateau of the Banjar from that of the Halon
and Burhner, which is 500 feet higher. To the north this plateau is
much cut up by hills, with small and fertile valleys lying between
them ; but in the south there are large expanses of good black soil,
watered by perennial streams, and covered over large areas with mag-
nificent sal forests (S/io/ra robusta). Still farther east lies the third
plateau of Raigarh, at an elevation of about 2,700 feet. This consists
for the most part of an open cultivable plain, but is very sparsely
populated and covered all through the hot season with an abundance
of thick green grass, which makes it a well-known grazing ground.
The rivers, even in the hottest months, never quite dry up ; and the
numerous natural springs render wells unnecessary. The hills here
are fiat-topped, sometimes forming small plateaux of a few square miles
in extent. Amarkantak, across the border, which is the most impor-
tant of these, has an elevation of 3,400 feet, while Chauradadar within
the District is of about the same height. North of the Narbada the
hills become more rugged and inaccessible, and extend over most of
the country. The valleys are small and scattered, though some of
them are extremely fertile.
The geology of Mandla presents but little variety, as except on the
southern and eastern borders nearly the whole surface is covered with
trap. In the south, the formation of the tract on both sides of the
Banjar to within a short distance of its junction with the Narbada
consists of crystalline rocks ; but they are not exposed over any wide
area. East of the Banjar valley, though granite, syenite, and limestone
frequently appear on the banks of streams and form the sides of hills,
yet almost everywhere, even on the tops of the highest peaks, trap i--
the uppermost rock, and sometimes the trap itself is covered by
laterite.
Sal (Shorea robusia) is the most important timber tree of the Dis-
trict, and occupies the higher hill-sides. The forests on lower levels are
i6o M AND LA DISTRICT
of the mixed type common in the Central Provinces, teak and bamboos
being the most important trees. Other common trees are harra
{Terminalia Chebula), saj {Terminalia tomentosa), tendu (Diospyros
tomentosa), kusumb {Schleichera trijuga), haldu (Adina cordifo/ia),
and dhaura (Anogeissus latifolid).
Wild animals are still plentiful in most of the District forests, espe-
cially in the central and southern regions. Towards the east they have
been almost exterminated by the snares and poisoned arrows of the
Baigas. Bison are found in most of the forests, and these animals are
now being carefully preserved ; but they are nowhere very numerous,
as they appear to suffer periodically from epidemics of cow-pox, with
which they are doubtless infected by tame cattle grazing in the forests.
The wild buffalo is not now met with, though it must at one time have
been common, and it has been shot in the Phen valley within the last
fifteen or twenty years. The deer tribe is well represented. The
barasingha or swamp deer is found in large herds in the sal forests.
Sambar, spotted, and barking-deer are common, and the mouse deer
is also found. Nilgai and antelope are frequently seen in the open
plains, but chinkara or 'ravine deer' are somewhat rare. Tigers,
leopards, and bears are found in all the forests. The numerous
packs of wild dogs are very destructive to game. Partridges and
quail are fairly common, but water-birds are not numerous, as there
are very few tanks. Mahseer and other kinds of fish are found in the
Narbada, but seldom attain to full size.
The climate is cool and pleasant. December and January are the
coldest months, and occasionally frosts occur. On the higher plateaux
ice is by no means rare. Malarial fever of a somewhat virulent type is
prevalent during the monsoon and autumn months.
The annual rainfall averages 52 inches. Hailstorms not infrequently
occur in the winter months and do serious damage to the crops, and
thunderstorms are common in the hot season.
The Gond Rajput dynasty of Garha-Mandla commenced, according
to an inscription in the palace of Ramnagar, in the fifth century, with
the accession of Jadho Rai, a Rajput adventurer who
entered the service of an old Gond king, married
his daughter, and succeeded him on the throne. Cunningham places
the date two centuries later, in 664. The original seat of the dynasty
is supposed to have been Garha near Jubbulpore, but this theory is
discredited by the fact that the Kalachuri Rajput dynasty was in
power there as late as the twelfth century. In any case the Garha-
Mandla kingdom was a petty local chiefship until the accession of
Sangram Sah, the forty-seventh king, in 1480. This prince extended
his dominions over the Narbada valley, and possibly Bhopal, Saugor,
and Dam oh, and most of the Satpura hill country, and left fifty-two
HISTORY i6r
forts or districts to his son. The control of the Garha-Mandla kings
over their extended principality was, however, short-lived, for in 1564
Asaf Khan, the imperial viceroy, invaded their territories. The queen
Durgavati, then acting as regent for her infant son, met him near the
fort of Singorgarh in Damoh ; but being defeated, she retired past
Garha towards Mandla, and took up a strong position in a narrow-
defile. Here, mounted on an elephant, she bravely headed her troops
in the defence of the pass, and notwithstanding that she had received
an arrow-wound in her eye refused to retire. But by an extraordinary
coincidence the river in the rear of her position, which had been nearly
dry a few hours before the action commenced, began suddenly to rise
and soon became unfordable. Finding her plan of retreat thus frus-
trated, and seeing her troops give way, the queen snatched a dagger
from her elephant-driver and plunged it into her breast. Asaf Khan
acquired an immense booty, including, it is said, more than a thousand
elephants. From this time the fortunes of the Mandla kingdom rapidly
declined. The districts afterwards formed into the State of Bhopal
were ceded to the emperor Akbar, to obtain his recognition of the next
Raja, Chandra Sah. In the time of Chandra Sah's grandson, Prem
Narayan, the Bundelas invaded Narsinghpur and stormed the castle
of Chauragarh. During the succeeding reigns family quarrels led the
rival parties to solicit foreign intervention in support of their preten-
sions, and for this a price had always to be paid. Part of Saugor was
ceded to the Mughal emperor, the south of Saugor and Damoh to
Chhatarsal Raja of Panna, and Seonl to the Gond Raja of Deogarh.
In 1742 the Peshwa invaded Mandla, and this was followed by the
exaction of chauth. The Bhonslas of Nagpur annexed the territories
now constituting Balaghat and part of Bhandara. Finally, in 1781,
the last king of the Gond- Rajput line was deposed, and Mandla was
annexed to the Maratha government of Saugor, then under the control
of the Peshwa. At some period of the Gond kingdom the District
must have been comparatively well populated, as numerous remains
of villages can be observed in places now covered by forest ; but one
of the Saugor rulers, Vasudeo Pandit, is said to have extorted several
lakhs of rupees from the people in eighteen months by unbridled
oppression, and to have left it ruined and depopulated. In 1799
Mandla was appropriated by the Bhonsla Rajas of Nagpur, in accor-
dance with a treaty concluded some years previously with the Peshwa ;
and during the period of eighteen years which followed, the District
was repeatedly overrun by the Pindaris, who, however, did not succeed
in taking the town of Mandla. In 1818 Mandla became British terri-
tory; and as the Maratha garrison in the fort refused to surrender,
a force under General Marshall took it by assault. The peace of the
District was not subsequently disturbed, except for a brief period
if) 2
M AND LA DISTRICT
during the Mutiny of 1S57, when the chiefs of Ramgarh, Shahpura,
and Sohagpur joined the mutineers, taking with them their Gond
retainers, who, though not really disaffected, followed their chiefs with
their usual unquestioning faithfulness. Order was restored early in
1858, and the estates of Ramgarh and Shahpura were subsequently
confiscated, while Sohagpur was made over to Rewah. The last repre-
sentative of the Gond Rajput kings, Shankar Sah, had retired to Jub-
bulpore, where he held an estate of a few villages. During the Mutiny
he attempted to raise a party in Jubbulpore, then in a very disturbed
condition, with a view to rebellion. On being captured and convicted,
he and his son were blown away from guns.
The District contains few notable buildings. Deogaon, at the
junction of the Narbada and Burhner, 20 miles north-east of Mandla,
has an old temple. At Kukarramath, 12 miles from Dindorl, are the
remains of numerous temples, most of which have been excavated and
carried away to make the buildings at Dindorl. The palace of the
Gond Rajas of Garha-Mandla, built in 1663, is situated at Ramnagar,
about 10 miles east of Mandla on the south bank of the Narbada, and
is in a fairly good state of preservation but of little architectural merit.
There are numerous other ruins, as Ramnagar remained the seat of
government for eight reigns.
The population of the District in the last three years of census was
as follows: (1881) 300,659; (1891) 339,341; (1901) Zlh2S°- The
increase between 1881 and 1891, of 13 per cent.,
was attributed partly to the increased accuracy of the
Census. During the last decade the decrease was d\ per cent., chiefly
in the Mandla tahsil. The District was severely affected by famine in
1897, and there was great mortality among the forest tribes. The
figures of population given below have been adjusted on account of
transfers of territory since the Census of 1901 : —
Population.
Tahsil.
Mandla
Dindorl
District total
V
Number of
03
3
Sf oi
"> V
vt
c —
c
03
jU
H
;^
<
^»
2,53°
I
98O
2-524
1
854
5,054
1,834
3
Q.
O
Hi
178,771
139,629
318,400
1*
V .
J!
™ U
■S 03
O 53"
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1 89 1
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
70
55
-8.4
- 3-9
4,154
I,8l2
63
-6.5
5,966
In 1904 an area of 15 square miles with 11 villages containing
1,150 persons was transferred from Balaghat to Mandla, and 5 square
miles of Government forest from Mandla to Balaghat. The corrected
District totals of area and population are 5,054 square miles and
POPULATION T63
318,400 persons. The density of population is 63 persons per square
mile, which is smaller than that of any District in the Province with
the exception of Chanda. The District contains one town, Mandla,
the head-quarters ; and 1,834 inhabited villages. The villages are
usually very small, the average number of persons to each being only
174. The figures of religion show that 121,000 persons, or 38 per
cent, of the population, are Hindus, and 191,000, or 60 per cent.,
Animists. Practically all the forest tribes are returned as still prof
ing their own religion. Muhammadans number only 5,000. Nearly
75 per cent, of the population speak the Bagheli dialect of Eastern
Hindi, and nearly 25 per cent. Gondi. The former dialect is spoken
in the Central Provinces only in Jubbulpore and Mandla, and
resembles Chhattisgarhl in many respects. About half of the Gonds
speak their own language and the other half a corrupt Hindi, which
is also the language of the Baigas and Kols.
The principal landholding castes are Brahmans (7,000), Kalars,
Gonds, Lodhis (5,000), Banias, and Kayasths. Next to Gonds, the
most important castes numerically are Ahlrs (23,000), Pankas (14,000),
and Telis (10,000). The Kalars were money-lenders to the Gonds
before the advent of the Bania. The Lodhis were formerly the chief
landholding caste and possessed several fine estates. The Gonds
number 160,000, or just half of the population. They are lazy culti-
vators, and favour the small millets kodon and ki/tkt, which in new soil
yield a large return with a minimum of exertion. The Baigas number
about 14,000. They are probably the first residents of the District;
and a Baiga is always the village priest and magician, on account of
the more intimate and long-standing acquaintance he is supposed to
possess with the local deities. The Baigas have always practised bewar
or shifting cultivation in patches of forest, manured by burning the
timber which has been cut down on it. When they were debarred
from continuing this destructive method in Government forests, a Re-
serve of 24,000 acres was allotted to them for this purpose, in which
there are still a few villages. Most of them have now, however, taken
to cultivation in the ordinary manner. Until recently the Baigas
considered that hunting was the only dignified occupation for a man,
and left as much as possible of the work of cultivation to their women-
kind. About 83 per cent, of the population of the District are
dependent on agriculture.
Of the 560 Christians, 536 are natives, and most of these belong
to the Church Missionary Society, which has stations at Mandla and
four other villages. There are a number of European missionaries
and the institutions supported include schools at all the stations and
two dispensaries.
The varieties of soil are mainly those formed by the decomposition
r64
MANDLA DISTRICT
of basalt rock, though in the south, and especially on the high south-
eastern plateau, areas of sandy soil occur. Black soil is generally
. found only in patches in low-lying valleys ; but owing
to the fact that the total area under cultivation is so
small, it furnishes a higher proportion of the whole than in most
Districts. The remaining land consists mainly of the shallow stony
soil in which only the minor autumn crops are grown. Much of the
forest stands on good cultivable soil, and although the land newly
broken up in the last thirty years is generally of the poorer varieties,
still the expansion of cultivation is far from having reached its limit.
About 31 per cent, of the area occupied is uncultivated, resting fallows
being essential in the absence of any artificial stimulus to allow the
poorer land to recuperate. Wheat is sown in embanked fields in the
tract round Mandla town and in open fields in the villages to the south-
west, where the ground is too uneven and the soil not sufficiently
adhesive to allow of embankments.
About Soo square miles, formerly Government forest, are in process
of settlement on ryotwari tenure, while 10,000 acres are held wholly or
partially free of revenue, and 33 square miles have been sold outright
under the Waste Land Rules. The balance is held on the ordinary
malguzari tenure. The following table gives statistics of cultivation in
1903-4, according to revenue returns, areas being in square miles : —
Tali <:i/.
Total.
Cultivated
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
•
Forests.
Mandla
DindorT
Total
2,537
2,524
608
682
5
73'
674
M°5
906
942
5.061
1,290
5
1,848
Wheat covers 164 square miles or 13 per cent, of the cropped area,
rice 173 square miles or 17 per cent., the oilseeds til and jagnl
145 square miles, and the small millets kodon and httkl 444 square
miles. The main feature of recent statistics is the decline in the
popularity of wheat, and the increase in that of almost every other
crop, as a result of the succession of unfavourable wheat harvests.
But in the twenty years previous to the summary settlement of 1890,
the area under wheat had more than doubled, while that of rice had
increased by nearly 50 per cent.
The method of rice cultivation is peculiar, the young shoots being
ploughed up as soon as they appear above the ground. Those which
are ploughed or trodden well into the ground subsequently take root
more strongly, while those left exposed on the surface die off and the
crop is thus thinned. Little rice is transplanted. The practice of
raising two crops in the embanked wheat-fields has grown up in the
FORESTS r65
last thirty years, and second crops are now normally grown on about
80 square miles. Manure is applied to this area. Considerable
quantities of waste or forest land have in recent years been allotted for
cultivation on the ryotivari tenure, the area so taken up amounting to
217 square miles, on which a revenue of Rs. 57,000 is paid. Practically
no loans have been taken under the Land Improvement Act, while
between 1894 and 1904 1-25 lakhs was advanced under the Agri-
culturists' Loans Act.
The cattle used are bred locally. They are small and weak, no care
being exercised in breeding, though Mandla has every facility for the
production of an excellent class of bullocks. Those raised on the
Raigarh and Ramgarh plateaux are the best. Buffaloes are not
generally used for cultivation, but they are bred, and the cows kept
for the manufacture of ghi, the young bulls being sold in Chhattisgarh.
The upper classes generally keep a small pony of the usual type for
riding, as carts cannot travel except on three or four main roads and
in the HavelT during the open season. Ponies and bullocks are
also largely used for pack carriage. There are very few goats or
sheep.
Irrigation is insignificant, being applied only to sugar-cane, which
covers about 500 acres, and to vegetable and garden crops, including
the betel-vine gardens, of which there are many round Mandla town.
The sandy soil of the south and south-east would, however, repay irri-
gation. Considerable stretches of sandy or kachhar land are exposed
on the banks of the Narbada, which are flooded every year by the
river, and fertilized by a deposit of silt ; and on these vegetables and
tobacco are raised.
Government forests cover an area of 1,848 square miles, distributed
all over the District, though the most valuable are in the south and
south-east. About 854 miles, not included in this
area, have lately been demarcated for disforestation
and agricultural settlement. The most important tree is the sal (Shorea
robusta), which forms almost pure forests, occupying the whole of the
eastern portion of the District, as well as a fringe of varying depth
along the northern and southern boundaries. It is found in the
south in the forests known as the Banjar and Phen Reserves, where
specimens 100 feet in height and 10 feet in girth are not uncommon.
The western and central portions of the District contain the ordinary
type of mixed forest common all over the Central Provinces. Teak
is not very plentiful and does not attain large dimensions. Bamboos,
which are very numerous in these mixed forests, are their most
generally useful and valuable product. Owing to the heavy rainfall,
the sal forests in the east of the District are watered by running
streams, and are widely known as grazing grounds for cattle, large
r66 MANDLA DISTRICT
herds being brought to them annually from all parts of the Province
for the hot season. Among the minor products of the forests the most
important is the myrabolam. In an exceptionally favourable year
the Government forests of the District have been known to yield
more than i,ooo tons of this commodity. Other minor products
include lac, resin from the saltree, tlkhur, and a species of arrow-
root. The forest revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,42,000, of which
about Rs. 44,000 was realized from sales of timber and Rs. 47,000
from grazing.
Extensive iron-ore deposits occur in the District, and are quarried
and smelted by Agarias or Gond iron-workers. The industry does not
flourish, as their methods are very primitive and they find it difficult to
compete with imported iron. The furnaces used are so small that each
smelting does not yield more than 2 lb. of refined iron. Only 34 tons
of iron were produced in 1904. Manganese is reported to have been
found within 3 miles of Mandla town at Sahasradhara. Limestone of
good quality is common in many parts of the District, but is only
quarried in small quantities to meet local requirements.
Coarse cotton cloth is produced in most of the larger villages, but
no fine material is woven except by a few families of Koshtas in
Mandla town. Machine-made cloth is now worn,
Trade and ■ h interior, except by the forest tribes,
communications. '. l. J
Other classes of agriculturists usually wear hand-
woven loin-cloths, and coats of cloth from the mills. The vessels
manufactured from bell-metal at Mandla are well-known locally.
Glass bangles are made at Itka near Nainpur, and lac bangles at
Mandla, BamhnI, and Hirdenagar. The most important bazar or
weekly market is at Pindrai on the western border towards Seonl,
which is both a cattle and grain market, and a centre for the disposal
of local produce and the purchase of imported commodities. The
other large bazars are at Mandla, BamhnI, and Newari in the Mandla
talis!/, and at Kukarramath in the Dindori tahstl. Two important
annual fairs are held : at Hirdenagar situated at the junction of the
Banjar with the Matiari, and at Madhpurl on the Xarbada about
eight miles east of Mandla town.
AYheat, rice, oilseeds, sa/i-hemp, and ghl are the staple exports.
From the forests a large quantity of sal timber and a little teak are
sent, and also lac and myrabolams. Bombay sea-salt and Mauritius
sugar come through Jubbulpore. Kerosene oil is generally used for
lighting. Gur is imported from Cawnpore, and in spite of the cost
of carriage can undersell that made locally. The pulse arhar is not
produced in Mandla and is imported for consumption, as well as
turmeric and all other condiments and spices. Vessels of brass are
brought from Mirzapur and of bell-metal from L'mrer. Silk and
FAMINE ,6;
cotton cloth comes principally from Nagpur. Agarwal and Gahoi
Banias conduct the general trade of the District, and Punjabi Muham-
madans the timber trade.
The Jubbulpore-Gondia branch of the Bengal-Nagpur Railway,
completed in 1904, passes through a small strip of the District on
the south-western border, and has two stations, Nainpur and Pindrai,
within the District. It is in contemplation to construct a branch line
from Nainpur to Mandla, a distance of about 22 miles by the direct
route. At present most of the trade from the west of the District is
with Jubbulpore, along the only existing metalled road. An alternative
route to Jubbulpore through Pindrai attracts some traffic, on account
of the importance of the Pindrai weekly market. From Dindori,
64 miles to the east of Mandla, there is an embanked road to Jubbul-
pore, which affords an outlet from the north-west. Dindori is also
connected with Birsinghpur and Pendra stations on the Katnl-Bilaspur
branch of the Bengal-Nagpur Railway. Carriage has hitherto generally
been by pack-animals, except on the main routes. The District has
48 miles of metalled and 233 miles of unmetalled roads, and the
annual expenditure on maintenance is Rs. 35,000. With the exception
of 7 miles kept up out of Local funds, all roads are maintained by
the Public "Works department. Only 13 miles of avenues of trees are
shown in the returns.
Mandla suffered from distress or famine in 1818-9, 1823-7, and
1833-4. On the first occasion the autumn rains were short, and
excessive rain fell during the winter months. From _
o o • c 1 Famine.
1823 to 1827 a succession 01 short crops was expe-
rienced, due to floods, hail, and blight, which caused the desertion of
many villages. In 1833-4 the autumn rains failed, and the spring
crops could not be sown owing to the hardness of the ground, caused
by the premature cessation of the rains. Rice was imported from'
Chhattlsgarh by Government agency, but no further details are known
regarding these famines. In the general famine of 1868-9 Mandla
was only slightly affected, as the kodon crop on which the poorest
of the population depend was fairly successful, and no general relief
was necessary. When the famine of 1896-7 came upon the District,
Mandla had already suffered from a succession of poor crops for three
years. The autumn harvest of 1896 was a total failure, and distress
was very severe, especially among the fsrest tribes, who were inclined
to view with suspicion the efforts made by Government to keep them
alive. Relief operations had commenced in June, 1896, on account of
the previous bad harvests, and they lasted until the end of 1S97. The
maximum number on relief was 37,000 persons, or n per cent. v( the
population, in September, 1897; and the total expenditure on relief
was 7-5 lakhs. In 1899 -'1900 Mandla was not severely affected.
1 68 MANDLA DISTRICT
The Deputy-Commissioner is aided by one Assistant or Extra-
Assistant Commissioner. For administrative purposes the District is
., . . . .. divided into two tahslls, each of which has a tahsildar
Administration. , .,,._,,_ ' ,_,
and a naib-taksildar. The Forest officer is generally
a member of the Imperial service. The Executive Engineer at Jubbul-
pore is also in charge of Mandla.
The judicial staff consists of a Subordinate Judge who is also Dis-
trict Judge, and a Munsif at Mandla. The Divisional and Sessions
Judge of the Jubbulpore Division has jurisdiction in Mandla. The
civil litigation is petty and crime extremely light, the commonest
class of cases being contraventions of the Excise Act by the illicit
manufacture of liquor.
.Mandla is stated to have paid at one time a very high revenue to
its Gond rulers, but when it first came under British control it had
undergone an interlude of Maratha maladministration in its worst form.
Xo records of the earlier governments remain, but at the date of the
cession in 1818 the revenue paid to the Marathas is believed to have
been Rs. 40,000. Under the Marathas the revenue was settled
annually with the village headmen, who were allowed to retain one-
seventh part of it. Xo rights in land were recognized, but the head-
men and tenants were not usually ejected except for default. Nume-
rous miscellaneous taxes were also imposed, the realizations from
which are said to have exceeded the ordinary land revenue. One
of these was the sale of widows, who were looked on as government
property, and sold according to a sliding scale varying with their age
and accomplishments, the highest price being Rs. 1,000. The revenue
raised in the first annual settlement after the cession was Rs. 36,000 ;
and subsequent efforts to increase this having resulted in further
impoverishing the District, in 1837 a twenty years' settlement was
made for Rs. 27,000. On its expiry the District was summarily
assessed for a few years until the completion of the twenty years'
settlement of 1868, when the revenue was fixed at Rs. 62,000, or an
increase of more than 48 per cent, on the previous demand. On this
occasion a cadastral survey was undertaken, and proprietary rights
were conferred on the village headmen. The twenty years' settlement
expired in 1888, and the District was then summarily assessed for
a period of fourteen to fifteen years pending the undertaking of
a regular cadastral survey. A very large increase in agricultural pros-
perity had taken place during the currency of the previous settlement,
and the price of grain had more than doubled. At revision the revenue
was raised to Rs. r, 08,000, an increase of 64 per cent, on the former
demand, but giving an incidence of less than 3^ annas per cultivated
acre. The District is now again under settlement, the previous term
having expired, while a new cadastral survey has also been completed.
MAXDLA TAHSIL
169
The following table shows the receipts, in thousands of rupees, of
revenue from land and from all sources : —
1880-1.
1890-1. 1900-1.
' 9°3-4-
Land revenue
Total revenue
90
2,46
] ;48 1 ,6y
4--1° 3,15
1,78
4-64
Mandla has no District council, and Local funds are administered
by the Deputy-Commissioner, the income from these in 1903-4 being
Rs. 31,000. Mandla Town is the only municipality.
The police force consists of 311 officers and men, with 3 mounted
constables, under a District Superintendent, besides 1,043 village
watchmen for 1,834 inhabited towns and villages. Mandla town has
a District jail with accommodation for 85 prisoners, including 8 females :
the daily average number in 1904 was 69.
In respect of education the District stands fifteenth in the Province,
3-7 per cent, of the male population being able to read and write in
1 90 1, while only 203 females were returned as literate. The percentage
of children under instruction to those of school-going age is 8. Statis-
tics of the number of pupils are as follows: (1880-1) 949; (1890-1)
1,767; (1900-1) 2,586; (1903-4) 3,873, including 283 girls. The
educational institutions comprise an English middle school, 3 ver-
nacular middle schools, and 56 primary schools. Mission schools
for male and female orphans are maintained at Patpara. The expen-
diture on education in 1903-4 was Rs. 18,000, of which Rs. 13,500
was provided from Provincial and Local funds, and Rs. 1,400 by
fees.
The District has 6 dispensaries, with accommodation for 52 in-
patients. In 1904 the number of cases treated was 25,108, of whom
428 were in-patients, and t,^2 operations were performed. The expen-
diture was Rs. 4,000, mainly derived from Provincial and Local funds.
Vaccination is compulsory only in the municipality of Mandla. The
number of persons successfully vaccinated in 1903-4 was 64 per 1.000
of the District population, this result being very favourable.
[J. B. Fuller, Report on the Summary Settlement, 1894. A District
Gazetteer is being compiled.]
Mandla Tahsil. — Southern tahsil of Mandla District, Central Pro-
vinces, lying between 22° 12' and 230 9' N. and 790 58' and 8i° 12' L.,
with an area of 2,537 square miles. Population decreased from 193,928
in 1891 to 177,621 in 1901. The area and population have been
slightly altered since the Census of 1901 by the transfer of territory
to and from Balaghat District, and the adjusted figures are 2,530 square
miles and 178,771 persons. The density is 70 persons per square
mile. The tahsil contains one town, Mandla (population, 5,428). the
17© M AND LA TAHSIL
tahsil and District head-quarters ; and 9S0 inhabited villages. Excluding
906 square miles of Government forest, 44 per cent, of the available
area is occupied for cultivation. The cultivated area in 1903-4 was
608 square miles. The demand for land revenue in the same year
was Rs. 90,000, and for cesses Rs. 14,000. The tahsil contains some
open tracts of good land on the south-west, while the rest consists
of a number of small and fertile valleys separated by hill ranges and
forests. The eastern plateaux are covered with nutritious grass, and
form a well-known grazing area for cattle in the summer months.
Mandla Town. — Head-quarters of the District and tahsil of the
same name, Central Provinces, situated in 220 36' N. and 8o° 23' E.,
60 miles south-east of Jubbulpore by road, and 22 miles from Nainpur
junction on the narrow-gauge Jubbulpore-Gondia line. The town is
picturesquely situated in a loop of the river Narbada, which surrounds
it on three sides, and for 15 miles between Mandla and Ramnagar
flows in a deep bed unbroken by rocks. Population (1901), 5,428.
Mandla was made the capital of the Gond Garha-Mandla dynasty
about 1670. The Gonds erected a fort and built a palace. Their
successors, the Marathas, built a wall on the side of the town not pro-
tected by the river, which has lately been demolished. Mandla was
held by a Maratha garrison in 181 8, and was taken by assault by the
British. It contains numerous ghats leading down to the Narbada, and
some modern temples. Ramnagar, the site of a Gond palace, is 10
miles from Mandla. The town was created a municipality in 1867.
The municipal receipts during the decade ending 1901 averaged
Rs. 7,400. In 1903-4 the receipts were Rs. 7,600, mainly derived
from a house tax and tolls on roads and ferries. The principal
industry is the manufacture of vessels from bell-metal. A number
of betel-vine gardens are situated in the outskirts of the town, and
vegetables are grown on the stretches of sandy alluvial soil which are
left exposed during the dry season on the banks of the Narbada.
Mandla contains an English middle school, girls' and branch schools,
besides a private Sanskrit school ; three dispensaries, including mission
and police hospitals ; and a veterinary dispensary. A station of the
Church Missionary Society has been established here.
Mandlana. — Village in the Gohana tahsil of Rohtak District,
Punjab. Sec MUNDLANA.
Mandleshwar. Head-quarters of the pargana of the same name
in the Indore State, Central India, situated in 220 u' N. and 750 42' E.
It stands on the right bank of the Narbada, at a narrow point where
in the monsoon the stream often rises 60 feet above its ordinary level,
becoming a roaring torrent. Population (1901), 2,807. It fell to the
Peshwa in the eighteenth century ; and in 1740 was granted by Malhar
Rao Holkar t<> a Brahman, Vyankatram Shastrl, whose family still holds
.VAXDC
r 7 r
a sanadiox it. In 1823 it became the head-quarters of the District of
Nimar, which until 1864 was managed by the Agent to the Governor-
General at Indore. In 1864, on the transfer of Nimar to the Central
Provinces administration, the head-quarters were moved to Khandwa,
a station at the junction of the Great Indian Peninsula and Rajputana-
Malwa Railways. Mandleshwar was restored to Holkar in 1867. The
town contains a palace, and several bungalows erected under British
rule, and also a British and State post office, a school, a dispensary,
and an inspection bungalow.
Mandor. — Ruined town in the State of Jodhpur, Rajputana, situated
in 260 2 17 N. and 730 2' E., about 5 miles north of Jodhpur city.
Population (1901), 1,450. The place is of great historical interest from
having been the capital of the Parihar Rajputs till 1381, when it was
wrested from them by Rao Chonda, -and subsequently the seat of
government of the Rathor Rajputs till 1459, when Jodhpur city was
founded. The old fort, built originally by a Buddhist architect, but
now in ruins, contains a low and dark pillared chamber, in which is
found the sculptured effigy of Nahar Rao, a famous Parihar chief. On
an elevated plateau not far from the fort are the Panch Kunda (• five
reservoirs ') ; the cenotaphs of four of the earlier Rathor rulers, the
carving on that of Rao Ganga, who died about 1532, being very fine;
and an old temple with an inscription dated 12 10. In another direction
are the cenotaphs attesting the epoch of Marwar's glory, which com-
menced with Maldeo and ended with the sons of Ajlt ; and the humbler
monuments erected over the ashes of later chiefs. Of these buildings,
that raised in memory of Ajlt Singh (who was murdered by his son about
1724) is larger and grander than anything in the neighbourhood; it
marks the spot where his sixty-four queens and concubines immolated
themselves on his funeral pyre. Another object of interest is the hall
of heroes, a gallery of sixteen colossal figures hewn out of a single
natural rock. It is known as the Tetls Karor Devatan-ka-sthan,
or 'the abode of the 330 million gods ' of Hindu mythology.
[A. Cunningham, Archaeological Survey of Nor titer n India, vol. xxiii.]
Mandu (or Mandogarh). — Historic fort in the Dhar State, Central
India, situated in 220 21' N. and 750 26' E., 22 miles from Dhar town,
on the summit of a flat-topped hill in the Yindhyan range. 2,079 feet
above sea-level.
Mandu must have been a stronghold from the earliest days, although
practically nothing is known of its history previous to Muhammadan
times. In 1304 it was taken by Ain-ul-mulk, and just a century later
became the capital of the Muhammadan kingdom of Malwa under
Hoshang Shah Ghorl (1405-34). During the rule of the Malwa
dynasty Mandu underwent the usual vicissitudes of capital towns
in those days, being, except for fourteen years during the rule ot
VOL. XVII. M
r72 MANDU
Ghiyas-ud-din Khiljl (1475-1500), constantly the scene of siege and
battle.
In j 531 Malwa was annexed to Gujarat by Bahadur Shah, in whose
possession it remained until he was defeated in 1535 by Humayun.
On Humayun's retiring soon after, the fort was seized by one Mallu
Khan, who assumed independence under the title of Kadir Shah. He
was ousted by Sher Shah in 1545, when Mandu, with the rest of Malwa,
"was placed under his general, Shujaat (or Shujawal) Khan. On the
break-up of the Suri dynasty, Shujaat Khan's son and successor
Bayazid, better known as Baz Bahadur, succeeded to the rule of Malwa
and assumed independence. He is best remembered for his skill in
music, and for his romantic attachment to the beautiful and accom-
plished singer, RupmatI of Sarangpur. In 1560-2 Mandu was finally
incorporated in the Mughal empire, and became the head-quarters of
a sarkar in the Subah of Malwa. Akbar visited Mandu in 1564 and
again in 1598. In 1585 the English merchant and traveller Fitch
visited the fort. The emperor Jahangir stayed at Mandu for some
months in 16 16 and was accompanied by Sir Thomas Roe, who
describes his sojourn there at some length. Jahangir also gives a long
account of the visit in his diary, and notes that he had the old palaces
repaired for the use of himself and his retinue at a cost of three lakhs.
Wild animals abounded in the neighbourhood, and the beautiful Nur
Jahan herself shot four tigers, a fact which roused the emperor's admira-
tion. He visited Mandu again in 1620. In 1625 prince Khurram
(Shah Jahan), when in rebellion against his father, took refuge in
Mandu. In 1696 the Marathas held the town, but only for a time, the
country not passing finally to the present Dhar family till 1732.
The fort is formed of the entire hill, round which runs a battle-
mented wall nearly 23 miles in circuit. Inside are numerous mosques,
palaces, tombs, and dwelling-houses, all more or less in a state of decay,
but many of them magnificent specimens of Pathan architecture.
Akbar appears to have destroyed a large number of the buildings to
render the place less attractive to his rebel subjects. Jahangir states
that his father took six months to capture the fort, when he caused the
gateways, towers, and ramparts, with the city within, to be dismantled
and laid in ruins. The fort has ten gates, several of which bear inscrip-
tions referring to their erection or repair. The usual entrance is by
the Garl Darwaza ('carriage gate') on the north side close to the Delhi
Gate. Just beyond the Garl Darwaza the road leads to a beautiful
collection of ruined palaces, built by the Khiljl rulers of Malwa and
enclosed within a wall. The principal buildings inside this enclosure
are the Hindola Mahal, a massively built structure with steeply sloping
buttresses, containing a great hall, very suggestive of the dining-hall of
an Oxford college, and the picturesque Jahaz Mahal (' ship palace '),
M AND VI TALUK A T73
so called from its overhanging a lake. To the north of this enclosure
stands the oldest mosque on the hill, built of fragments of fain temp
by Dilawar Khan in 1405. Next come the Jama Masjid and tomb of
Hoshang Shah, the two finest buildings in the fort now standing. The
great mosque is a splendid example of Pathan architecture, of simple
grandeur and massive strength. It was founded by Hoshang Shah and
completed in the year 1454. Opposite is a mound of debris, in which
the remains of a magnificent marble tomb have been discovered, pro-
bably that of Mahmud Khiljl I. When complete, it must have sur-
passed every other building on the hill. Beside it stand the foundations
of the Tower of Victory, seven storeys high, raised by Mahmud in
1443, in commemoration of his victory over Rana Kumbha of Chitor.
The nature of the victory may be gathered from the fact that the Rana
erected the famous tower on Chitor fort in 1448, in memory of his
success on the same occasion. The tomb of Hoshang Shah stands
beside his mosque. It is a magnificent marble-domed mausoleum,
which in its massive simplicity and dim-lighted roughness is a suitable
resting-place for a great warrior. Not far beyond stands the mosque
of Malik Mugdls, the father of Mahmud I. It was built in 1432 from
the remains of other buildings, and, though somewhat damaged, is still
a very fine building, both in its proportions and delicate finish. The
remaining buildings of importance are the palaces of Baz Bahadur and
Rupmatl. The former stands about half a mile from the scarp of the
hill, the latter on its very edge. The view from the roof of Rupmatl's
palace is a magnificent one. Below flows the broad stream of the sacred
Xarbada, its fertile valley lined with fields of wheat and poppy, while to
the south the long line of the forest-covered Satpuras stretch ridge
behind ridge down to the valley of the Tapti river beyond. Among
these hills the sacred peak of Bawangaja (see Barwani) stands con-
spicuous.
[C. Harris, The Ruins of Mandoo (i860); Bombay Gazetteer, vol. i,
part ii, pp. 352-84; Captain Barnes, Journal of the Bombay Branch,
Royal Asiatic Society, vol. xxi, pp. 355-91.]
Mandvi Taluka.— North-eastern taluka of Surat District, Bombay,
lying between 210 12' and 210 27' N. and 720 5c/ and 730 29/ E., with
an area of 279 square miles. The river Tapti forms the southern
boundary. There are 136 villages and one town, Mandvi (population,
4,142), the head-quarters. The population in 1901 was 42,450, com-
pared with 53,942 in 1 89 1. This is the most thinly populated taluka
in the District, and the density, 152 persons per square mile, is much
below the average. Land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to
over i-8 lakhs. The western part of the taluka is the most fertile and
prosperous ; in the east the population gradually becomes scanty and
unsettled, and cultivation disappears. The climate is the worst in Surat
M 2
174
MA YD VI TAL UK A
District. Both in ponds and wells the water-supply is defective and
its quality bad. The staple crops are rice, cotton, and jowdr.
Mandvi Town (i).— Head quarters of the tdluka of the same name
in Surat District, Bombay, situated in 210 i8'N. and 73°22r E. Popula-
tion (1901), 4,142. The municipality was established in 1868. During
the decade ending 1901 the income averaged Rs. 6,000 ; in 1903-4
it amounted to Rs. 6,273. The town contains a dispensary and four
schools, three (including an English school) for boys and one for girls,
attended respectively by 302 and 58 pupils.
Mandvi Town {Mondavi) (2).— Seaport in the State of Cutch, Bom-
bay, situated in 220 50' N. and 690 32' E., on the coast of the Gulf of
Cutch, 36 miles south-west of Bhuj. Population (1901), 24,683. The
town contains a hospital and a dispensary, treating annually about
14,000 patients. Mandvi, or 'the mart,' also called Maska Mandvi, was
known in old times as Raipur or Riyan. Two suburbs, Old and New
Saraya, inhabited by traders and seafaring men, stand outside the town
walls. Vessels of 70 tons can come within 500 yards. Mandvi is
a port of call for British India steamers. The muallims (pilots) are
noted throughout Cutch. There are two lighthouses : one at the end
of the breakwater with a revolving dioptric light of the fourth order ;
and the other on the south-west bastion of the fort, which is maintained
by the State and is visible for 1 7 miles in clear weather. The light is
of the holophotal order, and shows three flashes at intervals of thirty
seconds. Mandvi is a municipal town, with an income in 1903-4 of
Rs. 6,600.
Mandwa. — Petty State in Rewa Kantha, Bombay.
Mandya. — North-eastern taluk of Mysore District, Mysore State,
lying between 120 26' and 120 48' N. and 760 43' and 770 8' E., with
an area of 450 square miles. The population in 1901 was 115,574,
compared with 99,783 in 1891. The taluk contains two towns, Mandya
(population, 4,496), the head-quarters, and Maddur (2,597) ; and 300
villages. The land revenue demand in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,74,000. The
Shimsha flows through the east of the taluk from north to south. It
is dammed north of Maddur, and feeds several miles of channels for
irrigation. The country is gently undulating, moderately wooded, and
contains no jungle. The ' dry-crop ' soils are poor and gravelly,
especially in the uplands to the north. Good red soil occurs in the
centre and east of the Shimsha. The soils of ' wet ' lands are of fine
quality. Rice is the principal ' wet ' crop. There is a good deal of
mulberry in the east. The areca gardens were ruined in the famine
of 1878. Inferior crops are grown after the harvest and ploughed in
for manuring the rice-fields. Sheep are numerous, and a superior kind
of blanket is made at Mandya and other places. Silkworms are largely
reared, the cocoons being sent to Channapatna for reeling.
MANGALDAI 175
Maner. — Village in the Dinapore subdivision of Patna District,
Bengal, situated in 250 38' N. and 840 53' E., a few miles below the
junction of the Son with the Ganges, 10 miles from Dinapore canton-
ment and 5 miles from Bihta station on the East Indian Railway.
Population (1901), 2,765. Maner is a very old place, being mentioned
in the Ain-i-Akbari. The chief antiquities are the tombs of Makhdum
Yahia Maner and Makhdum Shah Daulat. The latter, which was built
in 16 1 6, stands on a raised platform, and at each corner rises a slender
pillar of graceful proportions and exquisite beauty. It has a great
dome, and the ceiling is covered with delicately carved texts from the
Koran. Two annual fairs are held at Maner.
Mangal. — One of the Simla Hill States, Punjab, lying between
310 18' and 310 22' N. and 760 55' and 770 i' E., with an area of
12 square miles. Population (1901), 1,227. ^ne chiefs are Rajputs
of the Atri tribe, and the family originally came from Marwar. The
State was an ancient dependency of Bilaspur, but was declared inde-
pendent after the expulsion of the Gurkhas in 181 5. Its principal
products are grain and opium, and it has a revenue of Rs. 900, out
of which Rs. 72 is paid as tribute. The present chief, Rana Tilok
Singh, was born in 1851, and succeeded in 1892.
Mangalagiri (' Hill of happiness '). — Town in the District and taluk
of Guntur, Madras, situated in 160 26' N. and 8o° 34' E. Population
(1901), 7,702. Some distance up the hill after which it is named is
a rock-cut platform with a temple of Narasimhaswami, to which thou-
sands of Hindus flock during the annual festival held at the full moon
in March. In the town is a large deep reservoir, built square with stone
steps. Local legends used to say that it was unfathomable, and had
a golden temple at the bottom ; but in the great famine of 1833 it dried
up. In it were found nearly 10,000 old matchlocks, thrown there,
doubtless, during one of the many wars which have swept over this
part of the country.
Mangaldai. — Subdivision of Darrang District, Eastern Bengal
and Assam, lying between 260 12' and 260 56' N. and 91 4-' and 92°
27' E., with an area of 1,245 square miles. It consists of a compact
block of land lying between the Brahmaputra and the Himalayas.
Between 1891 and 1901 the population fell from 187,950 to 170,580,
while in the previous decade there had been hardly any increase. This
lack of progress is chiefly due to kald azar, the malarial fever which has
wrought such havoc in Lower and Central Assam. The marshes that
fringe the Brahmaputra are fit only for the cultivation of mustard and
summer rice, but the central portion of Mangaldai is closely populated,
and the subdivision supports 137 persons per square mile, as compared
with 77 in the neighbouring subdivision of Tezpur. In 1904 there
were in Mangaldai 26 tea gardens with 10,940 acres under plant, which
176 MANGALDAI
gave employment to 28 Europeans and 13,271 natives ; but the tea plant
does not thrive as well here as in Upper Assam. In the central portion
the annual rainfall averages between 60 and 70 inches, while it is as
much as 100 inches under the hills. The submontane tracts are chiefly
inhabited by the Kachari tribe, who irrigate their rice-fields with water
drawn from the hill streams ; but artificial irrigation is not required in
the central portion of the subdivision. The subdivision contains 783
villages, including Mangaldai, the head-quarters. The assessment of
land revenue and local rates in 1903-4 was Rs. 4,01,000.
Mangalore Subdivision (Ma/igaluru). — Subdivision of South
Kanara District, Madras, consisting of the Mangalore taluk and the
Amindivi Islands.
Mangalore Taluk.— Taluk in the centre of South Kanara District,
Madras, lying between 120 48' and 13° 13' N. and 740 47' and 750
17" E., with an area of 679 square miles. It contains one town, Manga-
lore (population, 44,108), the head-quarters; and 243 villages. The
demand for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 5,82,000.
The population was 334,294 in 1901, compared with 302,624 in 1891,
showing an increase of 10-5 per cent. The density is high along the
coast and in the fertile valleys of the Netravati and Gurpur rivers, and
averages 492 persons per square mile for the taluk as a whole. The
finest coco-nut gardens are, as usual, found along the backwaters, where
also a considerable amount of sugar-cane is grown. The best areca
gardens occur inland and near the Western Ghats. Rice is the prin-
cipal crop. Round Mangalore, near Bajpe and elsewhere, considerable
quantities of ' dry grains,' chillies, turmeric, vegetables, and flowers
are grown, chiefly by native Christians. The laterite plateaux in this
taluk are very extensive, notably that round Mudbidri, and many of
the hills round Mangalore have been stripped bare to supply the local
market for firewood ; but its deep valleys and outstanding bluffs and
crags, with the ever-present towering background of the Ghats, render
its scenery unsurpassed.
Mangalore Town. — Administrative head-quarters of South Kanara
District, Madras, situated on the shore of the Indian Ocean in 120
52' N. and 740 51' E. The population in 1901 was 44,108, of whom
25,312 were Hindus, 7,149 Musalmans, and as many as 11,604 Chris-
tians. The town stretches for about 5 miles along the backwater formed
by the Netravati and Gurpur rivers. Viewed from the sea, or from
any point of vantage, it presents the appearance of a vast coco-nut
plantation, broken only here by some church spire and there by a
factory chimney. The busy bazars are quite concealed from view.
Under various local chiefs, whether they aspired to independence
or admitted the suzerainty of Vijayanagar or Bednur, such places as
Barkur and Karkala were of greater importance than Mangalore,
MANGALORE TOWN 177
though the local Raja, known as the Hangar chief, played his part in
all the disturbances of the time. The Portuguese, attracted by trade,
seized the town in a.d. 1596, and maintained a footing for the next
two centuries with varying success. To Haidar, with his ambitious naval
schemes, Mangalore was both strategically and politically important.
On the fall of Bednur he at once seized it (1763), and established
dockyards and an arsenal. Captured by the British and abandoned
in 1768, it was again taken by them in 1781. Surrendered to Tipu
after an heroic defence by Colonel Campbell in 1784, it finally fell to
the British in 1799.
Ibn Batuta mentions the commerce of Mangalore with the Persian
Gulf as far back as 1342. It is now the centre of the commercial and
industrial enterprise of the District. Tile-making, introduced by the
Basel Mission, which has two factories in the town, is carried on by
another European firm and nine native merchants as well ; and the
exports of tiles are valued at 3^ lakhs. The town also contains a well-
known weaving establishment belonging to the Basel Mission, as well
as a mechanical workshop of theirs, and three printing presses. Coffee
is the chief article of export, the amount sent out being valued at
48 lakhs annually. It is all brought from Mysore and Coorg to
Mangalore to be cured, an industry in which four European and three
native firms are engaged. The other articles exported are areca-nuts
and spices (11 lakhs), rice {Z\ lakhs), and salted fish (2§ lakhs). The
total value of the exports amounts to S6-| lakhs annually. Of the
imports, valued at 39^ lakhs, piece-goods (5^ -lakhs), salt (4^ lakh-),
rain and pulse (3A lakhs), and liquor (2^ lakhs) are the most important
items. Steamers and large vessels are obliged to anchor uutside the
backwater, but the Arabian buggalows and country craft, of which more
than 2,000 enter annually, can cross the bar. Reclamations and
improvements, including a pier and tramway, have lately been com-
pleted at the wharves at a cost of Rs. 70,000. The St. Aloysius
College (first grade), founded by the Jesuit Mission in 1880, and the
Government College (second grade) are the chief educational institu-
tions. The former has an average attendance of 460 students, oi
whom 60 are reading in the college classes. Mangalore was constituted
a municipality in 1896. The receipts and expenditure during the ten
years ending 1902-3 averaged Rs. 48,600 and Rs. 48,200 respectively.
In 1903-4 the corresponding figures were Rs. 66,400 and Rs. 63,000,
the chief items in the receipts being the taxes on houses and land and
a grant from Government. There are two municipal hospitals with ^2
beds for in-patients, and also two private leper asylums. A drainage
scheme for the western portion of the town, the estimated cost of which
is Rs. 1,46,000, is under consideration. An extension of the Madras
Railway from Kumbla to Mangalore (21 miles) will shortly be opened.
&
i78
MANGALVEDHA
Mangalvedha. — Head-quarters of the subdivision of the same name
in the State of Sangli, Bombay, situated in 170 31' N. and 750 29' E.,
between the angle formed by the junction of the Bhlma and the Man,
about 13 miles south of Pandharpur and 15 miles north-east of Sangli
town. Population (1901), 8,397. Mangalvedha was founded before
the Muhammadan period by a Hindu prince named Mangal, whose
capital it was. Judging from the remains of an old temple, the place
must have been of some importance and wealth. After its destruction
by the Muhammadans, the materials were used in building the fort in
the centre of the town. The town is administered as a municipality,
with an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 4,000. The fort contains the Jama
Masjid and a citadel known as the Chauburji, said to have been built
by the Pandhres who were in charge of the pargana under the Satara
Rajas (1720-50). The town contains a dispensary.
Mangaon. - Eastern taluka of Kolaba District, Bombay, lying between
i8°6'and i8°30/N.and 73°3'and 730 26' E., with an area of 352 square
miles. There are 226 villages, but no town. The population in 1901
was 83,415, compared with 83,837 in 1891. The density, 237 persons
per square mile, is much below the District average. The demand for
land revenue in 1903-4 was 1-69 lakhs, and for cesses Rs. 10,000.
The head-quarters are at Mangaon village. The Mandad river flows
through the north and west of the taluka, and the Ghod through the
centre. Except in the south, the country is broken up by a number of
detached hills. The rainfall during the ten years ending 1903 averaged
136 inches. Except in some of the western uplands, where the sea-
breeze is felt, Mangaon is hot during the summer.
Manglaur.— Town in the Roorkee tahsil of Saharanpur District,
United Provinces, situated in 290 48' N. and 770 53' E., 6 miles south
of Roorkee town and close to the Upper Ganges Canal. Population
(1901), 10,763. According to tradition, the town was founded by
Raja Mangal Sen, a Rajput feudatory of Yikramaditya, and the remains
of a fortress attributed to him can still be traced. A mosque in the
town was built by Balban in 1285. There is little trade ; but the crops
grown in the neighbourhood are irrigated from the canal and are
exceptionally fine, and there is a great demand for manure. The place
was formerly noted for carpentry. This industry, which had begun to
decline, has now revived ; and very good chairs and other articles are
made. The Muhammadan weavers are much impoverished. Manglaur
is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about
Rs. 3,500. Much has been clone to improve its sanitary condition.
Manglon. — One of the Northern Shan States, Burma, lying astride
the Salween, between 210 31' and
22° 54'
N. and 980 20' and
99"
18' E., and having, with its sub-feudatory States, an area of about
3,000 square miles. It is bounded on the north by South Hsenwi and
MANGLON i79
the Wa States ; on the east by the Wa States, China, and the Southern
Shan States of Kengtung (from which it is separated by the Nam Hka
river) ; on the south by Mdngnawng ; on the west by Mongnawng,
Monghsu, Kehsi Mansam, and South Hsenwi. The State proper is
divided into East and West Manglon by the Salween ; and the Sawbwa
has control over the sub-States of Mothai in the extreme north and
Mawhpa in the extreme south (both lying almost entirely east of the
Salween), also of Manghseng on the left bank of the Salween, and
Ngekting east of it. The country east of the Salween consists, in the
south, of the broad mountain mass separating the valleys of the Salween
and its important tributary the Nam Hka. The northern part is
drained by short tributaries of the Salween, and is composed of steep
hills and deep narrow valleys. West Manglon is a narrow strip of hill
country, little wider than the ridge following the Salween river, and
cut up by a number of narrow valleys.
The authentic history of Manglon begins about eighty years ago with
the rise of a Wa chief, Ta Awng, who retained his hold on the State
by becoming tributary to Hsenwi. At the time of annexation, trans-
Salween Manglon was in charge of a Sawbwa named Ton Hsang, the
cis-Salween territory being administered by the Sawbwa's brother, Sao
Maha. Considerable difficulty was experienced by the British in
dealing with the latter, who refused to attend the darbar at Mongyai
in 1 88 1. Acting under the influence of Sao Weng, the ex-Sawbwa of
Lawksawk, he persistently refused to come in, and deserted his State
in 1892 when a British party marched through it. Ton Hsang was
then put in charge of West Manglon as well as of his own country east
of the Salween, but had to suffer an attack by Sao Maha immediately
afterwards. One more chance of reforming was given to the latter and
he was then definitely expelled, and West Manglon has since remained
undisturbed in Ton Hsang's charge. East Manglon has suffered from
time to time from raids on the part of the independent Wa chiefs to
the east, but the State as a whole is gradually settling down. The
exact population is not known, as the State was wholly omitted from
the census operations in 1901 ; but it is probably not below 40,000.
The inhabitants of East Manglon and of the sub-States are mainly
Was, the Shans being confined to the valleys; West Manglon is almost
wholly Shan. Lisaws and Chinese are found on both sides of the
Salween, and Palaungs in West Manglon. The capital, Takiit, is
situated in the mountains of Mast Manglon, but some of the officials
reside at Pangyang a few miles to the south. The revenue consists
entirely of thathameda, amounting in 1903-4 to Rs. 11,000. Of this
Rs. 4,200 went to the privy purse, and Rs. 4,200 towards administra-
tion and salaries, and Rs. 2,000 was spent on public works. The
tribute to the British Government is only Rs. 500.
180 MANGO LI
Mangoli. — Village in the Bagevadi taluka of Bijapur District,
Bombay, situated in i6° 40" N. and 750 54' E.. 15 miles south-east of
Bijapur town. Population (1901), 5,287. It was formerly the head-
quarters of the Bagevadi taluka, but has now declined in importance.
The country round Mangoli is very fertile, and the village exports
a good deal of wheat, cotton, linseed, and jowar.
Mangrol {Mangarol Bandar, apparently the Monoglossum of
Ptolemy) (1). — Seaport in the State of Junagarh, Kathiawar, Bombay,
situated in 21° 8' N. and 700 14' E., on the south-west coast, a mile
and a half north-east from the bandar, which is washed by the Arabian
Sea. Population (1901), 15,016. The mosque here is the finest in
Kathiawar. A tablet in one part of the building records the date of
its foundation as 1383. The town belongs to a petty Musalman chief,
styled the Shaikh of Mangrol, who pays a tribute of Rs. 11,500 to the
Nawab of Junagarh. The harbour is much exposed, being open to all
but north-east and north-west winds, and will not admit more than
three or four kotiychs or native vessels at a time. Soundings are
regular, over a muddy but rocky bottom, from one to one and a half
mile off shore. There is a manufacture of ivory and sandal-wood
inlaid boxes, and the ironsmiths are famous for their skill. The musk-
melons grown here are celebrated. A lighthouse, 75 feet above high-
water mark, shows a fixed light visible 4 miles at sea. The shrine
of Kamnath Mahadeo, situated about 5 miles from the town, is visited
annually on the 15th of the bright half of the month of Kartik
(November) and the last day of the dark half of the month of Shravan
(August). There is a well at a distance of about 200 yards. The
land surrounding this well forms a tract of about 5 or 6 miles in
circumference, and is called Labur Kua. Excellent cotton is grown
here, which finds a ready sale in the Bombay market. Betel-vine
plantations have been in existence for about thirty years.
Mangrol (2).— Head-quarters of the district of the same name in the
State of Kotah, Rajputana, situated in 250 20' N. and 700 31' E., on
the right bank of the Banganga, a tributary of the Parbati, about
44 miles north-east of Kotah city. The town is a commercial mart
of some importance, with a population in 1901 of 5,156. It possesses
a post office, a vernacular school, and a hospital with accommodation
for six in-patients. Mangrol is the site of a battle fought in 1821
between Maharao Kishor Singh of Kotah and his minister Zalim Singh,
assisted by a detachment of British troops. The Maharao was defeated,
and his brother Prithwl Singh was killed. A mausoleum constructed
where the body of the latter was burnt still exists close to the river,,
while to the east of the town are the tombs of two British officers
(Lieutenants Clarke and Read of the 4th Light Cavalry) who fell in
this engagement. Three miles to the south is the village of Bhatwara,
MANIAR 181
where the Kotah troops defeated a much stronger army from Jaipur
in 1 761, and captured the latter's five-coloured banner. The valour
and skill of Zalim Singh (then Faujdar of Kotah) contributed greatly
to the victory, which put an end to Jaipur's pretensions to supremacy
over the Hara Rajputs. Ten miles to the west of Mangrol is the
ancient village of Siswali, said to have been founded by the Gaur
Rajputs of Sheopur. The Chhipas of the place carry on a fairly large
trade in dyed cloths.
Mangrul Taluk. — Formerly a taluk of Basim District, but since
August, 1905, the south-eastern taluk of Akola District, Berar, lying
between 200 4' and 2oc 8o' N. and 770 9' and 77° 42' E., with an area
of 630 square miles. The population rose from 82,446 in 1891 to
91,062 in 1901, its density, 144 persons per square mile, being the
lowest in the District. The taluk contains 202 villages and onlv one
town, Mangrul Pir (population, 5,793). The demand for land
revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,68,000, and for cesses Rs. 13.000. The
taluk lies in the Balaghat, or southern plateau of Berar, and its most
fertile tracts are those in the valleys of the streams running south-
wards to the Peiiganga river.
Mangrul Town (1). — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name,
Akola District, Berar, situated in 20° 19' N. and 770 24' E. Popula-
tion (1901), 5,793. The town is distinguished from many other places
of the same name by the epithet Pir, which has reference either to the
shrine of Hayat Kalandar. or to the shrines of several minor saints
buried here. The real name of Hayat Kalandar is said to have been
Shah Badr-ud-din. and he was also known as Baba Budhan and Saiyid
Ahmad Kabir. His native place is said to have been Bataih in Rum
(Asia Minor), and he is said to have died in 1253. The shrine at
Mangrul must therefore be a cenotaph ; and it is believed not to be
more than about four hundred years old. Of the minor saints buried
here, none has any celebrity beyond the neighbourhood.
Mangrul Town (2).— Town in the Chandur taluk of Amraoti Dis-
trict, Berar, situated in 200 36' N. and 770 52' E. Population (1901),
6,588. The town is distinguished from other towns and villages of
the same name by the epithet Dastglr.
Maniar. — Town in the Bansdih tahsll of Ballia District, United
Provinces, situated in 250 59' N. and 840 n' E., on the right bank
of the Gogra. Population (1901), 9,483. The houses of Maniar
cluster round high artificial mounds, formerly the sites of the fortified
residences of the principal zamindars, but now waste and bare. It has
no main thoroughfares, nor does it possess any public buildings. Its
importance is derived from its position as a port on the Gogra, through
which rice and other grains are imported from Gorakhpur, Basti, and
Nepal, while sugar and coarse cotton cloth of local manufacture
1 82 MANIAR
and oilseeds are exported to Bengal. Maniar is administered under
Act XX of 1856, with an income of Rs. 1,500. There is a school
with 50 pupils.
Manihari.— Village in the head-quarters subdivision of Purnea Dis-
trict, Bengal, situated in 250 20' N. and 870 37' E., on the north bank
of the Ganges. Population (1901), 3,759. It is a terminus of the
Bihar section of the Eastern Bengal State Railway, connected by ferry
steamer with the East Indian Railway station at Sakrigali Ghat, and
a place of call for river steamers.
Manikarchar.— Village in the extreme south-west of Goalpara
District, Eastern Bengal and Assam, situated in 250 32' N. and 890
53' E., near the Garo Hills frontier. Population (1901), 3,870. The
village contains a large bazar, and a bi-weekly market, where a con-
siderable trade is carried on in cotton and other products of the Garo
Hills, jute, and mustard. The principal merchants are Marwaris from
Rajputana and Muhammadans from Dacca. The public buildings
include a dispensary.
Manikcheri. — Village in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Eastern Bengal
and Assam, situated in 220 51" N. and 910 51' E., on a stream of the
same name. Population (1901), 1,356. It is the residence of the
Mong Raja.
Manikganj Subdivision. — Western subdivision of Dacca District,
Eastern Bengal and Assam, lying between 23° 37' and 240 2' N. and
890 45' and 900 15' E., with an area of 489 square miles. The sub-
division is a level alluvial plain, bounded on the west and south by the
Padma. The population in 1901 was 468,942, compared with 448,927
in 1 89 1, the density being 959 persons per square mile. It contains
1,461 villages, but no town. Since 1861, when the town of Manikganj
was swept away by flood, the head-quarters have been at Dasara,
a village 2 miles to the south of the old site. There is a large mart
at Jaglr Hat, 2 miles from the subdivisional head-quarters.
Manikiala. — Village and group of ruins in the District and tahsll
of Rawalpindi, Punjab, situated in $£ 27' N. and 730 17' E., midway
between Hassan Abdal and Jhelum. Population (1901), 734. The
remains consist of a great tope or stupa south of the modern village,
together with fourteen smaller buildings of the same class, fifteen
monasteries, and many isolated massive stone walls. Eocal tradition
connects these ruins with the name of an eponymous Raja, Man or
Manik, who built the great stupa. According to the current legend,
an ancient city named Manikpur stood upon the site, inhabited by
seven Rakshasas or demons. Rasalu, son of Salivahana, Raja of
Sialkot, was the enemy of these demons, who daily devoured by lot
one of the people of Manikpur. Accordingly, Rasalu once took the
place of the victim, went out to meet the demons, and slew them all
MANIKTALA 183
save one, who still lives in the cavern of Gandgarh. In this legend
Sir Alexander Cunningham saw a Hinduized version of the Buddhist
story, in which Gautama Buddha offers up his body to appease the
hunger of seven tiger cubs. Hiuen Tsiang places the scene of this
legend south-east of Shahdheri, which agrees with the bearing of
Manikiala from the latter ruins. At this spot stood the famous stupa
of the ' body-offering,' one of the four great stupas of North-Western
India. The stupa was explored by General Court in 1834, and
Cunningham states that the inscription on it twice makes mention of
the sacrifice of Buddha's body. All the existing remains present the
appearance of religious buildings, without any trace of a city or fortress.
The people point to the high ground immediately west of the great
stupa as the site of Raja Man's palace, because pieces of plaster occur
there only among the ruins ; but the Satraps of Taxila may very
probably have taken up their residence upon this spot when they came
to worship at the famous shrine. A town of 1,500 or 2,000 houses
may also have extended northward, and occupied the whole rising
ground now covered by the village of Manikiala. But the place must
be regarded as mainly an ancient religious centre, full of costly
monasteries and shrines, with massive walls of cut stone. The people
unanimously affirm that the city was destroyed by fire, and the quantity
of charcoal and ashes found among the ruins strongly confirms their
belief. Manikiala is one of the sites for which is claimed the honour
of being the burial-place of Alexander's horse Bucephalus.
Maniktala. — Town in the District of the Twenty-four Parganas,
Bengal, situated in 220 35' X. and 88° 23' E. Population (1901),
32,387, of whom Hindus numbered 22,792, Musalmans 9,512, and
Christians 65. Maniktala is the great eastern industrial suburb of
Calcutta, wedged in between the Circular Canal on the west, the New
Cut on the east, and the Beliaghata Canal on the south. Beliaghata
in the south of the town is the seat of an extensive trade in rice
imported from the eastern Districts, while along the frontage of the
Circular Canal a brisk business is done in firewood, loose jute, and
rice. The other important wards are Ultadanga and Narikeldanga.
Factories are numerous, including a jute mill, a silk factory, bone-
crushing mills, shellac, saltpetre, castor-oil, and soap factories, and four
tanneries. The nursery gardens of two Calcutta florists are situated
in the town, which is within the jurisdiction of the Commissioner of
Police, Calcutta, and forms part of the ' Suburbs of Calcutta ' sub-
division. Maniktala was comprised in the Suburban municipality until
1889, when it was constituted a separate municipality. The income
during the decade ending 1 901-2 averaged Rs. 63,000, and the
expenditure Rs. 59,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 2,14,000,
including a loan of Rs. 25,000 from Government, Rs. 31,000 derived
1 84 MANIKTALA
from a tax on houses and lands, Rs. 18,000 from a conservancy rate,
and Rs. 7,000 from a tax on vehicles. The incidence of taxation was
Rs. 2- 1- 10 per head of the population. In the same year the chief
items of expenditure were Rs. 5,000 spent on lighting, Rs. 3,000 on
drainage, Rs. 23,000 on conservancy, Rs. 1,800 on medical relief,
Rs. 16,000 on roads, and Rs. 1,300 on education ; total, Rs. 74,000.
Manipur. — Native State lying to the east of the Province of
Eastern Bengal and Assam, between 230 50' and 250 41' N. and 930 2'
and 940 47" E., with an area of 8,456 square miles. It is bounded on
the north by the Naga Hills District and by hilly country inhabited
by tribes of independent Nagas ; on the east by independent territory
and Burma ; on the south by Burma and the Lushai Hills ; and on the
west by the District of Cachar. The State consists of a great tract
of hilly country, and a valley about 30 miles long and
aspects. 2° m^es wide, shut in on every side. The general
direction of these ranges is north and south, but in
places they are connected by spurs and occasional ridges of lower
elevation. The greatest altitude is reached to the north-east, about
fifteen days' journey from the Manipur valley, where peaks rise upwards
of 13,000 feet above sea-level. To the north of this the hills gradually
decrease in height till they sink into the flat plains of the Assam
Valley. Southwards, too, there is a gradual decline in altitude till the
sea is reached near Chittagong and Arakan. The general appearance
of the hill ranges is that of irregular ridges, occasionally rising into
conical peaks and flattened ridges of bare rocks. Sometimes, as in the
western ranges of hills overlooking the Manipur valley, the summit
of the hills presents a more open and rolling character.
The journey through the hills from Cachar to Manipur is one of
great interest. The path crosses five considerable ranges, covered with
forest and separated from one another by deep river valleys, and thus
possesses all the attractions which are conferred by stately timber,
luxuriant undergrowth of bamboos, creepers, and giant ferns, bold
cliffs, and rivers rushing through wild gorges. The general appearance
of the valley, as the traveller descends from the hills, has much to
please the eye. On every side it is shut in by blue mountains. To
the south the waters of the Eoktak Lake sparkle in the sun, and all the
country in the neighbourhood is covered with waving jungle grass.
Farther east the villages of the Manipuris are to be seen buried in
clumps of bamboos and fruit trees, and lining the banks of the rivers
that meander through the plain. The jungle gives way to wide
stretches of rice cultivation, interspersed with grazing grounds and
swamps, and to the north-east are the dense groves which conceal the
town of Imphal.
The principal rivers of the valley are the Imphal, Iril, Thobal,
M ANT PUR 1S5
Nambal, and Nambol. The last named river Tails into the Loktak
Lake, from which it emerges under the name of Kortak. This stream
eventually joins the Imphul and the Nambal, and their united waters,
which are known as the Achauba, Imphal, or Manipur river, finally fall
into the Kendat and thus into the Chindwin. The chief rivers crossed
in the hills by the traveller from Cachar are the Jiri, the Makru, the
Barak, the Irang, the Lengba, and the Laimatak. The Jiri, which
forms the boundary between British territory and Manipur, is about
40 yards wide where it is crossed by the Government road, and is
fordable in the dry season. The Makru, which runs parallel with the
Jiri, has a very clear stream, and is also fordable in the dry season.
The Barak is the largest and most important river in the Manipur hill
territory ; it receives the Makru, the Irang, the Tipai river, which flows
north from the Lushai country, and finally the Jiri. It is said to be
navigable for canoes for about one day above its junction with the
Tipai. The rivers in the plains are navigable by dug-out canoes at all
seasons of the year. It was at one time thought that the Manipur
valley originally consisted of a large lake basin, which gradually con-
tracted in size until nothing remains but the Loktak, a sheet of water
about 8 miles long and 5 miles wide, which occupies the south-eastern
corner of the valley. Further investigations by competent geologists
have shown that this hypothesis is not correct.
The soil of the valley is an alluvial clay washed down from the
surrounding hills. The mountains to the north are largely composed
of Pre-Tertiary slates and sandstones, with Upper Tertiary deposits on
the higher ridges and on the hills overhanging the Chindwin valley.
The inner hills are clothed with forest, but the slopes of the Laimatol
range, which overlook the valley on the west, are only covered with
grass. In the valley itself there is little tree growth. A great portion
of the plain is cultivated with rice, but near the Loktak Lake there are
wide stretches of grass jungle.
Wild animals are fairly common, and include elephants, tigers,
leopards, bears, deer, and wild hog. Rhinoceros and bison {Bos
gaurus) are also found in the hills to the south-east, but are not
common, and serow or goat-antelope are occasionally met with on the
higher ranges. Hog, leopards, and deer are the only animals to be
seen in large numbers in the plains. Elephants used at one time to
be regularly hunted, but the herds have been considerably reduced in
numbers, and these operations are no longer profitable. Large flocks
of wild geese and ducks are to be found on the Loktak Lake, and
partridge, pheasant, and jungle-fowl are common.
The valley lies about 2,500 feet above the level of the sea, and the
climate is cool and pleasant. At the hottest season the nights and
morning's are always cool. In the winter there are sharp frosts at
186 MA NT PUR
night, and heavy fogs often hang over the valley till the day is well
advanced. The annual rainfall at Imphal town averages about 70
inches ; in the hills it is believed to be as much as roo inches.
Manipur, like the neighbouring Province of Assam, is subject to
seismic disturbances. A severe shock occurred in 1869 ; but the earth-
quake of 1897, which did so much damage in other parts of Eastern
India, was only slightly felt.
The origin of the Manipuri people is obscure, and the written
records, having been mainly composed since they became Hindus, are
not worthy of credit. From the most trustworthy
traditions, the valley appears originally to have been
occupied by several tribes, which came from different directions.
Although the general facial characteristics of the Manipuris are Mon-
golian, there is great diversity of feature among them, some showing
a regularity approaching the Aryan type. The kingdom of Manipur
first emerges from obscurity as a neighbour and ally of the Shan
kingdom of Pong, which had its capital at Mogaung. The regalia of
the royal family are said to have been bestowed by king Komba
of Pong. The history of Manipur contains nothing of special interest
until about a. d. 17 14. In that year a Naga named Panheiba became
Raja of Manipur, and adopted Hinduism, taking the name of Gharib
Nawaz. His people followed his example, and since that date have
been conspicuous for the rigidity with which they observe the rules
of caste and ceremonial purity.
Gharib Nawaz made several successful invasions into Burma, but no
permanent conquest. After his death, the Burmans invaded Manipur,
and the ruler, Jai Singh, having sought the aid of the British, a treaty
of alliance was negotiated in 1762. The force sent to assist Manipur
was, however, recalled, and after this little communication passed
between the British Government and the State for some years. On
the outbreak of the first Burmese War in 1824, the Burmans invaded
Cachar and Assam, as well as Manipur ; and Gambhir Singh of Mani-
pur asked for British aid, which was granted. A force of sepoys and
artillery being sent towards Cachar, and a levy of Manipuris being
formed under British officers, not only were the Burmans expelled from
the Manipur valley, but the Kubo valley down to the Ningthi river,
situated to the east of the old boundaries, and peopled by Shans, was
added to the State. In 1826 peace was concluded with Burma, and
Manipur was declared independent. Until 1834, when Gambhir Singh
died, the country remained quiet and prosperous. On his death, his
son being at the time only one year old, Nar Singh, his uncle and
great-grandson of Gharib Nawaz, was appointed regent. In 1834 the
British Government decided to restore the Kubo valley to Burma,
the government of which had never ceased to remonstrate against its
HISTORY 187
separation from that country. The valley was given hack, and a new
boundary laid down by an agreement dated January 9, 1834. The
British Government at the same time bound itself to pay to the Raja of
Manipur an annual allowance of Rs. 6,370, in compensation for the loss
of the Kubo valley. In 1835 a Political Agent was appointed to act as a
medium of communication between the State and the British Government.
An unsuccessful attempt was made on Nar Singh's life in 1844,
and the Raja's mother, being implicated, fled with her son, Chandra
Klrtti Singh, to Cachar. Nar Singh upon this assumed the throne,
which he retained until his death in 1850. Debendra Singh, his
brother, was then recognized as Raja by the British Government.
Three months afterwards, Chandra Klrtti Singh invaded Manipur, and
Debendra Singh, who was unpopular, fled towards Cachar. Chandra
Klrtti Singh, having established his authority, was in February, 185 1,
recognized by the British Government ; and though numerous attempts
were made by other members of the royal family to head a rebellion,
the leaders were all defeated, and either killed, imprisoned, or placed
under surveillance in British territory. In 1879, when the Angami
Nagas killed Mr. Damant, the Deputy-Commissioner of the Naga Hills,
and besieged the stockade at Kohlma, the Maharaja dispatched a force
under Colonel Johnstone, the Political Agent, who raised the siege.
In recognition of this service, the Government of India bestowed upon
the Maharaja the dignity of K. C.S.I. During the Burmese War of
1885, which ended in the annexation of king Thlbaw's dominions, a
small force under Colonel Johnstone succeeded in rescuing a number
of British subjects and Europeans in Northern Burma. In the course
of these operations the Political Agent was seriously wounded, and
compelled to take leave ; and his successor, Major Trotter, was shortly
afterwards treacherously attacked near Tammu, and received a wound
which caused his death two months later.
In 1886 Chandra Klrtti Singh died, and was succeeded by his son,
Sur Chandra Singh. As on previous occasions, a series of attempts
were made by other claimants to the throne to oust the lawful heir.
The first two expeditions were led by Bora Chaoba Singh, a son of the
Nar Singh who ruled Manipur from 1844 to 1850, but proved un-
successful. Two more attempts were made in 1S87, but the pretenders
were defeated and killed and their followers dispersed. In September,
1890, two of the Maharaja's brothers attacked the palace, and Sur
Chandra Singh fled to the Residency for protection. He then announced
his intention of resigning the throne, and left Manipur for Cachar en
route for Brindaban. His younger brother, Kula Chandra Singh, pro-
claimed himself Maharaja, though the real power seems to have lain in
the hands of his brother Tikendrajit Singh, who was Senapati, or
commander-in-chief of the Manipur forces.
vol. xvir. N
r88 MA NT PUR
On reaching British territory, Sur Chandra Singh repudiated his
abdication, and applied for help. It was decided that the Jubraj,
Kula Chandra Singh, should be recognized as Maharaja, but that the
Senapati should be removed from the State and punished for his law-
less conduct ; and the Chief Commissioner was directed to visit Mani-
pur early in March, 1891, to give effect to these orders. Mr. Quinton
was accompanied by an escort of 400 men from two Gurkha battalions,
which, in addition to the Political Agent's guard of 100 men, was
thought sufficient to check any attempt at opposition. After much
deliberation, the Chief Commissioner determined to hold a darbar, at
which the orders of the Government of India were to be announced
and the Senapati arrested. The latter, however, refused to appear, and
it was decided to arrest him on March 24. Troops were accordingly
sent to his house, but were attacked, and Lieutenant Brackenbury, one
of the officers in command, was killed. Fighting went on throughout
the day, but at evening an armistice was agreed to and the Senapati
invited the Chief Commissioner to meet him. Mr. Quinton, accom-
panied by other British officers, proceeded to the rendezvous and then
into the fort, where they met the Senapati, but no agreement was
concluded. As the party were leaving, their way was barred, Mr. Grim-
wood was fatally speared, and Lieutenant Simpson severely wounded.
Mr. Quinton and the officers with him were detained for two hours,
and were then marched out to an open space, and beheaded by the
public executioner. The attack upon the Residency was renewed, but
after a short interval the British force drew off towards Cachar, which
they reached without serious misadventure. The Superintendent of
Telegraphs, Mr. Melvill, who had left Imphal for Kohlma before the
outbreak, was pursued by the Manipuris, and both he and a European
signaller who accompanied him were killed.
As soon as news of the disaster was received at Kohlma, the Deputy-
Commissioner marched down the road to the Manipur boundary and
drove back the rebels. Lieutenant Grant also advanced from Tammu
with 80 men to within 14 miles of the capital, but was unable to proceed
farther and was recalled. Three British columns entered the State
from Burma, Cachar, and the Naga Hills, and arrived before the palace
on April 27, to find that the Jubraj and the Senapati had taken flight.
They were, however, captured ; and the Senapati and several of the
actual murderers were tried and hanged, while Kula Chandra Singh
and the other ringleaders were deported to the Andamans. Chura Chand,
a boy belonging to a collateral branch of the royal house, was then placed
on the gaddi. During his minority the State has been administered
by the Political Agent, and numerous reforms have been introduced.
In 1907 the young Maharaja, who had been educated at the Ajmer
College, was formally installed.
POP IV.. IT/OX r89
The disturbances of 1891 led to an outbreak of lawlessness among
the hill tribes subject to Manipur. No less than eight raids were com-
mitted by various villages on one another within the year, in the course
of which 104 lives were lost. Murders along the road running from
Manipur to Kohima were common; and in 1893 the Naga village of
Swemi was raided by Kukis, who professed to have been incensed at
the failure of the Nagas to compensate a Kuki chief for an alleged theft
of rice. The attack was delivered at dawn, and 99 men and 187 women
and children were put to the sword. In 1901 the State was visited by
Lord Curzon as Viceroy, on his way from Cachar to Burma.
The first Census of Manipur, which was taken in 1881, disclosed a
population of 221,070. The census papers of 1891 were destroyed in
the rising that took place in that year. The popu-
lation in 1901 was 284,465, giving a density of 34 opu a ion.
persons per square mile. The whole of this increase was due to natural
growth, there being practically no immigration into the State. ^Yomen
exceed men in numbers. They enjoy a position of considerable im-
portance, and most of the trade of the valley is in their hands. Of the
population in 1901, 60 per cent, were Hindus, and 36 per cent, aborigi-
nal tribes still faithful to their own primitive forms of belief. Muham-
madans formed nearly 4 per cent, of the whole. Manipuri is the
ordinary language of the valley, and was returned by 64 per cent, of
the population, but in the hills Naga (21 per cent.) and Kuki (14 per
cent.) are the common forms of speech. The State contains one town,
Imphal (population, 67,093), and 467 villages.
The mass of the Hindu population describe themselves as members
of the Kshattriya caste (161,000), though the Manipuris have been con-
verted within comparatively recent times to Hinduism ; the majority of
the remainder are Brahmans.
The hill tribes fall into two main sections, Kukis and Nagas. Kuki
is a generic term applied to tribes whose home is in the mountainous
tract lying between Burma, Manipur, Cachar, and Arakan. These
tribes have been steadily moving northwards, and have crossed the
Cachar and Manipur valleys and settled in the hills beyond. The total
number of Kukis in the State in 1901 was 41,000. The hills that
surround the valley are inhabited by various tribes of Nagas (59,000),
of whom the Tankuls (20,000) are the best known. The men of this
tribe, when working in the fields or on the roads, are often stark naked
except for a small bone ring, through which the foreskin is drawn.
Other Naga tribes are the Kabui, Koirao, and Maring. The Lois arc a
low caste, not even dignified by the name of Hindu. They are probably
descended from one of the hill tribes, but under native rule the degrada-
tion of a Hindu Manipuri to the class of Loi was a not uncommon form
of punishment. Agriculture is the main occupation of the people.
N 2
190 MANIPUR
The soil of the valley is a reddish clay of considerable depth, which
is enriched every year by deposits of silt from the rivers, and yields
luxuriant crops of rice. The system of cultivation
does not differ materially from that followed in the
plains of Assam. The staple crop is rice, of which there are two main
kinds : one sown on high land in March or April and cut in July or
August ; and the other sown in April to June, transplanted about two
months later into beds of liquid mud, and reaped in December. Most
of the rice grown belongs to the second, or transplanted Variety. Other
crops include mustard and sugar-cane, which do extremely well, pulses
of various kinds, and tobacco. The poppy is cultivated to a small
extent by Muhammadans. English vegetables are grown in the cold
season, and oats and wheat have been tried with success. Fruit trees
include oranges, limes, pine-apples, plantains, jack-fruit, and mangoes.
The last are injured by the worm, which also ruins this fruit in Assam.
Various kinds of English fruit trees have been tried, but have not
proved successful. The areca palm does not grow in Manipur, and
large quantities of the nut are, in consequence, imported from Cachar.
The rainfall renders any general system of irrigation unnecessary, but
when the rivers rise small channels are often cut to bring water to
the fields.
Most of the hill tribes practise the jhum system of cultivation.
Jungle is cut down and burned, and seeds are sown among the ashes.
The crops thus grown include hill rice, cotton, pulses, pepper, tobacco,
ginger, vegetables of various kinds, potatoes, and maize. The same
jhum is seldom cropped for more than two years in succession, and is
then allowed to lie fallow for as long a time as possible, the minimum
period of rest being four years. The Tankul Nagas, who live in the
hills east of the valley, grow transplanted rice. The sides of the hills
are cut out into a succession of terraces, built up with stone retaining
walls, over which the water from the hill streams is distributed through
small irrigation channels. It is from this tribe that the AngamI Nagas
are said to have learned the art of terracing the hill-sides. The
advantages of the system are twofold. It enables the villagers to obtain
their supplies from fields close to their own homes, while the grain
raised is of a better quality than that grown in thejhFnns.
It is impossible to trace the extension of cultivation, as an accurate
system of land measurement has only recently been introduced.
A strong stimulus has, however, been given to agriculture by the
construction of the cart-road through the hills to the Assam Valley,
and by the completion of the railway line from Gauhati to Dimapur :
and there is now a large export of rice along this route.
The cattle are strong, hardy little animals, and when exported outside
the State command a ready sale. There is abundance of excellent
FORESTS 191
grazing in the rich grass of the jhils, and the live-stock of the farm are
carefully tended by their owners. The cows, like those of Assam, are
poor milkers. The buffaloes are much superior to those imported into
the Surma Valley from Bengal. The Manipuri ponies are well-known.
They do not, as a rule, stand as much as 12 hands high, but they
have remarkable endurance, courage, and speed. Unfortunately, the
mares have been recklessly sold, and many were carried away after the
expedition of 1891. Good ponies in consequence are now very scarce,
and there is serious risk of the breed disappearing. In 1839 an Arab
stallion and 8 mares were supplied to the Raja, but the climate did not
suit them and their progeny soon died out.
The whole of the hill ranges lying between the valleys of Cachar and
Manipur, and far to the north and south, are densely clothed to their
summits with tree jungle. Almost the only excep-
tions to this are the hill slopes facing the Manipur
valley, which have been denuded of timber. The trees are of great
variety, and in the ranges lying west of the Manipur valley large tracts
contain nahor (Mesua ferred),jarul {Lagerstroemia Flos Heginae), india-
rubber, tun (Cedrela Toona), oak, ash, &c. Bamboo jungle is every-
where plentiful. Towards the north, in the valleys dividing the hill
ranges from one another, the trees attain an immense size and height ;
and where this kind of forest exists the bamboo is uncommon. The
tea plant is found wild in the Hirok range between Manipur and
Burma, and on the hills to the north. Teak is common on the slopes
overlooking the Kubo valley. There are fine pine forests in the Tankul
hills and on the ranges which stretch northward to the Lanier river.
Rubber used formerly to be obtained in considerable quantities, but
most of the trees have been killed by excessive and improper tapping.
The forests lying between Manipur and Cachar are worked by the
Assam Forest department, which retains 25 per cent, of the profits.
Rents are usually paid in kind, the ordinary rate being about 4§ cwt.
of unhusked rice per acre. The rate of wages for unskilled labour is
4 annas a day. Owing to difficulties of transport, the price of rice is
low. The opening of the cart-road has developed a considerable export
trade to the Assam Valley, but in spite of this common rice is often
sold for less than a rupee a maund.
The valley and the surrounding hills have not yet been sufficiently
explored for their mineral resources to be fully known. There are
patches of coaly matter in the Kassom ridge, but experts are of opinion
that there is little hope of discovering workable coal in these hills.
Iron is found in the shape of small pisolitic nodules of hydrated oxide
of iron, covered with alluvial deposits to the depth of 4 or 5 feet. At
Kakching, to the south of the valley, the ore is dug up, smelted, and
made into duos and farm implements. At Hundong, near Ckrul, and
192 MANIPUR
at Palel, limestone deposits are worked for the use of the State. A large
part of the salt used in Manipur was formerly obtained from the brine
wells which exist in the valley and in the adjoining hills, but since the
opening of the cart-road Liverpool salt has to a great extent succeeded
in ousting the home-made article. The only other mineral of interest
is an unctuous clayey rock found in a small hill to the left of the main
road leading northwards from Imphal town. This rock is believed to
possess medicinal properties and is eaten by the people.
Silk is obtaine'd from a worm that feeds on the mulberry. The
climate and soil of Manipur are favourable to the growth of this tree,
and a European firm has recently submitted pro-
communications. Posa^s> whicJhj if accepted, will lead to the investment
of a large sum of money in sericulture. The rearing
of the silkworm is at present confined to the degraded class of
Manipuris known as Lois, a fact which in itself is enough to account
for the stagnation of the industry. A certain amount of rough pottery
is manufactured, and the Manipuris make the simple agricultural
implements they require, and brass and metal vessels. The supply of
these commodities does not, however, equal the demand, and has to
be supplemented by imports from other parts of India. The people
manufacture neat cane baskets and reed mats, and are fairly expert
carpenters and wood-carvers. Native jewellery is also made, but the
designs are rough, and possess little artistic merit. The skins of deer
and calf are tanned, and saddles, shoes, belts, pouches, and other
articles are manufactured. This leather is often tastefully enamelled
in black.
The internal trade of the State is carried on at markets which are
held in the neighbourhood of the larger villages. Two large markets
are held daily at Imphal, at which the principal articles offered for sale
are cotton and silk cloths and wearing apparel, pillows, rugs, Naga.
cloths, dried and fresh fish, vegetables, rice, reed mats, oil, and treacle.
Almost all the business is transacted by the women, who are shrewd
and capable, the men thinking it beneath their dignity to come and
traffic at the bazar. Very frequently no money changes hands, but
goods are exchanged by barter. External trade is carried on with
Kohima and the Assam Valley, with Cachar, and to a small extent
with Burma. The principal exports are rice, which goes by cart to
Kohima and to the Assam-Bengal Railway at Dimapur; and forest
produce, which is carried down the Barak into Cachar. At one time
there was a brisk trade in tea-seed, a considerable quantity of which
came from Burma and merely passed through Manipur. The trade
has, however, been killed by the depression in the tea industry, which
has checked any tendency to extend the area under cultivation, and
by the unscrupulous conduct of the contractors, who injured the repu-
FAMINE 193
tation of Manipur seed by plucking and selling it before it was ripe.
Cattle and buffaloes are exported in considerable numbers, but restric-
tions are from time to time imposed to prevent the State from being
denuded of its live-stock. The principal articles of import are mineral
oil, betel-nuts, dried fish, salt, and cotton piece-goods and yarn. Dried
fish, oil, and tea-seed come from the Burma frontier, but the bulk of
the State trade is with Assam. Although the Manipuri women are
keen and energetic shopkeepers, most of the wholesale business is in
the hands of the Marwari merchants, who have practically monopolized
the trade of Assam. The dealers in cattle and forest produce are
generally Muhammadans from the Surma Valley.
The most important line of communication in the State is the cart-
road from Manipur through the Naga Hills, which meets the Assam-
Bengal Railway at Dimapur ; 67 miles of this road lie in State territory.
The gradients are very easy, and commodious resthouses have been
erected at convenient stages ; but as the road is unmetalled, it is practi-
cally closed for cart traffic during the rains. Excellent bridges, which
for the most part are of solid masonry, have been thrown across all the
rivers. There is a good bridle-path from Cachar to Imphal, which
passes over the five ranges dividing the State from British territory.
Altogether twelve wire suspension bridges have been erected along this
route, while the Jiri is crossed by a ferry. A third road leaves the
valley to the south, and passing through Tammu reaches the valley of
the Chindwin in Upper Burma. The first 29 miles are fit for wheeled
traffic, but after this point the gradients become very steep, and in
places riding is barely possible. Numerous driving roads in the valley
are kept up by the State, each village being held responsible for the
repair of a certain section. These roads resemble those found in
Assam, and consist of earthen embankments raised above the level
of the rice-fields. They are unmetalled, and thus incapable of carrying
much cart traffic in the rains, so that at this season of the year the
rivers are used for the transport of produce. The only boats employed
are canoes hollowed out of the trunks of trees. Three lines of post
leave Imphal— to Tammu, to Kohlma, and to Silchar. The first two
are maintained by the State, the last by the Assam Administration.
No famine has occurred in Manipur for many years, though a poor
harvest sometimes causes a slight scarcity. Prior to the construction
of the cart-road, it was almost impossible to export Famine
grain from the State, and there was nearly always
a large supply in hand. These stocks have now been to some extent
depleted, and a complete failure of the harvest would be attended by
serious results, as it would be impossible to throw much grain into the
valley. The chances of a serious famine occurring are, however, slight.
The State has never been divided into any minor administrative
194 M AM PUR
units. Since 1891 it has been administered by a Political Agent,
as the Raja who was placed on the gaddi after the outbreak is still
. . . ._ A. a minor. A junior member of the Assam Commission
Administration. . . J . . . ,_,,..
is usually deputed to act as Assistant to the Politi-
cal Agent. The Medical officer in charge of the regiment at Manipur
discharges some of the functions of a Civil Surgeon, and public works
are carried out by the State Engineer. The land records establishment
is in charge of a Sub-Deputy-Collector lent by the Assam Government.
Petty civil and criminal cases are tried by panchayat courts sitting at
Imphal and at nine places in the valley, which can impose sentences of
line but not of imprisonment. Appeals lie from these courts to the
Chirap, a court sitting at Imphal, which exercises the ordinary powers
of a first-class Magistrate. The Superintendent of the State hears
appeals from the Chirap, and is invested with powers of life and death
subject to confirmation by the Chief Commissioner. He also hears all
cases in which hillmen are concerned. Civil and criminal cases tu
which European British subjects are a party are tried by the same
officer in his capacity as Political Agent, or by his Assistant. Serious
crime is not common, except among the hillmen, whose sense of
the sanctity of human life is still somewhat undeveloped. Since the
administration of the State has been placed upon a more satisfactory
basis, raids upon villages have happily become less common ; but
murders, though not on such a wholesale scale, still take place. Civil
suits are generally of a petty character.
Under native rule, the ryots paid revenue in kind and labour.
Officials, instead of receiving salaries in cash, were remunerated by
allowances in land and rice ; and public buildings, bridges, and roads
were constructed or repaired by unpaid labour. Since the adminis-
tration has been controlled by the British, the system of forced labour
has been almost entirely abolished, and land revenue has been assessed
at the rate of Rs. 2 per acre. The valley has been divided into five
divisions or pannahs, each in charge of a collecting officer. A survey
establishment has been organized, and the occupied area is being
gradually measured, the result of these operations being to disclose
a large area of unassessed cultivation. House tax is levied in the
hills, and no attempt is made to ascertain the area actually under
cultivation.
There are practically no excise arrangements in the State. The
Manipuris abstain from both liquor and intoxicating drugs. A little
opium is used by Muhammadans ; and the hill tribes prepare alcoholic
liquors, both fermented and distilled, but no restriction is placed upon
this practice. Salt is obtained from brine wells leased from the State,
and is also imported from Bengal in considerable quantities.
The total revenue and expenditure of the State in 1903-4 and the
MA XJ ARAB AD r95
principal items were as follows, in thousands of rupees. Receipts :
total, 3,95 : including land revenue 2,77, house-tax 46, fisheries 24,
forests 26, salt 6. Expenditure : total 3,88 ; including State works
1,48, Raja's civil list 50, police 60, tribute 50, land revenue 28,
education 15.
A police station at Imphal town is the centre of the whole investi-
gating agency. The civil police force consists of 19 men under
a sub-inspector. In addition to the regular police, one chaukiddr has
been appointed to every hundred houses. A battalion of military
police is kept up by the State. The Assistant to the Political Agent
acts as commandant, and the sanctioned strength is 13 native officers
and 364 non-commissioned officers and men. Thirteen outposts along
the main roads and in the hills are held by this force. There is one
jail in the valley, at Imphal.
Education has made very little progress in Manipur. At the Census
of 1 901 only 1-9 per cent, of the male population was returned as
literate. An English middle school is maintained at Imphal ; and in
1903-4 there were 29 primary schools in the State, two of which arc
located in the hills. The total number of pupils on March 31, 1904,
was 1,629. All except 46 of these were reading in primary schools.
The girls' school has recently been closed, as it was considered that
the advantages it conferred were out of all proportion to the cost of its
maintenance.
There is one hospital at Imphal town, with accommodation for 14 in-
patients. In 1904 the number of cases treated was 10,000, of which
300 were in-patients, and 400 operations were performed. The total
expenditure amounted to Rs. 4,000.
Vaccination is not compulsory, but the Kukis are the only in-
habitants of Manipur who object to the process, and even their dislike
is wearing off. The number of successful vaccinations in 1903-4
represented 58 per 1,000 of the population, which was considerably
above the proportion in Assam as a whole.
[E. W. Dunn, Abridged Gazetteer of Manipur (Calcutta, 1891);
Dr. R. Brown, Annual Report of the Manipur Political Agency for
1868-9; Sir J. Johnstone, My Experience in Manipur and the
Ndga Hills ; B. C. Allen, Gazetteer of Manipur (1905).]
Manjarabad. — Western taluk of Hassan District, Mysore, lying
between 12° 40' and 130 3' N. and 750 33' and 750 57' E., with an
area of 438 square miles. The population in 1901 was 59,304, com-
pared with 55,862 in 1891. The taluk contains one town, Sakleshpur
(population, 2,140), the head-quarters; and 277 villages. The land
revenue demand in 1903-4 was Rs. 1,78,000. The whole taluk lies
in the Malnad, and contains some of the finest scenery in Mysore,
flanked by the stupendous mountain range of the Western Ghats,
196 MANJARABAD
whose slopes are covered with magnificent forest. The Hemavati
flows through the east, and, after receiving the Aigur and Kotehalla,
turns east along the southern border* East of this river the country
is more open. Streams from the Western Ghats run west to the
Netravati in South Kanara. The soil on the hills is generally a rich
red, in the valleys red or nearly black. ' The principal cultivation is
rice, which grows luxuriantly in the valleys and on the terraces cut
on the hill-sides. The abundant rain makes irrigation unnecessary as
a rule. ' Dry ' cultivation is found to the east of the Hemavati. In
the west rdgi is grown in small patches once in two or three years,
or at longer intervals. During the past half-century coffee cultivation
has spread over the whole taluk, and through the investment of
European capital and the settlement of European planters has changed
the face of the country, revolutionizing its old feudal customs. Carda-
moms are also grown on the Ghats.
Manjeri. — Village in the Ernad taluk of Malabar District, Madras,
situated in n° 7' N. and 760 7' E. Population (1901), 4,000. It is
the head-quarters of the tahsildar, of a stationary sub-magistrate, and
of a District Munsif, and is notable as the scene, in 1849, of one of
the worst of the Mappilla outrages. The native troops sent against
the rioters were routed and Ensign Wyse was killed. Another outbreak
occurred here in 1896, when 99 fanatics were shot.
Manjha. — A tract of country in the Lahore and Amritsar Districts
of the Punjab, lying between 300 52' and 210 35' N. and 730 45' and
750 21' E., and forming a portion of the uplands of the Bari Doab.
In shape it is, roughly speaking, a triangle, whose base may be taken
as the grand trunk road crossing Lahore and Amritsar Districts from
the Ravi to the Beas, and whose sides are the high banks marking the
ancient courses of those rivers. From the point where the Beas now
joins the Sutlej, the old Beas bank diverges from the present course
of the Sutlej and approaches the old bed of the Ravi near the borders
of Montgomery District. This is the apex of the Manjha, for, though
the upland ridge is continued as far as Multan, from this point it bears
the name of the Ganji Bar. Before the construction of the Bari Doab
Canal the Manjha was an ill-watered and infertile expanse, described
by the Settlement officer of Lahore in 1854 as a jungle in which only
the poorer cereals and pulses could be grown. Now, however, the
Bari Doab Canal runs through the whole length of the tract, which is
second in fertility to none in the Province. The Sikhs of the Manjha
are some of the finest specimens of the Jat race, and the tract is one
of the most important recruiting grounds for Sikh regiments. The
expression ' Sikhs of the Manjha ' is, however, sometimes loosely used
to denote all Sikhs recruited north of the Sutlej. Punjabi of the
Manjha is the phrase used to express the dialect of Punjabi spoken
MANKACHAR 197
in and about the Manjha, as contrasted with Western Punjabi, the
Punjabi of the submontane tract, the Punjabi of the Jullundur Doab,
and Malwa Punjabi, or that spoken south of the Sutlej.
Manjhand. — Town in the Kotri taluka of Karachi District, Sind,
Bombay, situated in 250 55' N. and 68° 17' E., close to the Indus, on
the North-Western Railway, 43 miles north of Kotri. Population
(1901), 2,862. Coarse cloth and shoes are manufactured here. The
municipality, which dates from 1856, had an average income during
the decade ending 190 1 of Rs. 2,400. In 1903-4 the income was
also Rs. 2,400. The town contains one boys' school, with an average
daily attendance of 92 pupils.
Manjhanpur. — South-western tahsll of Allahabad District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Kararl and Atharban, and lying
north of the Jumna, between 250 17' and 25° 32' N. and 8o° 9' and
8i° $2' E., with an area of 272 square miles. Population fell from
131,688 in 182 1 to 129,798 in 1901. There are 269 villages and one
town, Manjhanpur (population, 3,221). The demand for land revenue
in 1903-4 was Rs. 2,38,000, and for cesses Rs. 38,000. The density
of population, 477 persons per square mile, is considerably below the
District average. A high cliff scored by deep ravines borders the
Jumna. The upland country beyond is at first sandy, but contains
small jliih used for irrigation, the largest being the Alwara jMl. The
soil then changes to the ordinary fertile loam of the Doab, where wells
supply most of the irrigation. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation
was 180 square miles, of which 51 were irrigated. The Fatehpur
branch canal supplies about one-fourth of the irrigated area ; and tanks
or jhils and wells the remainder in almost equal proportions.
Manjra. — River of Hyderabad State, rising on the plateau of
Patoda in Bhlr District. After flowing through or along the Districts
of Osmanabad, Bldar, and Medak, generally in a south-eastern direction,
it takes a sudden turn 10 miles east of Kalabgur in the last-named
District and thence flows almost due north, forming the boundary
between Nander and Indur Districts, till it joins the Godavari from
the right near Kondalwadi, after a course of 387 miles. During its
course it receives the Tirna on the right bank in the Nilanga taluk
of Bldar District, and 1 8 miles farther down, the Karanja on the same
side. In Nander two smaller streams, the Lendi and the Manar, join
it on the left bank. The banks of the Manjra are nowhere steep, and
are earthy. Several ferries are maintained, and its waters are largely
used for irrigation. Two new projects, known as the Manjra and the
Manjra Extension, which are in course of construction, comprise
extensive schemes for irrigating lands in Medak District.
Mankachar.— Trade centre in Goalpara District, Eastern Bengal
and Assam. See Maxikakchar.
1 98 MAXK. IRXACIL 1
Mankarnacha. — Highest peak in the Orissa State of Bonai, Bengal,
situated in 210 47' N. and 850 14' E., and rising to a height of 3,639
feet above sea-level.
Mankera. — Village in the Bhakkar tahsil of Mianwali District,
Punjab, situated in 310 23' N. and 710 27' E. It lies in the heart
of the Thai, the desert of the Sind-Sagar Doab. A large fort, said to
have been founded by the Sials of Jhang, still exists in the village.
Mankera was once the great stronghold of the Jaskani Baloch, who
in the beginning of the seventeenth century held the country from
the Indus to the Chenab, and from Bhakkar to Leiah on the Indus.
They appear to have lost Mankera to the Bhangi Sikhs about 1772,
but to have soon recovered it. In 1792 it became the capital of the
Pathan Nawab, Muhammad Khan Sadozai, who governed the Sind-
Sagar Doab, and subsequently also Dera, for the Durrani kings of
Kabul, Bhakkar being his second capital. Muhammad Khan gradually
became independent, and was not molested by the Sikhs ; but after
his death in 181 5 RanjTt Singh invaded his territories, and in 1821
look Mankera by siege. Mankera then became the seat of a Sikh
governor, and at the annexation of the Punjab was made the head-
quarters of a tahsil till 1853-4.
Manki. — Village in the Honavar taluka of North Kanara District,
Bombay, situated in 140 n' N. and 740 32' E. Population (1901),
6,co8. The remains of several Jain temples point to the fact that
Jain influence was formerly paramount in Manki, while several in-
scriptions show that the place was once of considerable importance.
A dilapidated fort on the coast is traditionally reported to have been
the former stronghold of the Karagars (now a degraded class) ; but
more probably it was held on behalf of the rulers of Vijayanagar by
the Sheorogars, a class claiming Kshattriya descent, who arc more
numerous in Manki than in any other part of the District. After the
fall of Vijayanagar, Manki was possessed by the chiefs of Bednur and
eventually passed into the hands of Hyder All. The downfall of
Tipu added it with the rest of Kanara to British territory. Manki
contains three old Hindu temples of uncertain date. It formerly
possessed a large export trade in rice, raw sugar, and coco-nuts ; but
at present the annual imports amount to only Rs. 1,270 and the
exports to Rs. 180.
Mankur. — Village in the head-quarters subdivision of Burdwan
District, Bengal, situated in 230 26' N. and 870 34' E. Population
(1901), 7,206. Mankur is a station on the chord-line of the East
Indian Railway, 90 miles from Calcutta, and has a considerable trade ;
it is also a local seat of the silk-weaving industry. The Church
Missionary Society maintains a medical mission, at which rr,ooo
patients were treated in 1901.
MANNARGUD1 TOWN 199
Manmad. — Town in the Chandor tdluka of Nasik District, Bombay,
situated in 200 15' N. and 740 26' E., on the north-eastern line of the
Great Indian Peninsula Railway. Population (1901), 7,113. Manmad
is the junction of the Dhond-Manmad State Railway with the Great
Indian Peninsula Railway, and also the starting-point of a metre-gauge
railway to Hyderabad. Much cotton from Khandesh and Malegaon
is carried by rail here. A remarkable pyramidal hill near Manmad,
about 750 feet high, is notable for a tall, obelisk-like rock on its
summit, at least 60 feet high, known locally as Ram-gulhni. At the
back of this hill are the peaks known as Ankai and Tankai. The
town contains an English school and two dispensaries, one of which
is maintained by the Great Indian Peninsula Railway.
Mannargudi Subdivision. — Subdivision of Tanjore District,
Madras, consisting of the taluks of Mannargudi and TiRurrrR-
AIPPUNDI.
Mannargudi Taluk. — Central taluk of Tanjore District, Madras,
lying between io° 26' and io° 48' N. and 790 19' and 790 38' E., with
an area of 301 square miles. The population in 1901 was 1S8. 107 :
and this has remained practically stationary since 1891, when it was
188,112. It contains 193 villages, besides the municipal town of
Mannargudi (population, 20,449), tne head-quarters. The demand
for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 6,28,000.
The south-western part of the taluk is unirrigated, while the remainder
lies within the Cauvery delta, though it contains no alluvial soil.
Mannargudi Town (also called Mannarkovil or Raja Mannar-
kovil).— Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in Tanjore
District, Madras, situated in to0 40' N. and 790 27' E., on the bank
of the Pamaniyar river, 9 miles south of the railway station of Xlda-
mangalam. The population in 1901 was 20,449, °f whom 651 were
Musalmans, 540 Christians, and 153 Jains, the rest being Hindus.
This is one of the centres of the Wesleyan Mission, which maintains
a second-grade college, called the Findlay College, affiliated to the
Madras University in 1898. The average attendance in the advanced
classes during 1903-4 was 58, and in the lower classes 533. In
addition, a high school is maintained by private agency. Mannargudi
was constituted a municipality in 1866. The receipts and expenditure
during the ten years ending 1902-3 averaged Rs. 27,000, and in
1903-4 amounted to Rs. 29,000. The chief sources of income are
tolls, and house and land taxes. A channel from the Vadavar, about
1 2 miles long, supplies twenty-two tanks in the town with good water.
Mannargudi is noted for the manufacture of metal ware and cloths,
and exports rice in large quantities. Of the many temples in the town,
the most important is that to Rajagopalaswami, which was founded by
Kulottunga Chola I in the eleventh century. Two other shrines bear
2oo MANNARGUDI TOWN
Chola names and inscriptions of Chola, Pandya, and Hoysala kings.
Mannargudi itself was formerly called Rajadhiraja Chaturvedimangalam,
obviously a name of Chola origin. An old Jain temple stands in the
town, and a mile to the west is a ruined fort said to have been built by
a Hoysala king.
Manne. — Village in the Nelamangala taluk of Bangalore District,
Mysore, situated in 13° 15' N. and 770 18' E. Population (1901),
748. Under the name of Manyapura it was the residence of the
Ganga kings in the eighth century. It was taken by the Cholas at
the beginning of the eleventh century. The city is said to have
extended over 8 miles to the east, but only some ruins of temples now
remain.
Manohar (Manohargarli). — Fort in the State of Savantvadi,
Bombay, situated in 160 N. and 740 i' E., 14 miles north-east of Vadi,
and on the south of the Rangna pass. Manohar is a solid mass of
rock about 2,500 feet high, said to have been fortified since the time
of the Pandavas. In the disturbances of 1844 the garrison of Manohar
espoused the cause of the Kolhapur insurgents. In the beginning of
1845 the fort was taken by General Delamotte.
Manoharpur. — Chief town of an estate of the same name in the
Sawai Jaipur nizamat of the State of Jaipur, Rajputana, situated in
270 18' N. and 750 57' E., about 28 miles north-by-north-east of
Jaipur city. The holder of the estate is termed Rao, and serves the
Darbar with 65 horsemen. The population in 1901 was 5,032. The
town contains a fort, and a primary school attended by 60 boys.
Manoli. — Town in the Parasgad taluka of Belgaum District, Bom-
bay, situated in 150 51' N. and 750 7' E., 42 miles east of Belgaum town.
Population (1901), 5,308. Manoli had a once considerable, but now
declining, industry in dyeing yarns. It is famous as the spot where
General Wellesley, afterwards the Duke of Wellington, overtook the
notorious freebooter Dhind-deva Wagh (better known as Dhundia),
after a long pursuit from Mysore territory. The freebooter with his
followers had encamped on the banks of the river Malprabha, opposite
the town, where he was surprised by General Wellesley at the head
of a body of cavalry. The town contains eight temples dedicated to
Panchalinga Deo, built of coarse-grained stone, without any remarkable
carving ; and a ruined fort. There is a boys' school with 97 pupils.
Manora. — Cape in Karachi District, Sind, Bombay, situated in
240 48' N. and 66° 59' E. A lighthouse on the cape, with a fixed
light 148 feet above high water, is visible upwards of 20 miles, but only
from 10 to 15 miles during the south-west monsoon. Manora forms
a cantonment, and contains the Persian Gulf Telegraph department
cable factory and a recently constructed dry dock, known as the Giles
Graving Dock. The Karachi Port and Pilot establishments, the
MAN PUR 20 1
Port Officer and Port Engineer, and a portion of the Indo-European
Telegraph establishment are resident here. An annual fair is held in
March in honour of a pir or saint, said to have been buried under
miraculous circumstances. Manora hill is a very healthy place, and
an occasional resort for invalids from Karachi ; it is roo feet high at
its east end, descending to 40 feet at the west end. At the distance of
2,310 feet to the east of Manora is a breakwater, which forms the
protection of the entrance to Karachi harbour in that direction.
Opposite the north end of this breakwater is the landing-place, with
three jetties on the island of Kiamari : the Commissariat, the Passenger,
and the Customs jetty. About 3 miles from the jetties is an island, on
which is a meteorological observatory. There are fortifications and
barracks, a dispensary, and a middle school for European and Eurasian
girls at Manora Point. The entire peninsula has now been constituted
a cantonment.
Manpur. — An isolated British pargana in Central India, situated in
the Bhopawar Agency. The pargana, which has an area of 60 square
miles, is bounded on the north, south, and east by portions of the
Indore State, and on the west by the petty holding of Jamnia. It lies
on the edge of the Vindhyan scarp, and is intersected by numerous
spurs of that range, covered with jungle. In the valleys the soil is
of high fertility. The climate is temperate, the temperature ranging
between ioo° and 720. The annual rainfall averages t,^ inches.
Manpur was originally a part of the Mandu sarkar of the Sub ah of
Malwa. In the eighteenth century it fell to Sindhia. In 1844 Manpur
was included in the tracts assigned by Sindhia for the maintenance
of the Gwalior Contingent, and under the subsequent treaty of 1S60
it was one of the districts of which possession was retained by the
British Government.
Population fell from 5,342 in 1891 to 4,890 in 1901, Hindus forming
53 per cent, and Animists 37 per cent, of the total. The inhabitants
consist mainly of Bhils, a fact not entirely brought out by the census
figures, as many were returned as Hindus. Native Christians numbered
241, chiefly belonging to the Roman Catholic Mission station at
Khurda.
Of the total area, 11 square miles, or 18 per cent., are cultivated,
of which only 332 acres are irrigated. About 15 square miles, or
25 per cent, of the total area, are capable of cultivation ; 30 square
miles, or 50 per cent., are under forest : and the rest is waste. Maize
occupies 7 square miles, jowdr and wheat 2 square miles each, and
poppy 127 acres.
The pargana is in charge of a ka/nasdar, who exercises the powers of
a third-class magistrate. All civil cases and serious crimes are dealt
with by the Political Agent. The total revenue is Rs. 19,800, of which
202 MANPUR
Rs. 12,500 is derived from land, Rs. 3,500 from forests, and Rs. 2,800
from excise. The chief heads of expenditure are: Rs. 4,700 on the
collection of revenue, Rs. 1,900 on administrative establishment, and
Rs. r,6oo on public works. The land is assessed in two classes, lower
rates being given to the Bhil cultivators as an inducement to settle.
A twenty years' settlement of seven villages was made in 1867, which
was renewed in 1887 for the whole pargana and extended to the
remaining villages. The Bhil rates are Rs. 8-8 per acre for irrigated
and Rs. 1-12 to R. 0-6-4 f°r unirrigated land; other cultivators
pay Rs. 12 for irrigated and Rs. 1-8 to R, 0-11-2 for unirrigated land.
The incidence of the land revenue demand is Rs. 2-5 per acre of
cultivated land, and R. 0-11-2 per acre of the total area. The revenue
is collected in cash in British currency, which has been legal tender
since 1861. The pargana is watched by a detachment of the Central
India Agency police. Two schools, one at Manpur village and the
other at Sherpur, are situated in the pargana.
Manpur, the head-quarters of the pargana, is situated in 220 26' N.
and 750 40' E., on the Bombay-Agra high road, 13 miles from Mhow
and 24 from Indore. Population (1901), 1,748. The place is said to
derive its name from Raja Man Singh of Jaipur. The story goes that,
after suffering a defeat, certain Rajputs of Man Singh's army were
ashamed to return home, and settled in the district, where they founded
Manpur, and called it after their chief. Forming connexions, as time
went on, with the Bhil women of the neighbourhood, they lost caste
and became merged in the general population. The Bhils of Manpur
claim a mixed descent equal to that of the Bhilala, and consider them-
selves superior to other Bhils. A British post office, the residence of
the Political Agent, a school, a dispensary, and a public works inspection
bungalow are situated in the place.
Mansa State. — Petty State in MahI Kantha, Bombay.
Mansa Town. — Chief town of the State of the same name in the
MahI Kantha Agency, Bombay, situated in 230 26' N. and 720 43' E.
Population (1901), 9,530. It has a large and wealthy community of
merchants, and is considered the richest town in MahI Kantha.
Mansehra Tahsll (Mdnsahra). — Tahsil of Hazara District, North-
West Frontier Province, lying between 34° 14' and 350 ro" N. and
7 20 55' and 740 6' E., with an area of 1,486 square miles. Shaped like
a cone, the tahsll runs in a north-easterly direction, comprising the
deep glen of Kagan and the mountain ranges on either hand. The
population in 1901 was 182,396, compared with 165,312 in 1891.
The tahsll contains the town of Baffa (population, 7,029) and 244
villages, including the large village of Mansehra, its head-quarters.
The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 1,03,000.
The Agror valley is situated in this tahsll.
MAN WAT 203
Mansehra Village (Mdnsahra). — Headquarters of the tahsil of the
same name, Hazara District, North-West Frontier Province, situated in
340 20' N. and 730 13' E., on the right bank of an affluent of the Siran,
north of Abbottabad, and on the main road from Kala-kl-Sarai to the
Kashmir border. Population (1901), 5,087. A few resident Khattri
traders do a considerable business in grain and country produce. The
chief institutions are an Anglo-vernacular middle " school maintained
by the District board, and a Government dispensary. Near the village
are two rocks on which are inscribed in the KharoshthI character
thirteen of the edicts of Asoka.
Manthani. — Head-quarters of the Mahadeopur taluk, Karimnagar
District, Hyderabad Slate, situated in 180 39' N. and 790 40' E., about
one mile south of the Godavari river. Population (1901), 6,680. The
town contains a dispensary, a school, and a post office.
Manu. — River of Assam which rises in the State of Hill Tippera,
and, after flowing in a tortuous north-westerly course through Sylhet
District, falls into the Kusiyara branch of the Surma a little to the east
of Bahadurpur. Almost the whole of its course in the plains lies
through cultivated land, and it is largely used for the carriage of forest
produce of all kinds, tea, rice, and oilseeds. Boats of 4 tons burden
can proceed as far as the frontier of Hill Tippera in the rainy season,
but during the dry season traffic is carried on in vessels of lighter
draught. The river passes a large number of local centres of trade, the
most important of which are Lalbag and Maulavi Bazar. A little to
the east of the latter place it receives a considerable tributary, the
Dholai. The total length of the river is 135 miles.
Manvi Taluk. — Taluk in Raichur District, Hyderabad State.
Including jaglrs, the population in 1901 was 70,773, and the area
573 square miles, while the population was 58,828 in 1891. It con-
tained one town, Manvi (population, 6,253), the head-quarters ; and
140 villages, of which 3 were jaglr. In 1905 part of the Yergara taluk
was incorporated in Manvi. It is separated from the Madras District
of Kurnool in the south by the Tungabhadra river. The land revenue
in 1901 was 2 lakhs. The soil is chiefly regar or alluvial.
Manvi Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in
Raichur District, Hyderabad State, situated in 150 59" N. and
770 3' E. Population (1901), 6,253. It contains temples of
Marothi, Ramasimha, and Venkateshwara, and a Jama Masjid.
Opposite the temple of Marothi, which is erected on a hill to the
west of the town, is a large block of stone bearing a length)- Kanarese
inscription. Another stone bearing an inscription stands near a well
in the fort, which is now in ruins.
Manwat. — Town in the Pathri taluk of Parbhani District, Hyder-
abad State, situated in 190 18' N. and 760 30' E., live miles south of
VOL. XVII. o
2o4 MAN WAT
the Hyderabad-Godavari Valley Railway. Population (1901), 7,395.
It is a busy centre of the grain trade, and contains a State post office,
a British sub-post office, and four schools.
Maodon. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 296, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 1,490. The principal products are millet, oranges,
areca-nuts, pineapples, and bay leaves. Deposits of lime and coal
exist in the State, but are not worked.
Maoflang. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 947, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 145. The principal products are millet, rice, coal,
and potatoes.
Maoiang.— Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 1,856, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 300. The principal products are potatoes, millet, and
honey. Lime and iron are found in the State, but are not worked.
Maolong. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 1,472, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 1,800. The principal products are oranges, millet,
areca-nuts, and pineapples. There is some trade in lime, and the
coal-mines of the State have been leased to a company for thirty
vcars.
Maosanram. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 1,414, and the gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 2,930. The principal products are potatoes, millet,
and honey. Lime, coal, and iron are found in the State, but are not
worked.
Mapuca. — Chief town in Bardez District, Goa, Portuguese India,
situated in 150 36" N. and 730 52' E., about 8 miles north of Panjim.
Population (1900), 10,733. Mapuca was celebrated in ancient times
for the great weekly fair on Fridays. It takes its name, according
to some, from map, ' measure,' and sa, ' to fill up," that is, the place
of measuring or selling goods. It is now one of the most important
commercial places in the territory of Goa. The church, dedicated to
Our Lady of Miracles, was built in 1594, and is held in great venera-
tion not only by Christian converts but also by Hindus. On the feast
of Our Lady of Miracles men of every class and creed come in crowds,
bringing offerings to the Virgin. On the same occasion a fair is
held, which lasts five days. Besides the church, Mapuca contains six
chapels, an asylum for the poor and destitute, a town hall, and a jail.
To the west of Mapuca are military barracks, where a regiment was
stationed from 1841 to 187 1, when it was disbanded. The barracks
arc now occupied by the police force, post office, and schools.
Marahra (or Madura). — Town in the District and tahsil of Etah,
MARBLE ROCKS 205
United Provinces, situated in 270 44' N. and 780 35' E., on the
Cawnpore-Achhnera Railway. Population (1901), 8,622. The Musal-
man residents, who form more than half the total population, have
great influence throughout the District. The name is said to be
derived from the mythical destruction of a former village {mar,
'killing,' and hara, 'green,' i.e. jungle). During Akbar's reign the
town was the head-quarters of a dastur. In the eighteenth century it
belonged to the Saiyids of Barha in Muzaffarnagar, and then passed to
the Nawabs of Earrukhabad and of Oudh. The town is scattered and
of poor appearance, but contains the ruins of two seventeenth-century
tombs, and another tomb and a beautiful mosque built in 1729 and
1732 respectively. There is also a dispensary. Marahra was a muni-
cipality from 1872 to 1904, with an income and expenditure of about
Rs. 5,000, chiefly derived from octroi. It has now been constituted
a 'notified area,' and octroi has been abolished. The trade is entirely
local, but glass bangles are made. Marahra contains four schools with
100 pupils, and a small branch of the Aligarh College.
Marang Bum. — Hill on the edge of the plateau of Hazaribagh
District, Bengal, situated in 230 ^ N. and 850 27' E., on the
boundary line between Hazaribagh and Ranch! Districts. It rises
2,400 feet above the valley of the Damodar and 3,445 feet above
sea-level. It is an object of peculiar veneration to the Mundas,
who regard Marang Bum as the god of rainfall, and appeal to him
in times of drought or epidemic sickness.
Marble Rocks. — The well-known gorge of the Narbada river,
in Jubbulpore District, Central Provinces, situated in 230 8' X. and
790 48' E., near the village of Bheraghat, 13 miles from Jubbulpore
city by road, and 3 miles from Mirganj station on the Great Indian
Peninsula Railway. The river here winds in a deep narrow stream
through rocks of magnesian limestone 100 feet high, giving an ex-
tremely picturesque effect, especially by moonlight. One place where
the rocks approach very closely is called the Monkey's Leap. Indra
is said to have made this channel for the waters of the pent-up
stream, and the footprints left on the rock by the elephant of the
god still receive adoration. The greatest height of the rocks above
water-level is 105 feet, and the depth of water at the same place
48 feet, but the basin near the travellers' bungalow is 169 feet deep.
On a hill beside the river are some curious remains of statuary. A
modern temple is surrounded by a high circular wall of much more
ancient date, against the inside of which is built a veranda supported
by columns set at regular intervals. The pilasters built against the
wall opposite each of the pillars divide the wall space into panels,
and in each of these on a pedestal is a life-sized image of a god,
goddess, &c, lor the most part in a very mutilated condition. Most
o 2
206 MARBLE ROCKS
of the figures are four-armed goddesses, and the name of the temple
is the Chaunsath Jogini, or 'sixty-four female devotees.' The statues
have symbols in the shape of various animals carved on their pedestals.
Bheraghat is sacred as the junction of the little stream of the Saras-
watl with the Narbada; and a large religious fair takes place here
in November for bathing in the Narbada, the attendance on the
principal day being about 40,000. The marble obtained from these
rocks is coarse grained and suitable only for building stone. It is
very hard and chips easily, and is therefore not well adapted for
statuary. The colours found are canary, pink, white, grey, and
black. Soapstone or French chalk is found in pockets in the bed
of the Narbada.
Mardan Tahsil. — Tahsil oi Peshawar District, North-West Frontier
Province, lying between 34° 5' and 340 32' N. and 710 49' and
7 20 24' E., in the centre of the part of the District which lies north
of the Kabul river, with an area of 610 square miles. It comprises
the greater portion of the Yusufzai plain, and with the Swabi tahsil
forms the Yusufzai subdivision of Peshawar District. The population
in 1901 was 137,215, compared with 113,877 in 1891. It contains
the cantonment of Mardan (3,572) and 130 villages, including Hoti
and Rustam. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted
to Rs. 1,76,000.
Mardan Town. — Cantonment in Peshawar District, North-West
Frontier Province, and permanent head-quarters of the Queen's Own
Corps of Guides. It is also the head-quarters of the Mardan tahsil
and the Yusufzai subdivision. Population (1901), 3,572. The can-
tonment is situated in -340 12' N. and 720 2' E., on the right bank
of the Kalpani river, 33 miles north-east of Peshawar and 15 miles
north of Naushahra, on the North-Western Railway. The fort was
built by Hodson of the Guides in 1854. The civil lines lie in the
southern part of the cantonment on the Naushahra road, and contain
the Assistant Commissioner's bungalow, court-house, tahsill, Govern-
ment dispensary, and other public offices. An Anglo-vernacular
middle school is maintained by the District board. The village of
Hoti, from which the station is sometimes called Hoti Mardan, lies
2 miles from the cantonment.
Margao. — Town in Salsette district, Goa, Portuguese India, situated
in 1 50 18' N. and 740 1' E., in a beautiful plain in the centre of the
district, on the bank of the Sal river, and about 16 miles south-east
of Panjim. It is a station on the West of India Portuguese Railway.
Population (1900), 12,126. Margao, according to tradition, was one
of the early seats of the Aryan settlers of Goa, and the site of the
chief math or convent, whence its name Mathagrama, or ' the village
of the convent,' corrupted into Margao. Though for some time
MARTAHU 207
exposed to the incursions of Muhammadans and Marathas, Margao
was inhabited by many rich families. Of late many public and private
buildings have been erected. Christianity was introduced into Margao
in 1560, and the first church was built in 1565. The Jesuits in 1574
built a college, which was subsequently removed to Rachol, a village
about 6 miles north-east. Margao contains a town hall, Government
schools, a theatre, and an asylum. The military barracks, built in
181 r, were formerly occupied by a regiment, but at present by the
police, a small military detachment, and the post office. From Margao
a good road leads south to Karwar, the chief town of the adjacent
British District of North Kanara, distant 44 miles.
Margherita. — Village in the Dibrugarh subdivision of Lakhimpur
District, Eastern Bengal and Assam, situated in 270 17' N. and
950 47' E., on the left bank of the Buri Dihing river. Margherita
lies at the foot of the Patkai range, and is surrounded on every side
by forest. The village owes its prosperity to the coal-mines in the
neighbourhood. The coal measures consist of beds of alternating
shales, coal, and sandstones, and are known as the Makum field.
Five mines have been opened — the Tikak, Upper Ledo, Ledo Valley,
Tirap, and Namdang— which in 1903 gave employment to r,2oo
coolies working under 9 Europeans. The output in that year was
239,000 tons. The coal is on the whole fairly hard and compact,
but after extraction and exposure to the air it breaks up into small
pieces. Mining is conducted on the 'square or panel' system, a
modification of the system known in England as ' pillar and stall.'
Margherita is connected with Dibrugarh by the Dibru-Sadiya Railway,
which crosses the Dihing river by a fine bridge. The Coal Company
has opened a large pottery, in which bricks, pipes, and tiles are made.
A police station and stockade are held by military police in the
vicinity. The weekly market is much frequented by the hill tribes,
who bring down rubber, amber, wax, and vegetables.
Mari. — Village in the District and tahsil of Mianwali, Punjab,
situated in 7,2° 57' N. and 710 39' E., on the east bank of the Indus.
Population (1901), 1,490. Mari is the terminus of a branch line
of the North-Western Railway, and serves as a depot for the salt
and alum of Kalabagh. Near it are the ruins of several Hindu
temples, similar to those at Kafirkot in Dera Ismail Khan, but
larger and better preserved.
Mariahu. — Southern tahsil of Jaunpur District, United Provinces,
comprising the pargana of Mariahu and tappets BarsathI and Gopalpur,
and lying between 250 24' and 250 44' N. and 820 24' and 820 44' E.,
with an area of 321 square miles. Population fell from 253,402
m 1891 to 243,792 in 1901. There are 676 villages and only one
town, Mariahu (population, 3,626), the tahsil head-quarters. The
208 MARTAHV
demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 3,21,000, and for cesses
Rs. 44,000. The density of population, 759 persons per square mile,
is slightly below the District average. Mariahu is divided into two
nearly equal portions by the Basuhl river, while the Sai and Barna
form its north-eastern and southern boundaries. The area under culti-
vation in 1903-4 was 212 square miles, of which 116 were irrigated.
There are about 1,200 small tanks; but wells are by far the most
important source of irrigation.
Markandi. — Village in the Garhchiroll tahsil of Chanda District,
Central Provinces, situated in 190 41' N. and 790 50' E., 56 miles
south-east of Chanda town hy road. Population (1901), 211. The
village stands on a bluff overlooking the Wainganga, and is remarkable
for an extremely picturesque group of temples. They are enclosed
in a quadrangle 196 feet by 118, and there are about twenty of dif-
ferent sizes and in different stages of preservation. They are richly and
elaborately sculptured, and are assigned to the tenth and eleventh
centuries. The wall surrounding them is of a primitive type, and
probably much older. The largest and most elaborate temple is that
of Markanda Rishi. There are also some curious square pillars
sculptured with figures of soldiers, and probably more ancient than
the temples. A religious fair is held annually at Markandi in February
and March, lasting for about a month. The great day of the fair
is the Sivaratri festival, when the attendance amounts to 10,000
persons.
Markapur Subdivision. — Subdivision of Kurnool District, Madras,
consisting of the Markapur and Cumbum taluks.
Markapur Taluk. — North-eastern taluk of Kurnool District,
Madras, lying between 150 37' and 160 18' N. and 780 50' and
790 34' E., with an area of 1,140 square miles. The population
in 1901 was 94,293, compared with 99,971 in 1891; the density
is only 83 persons per square mile. It contains 76 villages, 12 of
which are 'whole indmsJ Most of these latter are uninhabited.
The demand for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to
Rs. 1,13,000, which is lower than in any other taluk in the District.
This tlluk and Cumbum are situated to the east of the Nallamalais,
which separate them from the rest of the District, and their physical
aspects are very different from those of their neighbours. The greater
part of Markapur is hilly. Several low ranges intersect it : and down
the valleys formed by these flow the chief rivers, namely, the Duv-
valeru, the Ralla Vagu, the Tlgaleru, and the Kandleru, which drain
the taluk and flow into the Gundlakamma river. The soil is mostly
rocky and gravelly, about 89 per cent, being red earth of a poor
description. There are great natural facilities for impounding rain-
water in tanks ; but owing to the sparseness of population and the
MARMAGAO 209
consequent dearth of labour, ' wet ' cultivation is not popular and
the tank projects are unremunerative. The taluk contains the largest
number of wells in the District, and nearly two-thirds of its irrigated
area is watered from these sources. The very large extent of 'reserved'
forests (557 square miles) affords ample grazing ground for cattle and
sheep, for which Markapur is noted. The cattle of the coast Districts
of Nellore and Guntur are driven to the Nallamalais to graze during
the hot season. The climate in the western half of the taluk bordering
upon the Nallamalais is unhealthy, but that of the eastern half is
comparatively salubrious. The annual rainfall averages 25 inches.
Marmagao. — Peninsula, village, and port in Salsette district, Goa,
Portuguese India, and the terminus of the West of India Portuguese
Railway, situated in 150 25' N. and 730 47' E. The peninsula of
Marmagao is situated on the southern side of the harbour of Goa,
on the left bank of the Zuari river, and is connected with the mainland
by a narrow strip of sand about a quarter of a mile broad, and elevated
about 10 feet above the sea. The whole peninsula is composed of
laterite, and the shore is fringed with heavy boulders, which have
crumbled and fallen from the cliff. The summit of the peninsula is
a table-land, about 180 to 200 feet high, composed of bare laterite
covered with loose stones, with patches of grass. The slopes of the
hill, which are steep, and present a bold appearance seaward, are
covered with thick jungle and scruh.
The village and port of Marmagao are situated at the eastern
extremity of the peninsula, about 5 miles south of Panjim. Population
(1900), 750, mostly Christians. In the last half of the seventeenth
century the Portuguese Viceroy, the Count of Alvor, resolved to
abandon Goa, and transfer the seat of the government to the peninsula
of Marmagao. In 1684-5 the foundations of a new capital were laid
and the work progressed favourably. In 1 686 the works were stopped
by his successor. During the next fifteen years orders were repeatedly
received from Portugal to demolish the public buildings of Goa, and
to apply the materials to the construction of new ones at Marmagao,
while the Viceroys were directed to transfer their residence to that
place. During the Viceroyalty of Caetano de Mello e Castro, the
works were pushed on with vigour, and several buildings were com-
pleted, among which may be mentioned the palace and the hospital.
The Viceroy himself resided at Marmagao for a few months in 1703.
Suddenly the works were stopped by a royal letter of March S. 1712.
In 1739, when Goa was in danger of falling into the hands of the
Marathas, the nuns and other helpless members of the population
sought refuge at Marmagao.
The Government buildings are now mere heaps of ruin. The only
relic of importance is a fine old church. The fortress ha>< been
2 to MARMAGAO
converted into an hotel. In anticipation of the trade which, it is
hoped, will be developed, now that goods can be shipped direct from
Marmagao to Europe, measures have been taken to improve the
harbour. Since 1903 the management of the port, as well as of
the railway, has been entrusted to the Southern Mahratta Railway
Company. The imports in the year 1903-4, by sea and land,
amounted to close on 35 lakhs, while the exports were valued at
ir lakhs.
Marot. — Ancient fort in the Khairpur tahsil of Bahawalpur State,
Punjab, situated in 290 ior N. and 720 28' E., on the south bank of the
Hakra depression. It was probably erected by Mahriit, king of Chitor,
an opponent of Chach, the Brahman usurper of the throne of Sind.
It was a place of some importance in the early Muhammadan period,
lying on the direct road from Multan to Delhi via Sarsuti (Sirsa). It
was wrested by the Nawab of Bahawalpur from Jaisalmer in 1749.
Marri. — Tahsil and town in Rawalpindi District, Punjab. See
Murree.
Marri-Bugti Country. — A tribal area in Baluchistan, controlled
from Sibi District, lying between 280 26' and 300 4' N. and 670 55'
and 690 48' E., with an area of 7,129 square miles. The northern
part, the area of which is 3,268 square miles, is occupied by the Marris,
and the southern part, 3,861 square miles, by the Bugtis. The country
is situated at the southern end of the Sulaiman range. It is hilly,
barren, and inhospitable, and supplies are scarce. Here and there are
good pasture grounds, and a few valleys and plains are gradually being
brought under cultivation. The valleys and plateaux include Nisau
(3,000 feet), Jant All (2,847 f"eet)> Kahan (2,353 feet)> Mawand
(2,620 feet), and Marav (2,195 fee0- The rainfall is scanty and is
chiefly received in July.
The Marris and Bugtis are the strongest Baloch tribes in the
Province. The total population of their hills was 38,919 in 1901, or
about five persons to the square mile. The Marris, including those
living in the British tahsil oi Kohlu, numbered 19,161, with 140 Hindus
and 1,090 other persons living under their protection (hamsdyah). The
population of the Bugti country amounted to 18,528, comprising 15,159
Bugtis, 272 Hindus, 708 hamsayahs, and 2,389 maretds or servile
dependants. The population are essentially nomadic in their habits,
and live in mat huts. The total number of permanent villages
decreased from eight in 1901 to five in 1904; the most important
are Kahan (population, about 400) in the Marri country, and Dera
Bugti (population, about 1,500) in the Bugti country.
Both tribes are organized on a system suitable to the predatory
transactions in which they were generally engaged in former times.
Starting from a small nucleus, each gradually continued to absorb
MARRI-BUGTI COUNTRY 21 r
various elements, often of alien origin, which participated in the
common good and ill, until a time arrived when it was found necessary
to divide the overgrown bulk of the tribe into clans (takkar), the clans
into sections {phalli), and the sections into sub-sections {para or firka).
At the head of the tribe is the chief {tumandar), with whom are asso-
ciated the heads of clans {mukaddam) as a consultative council. Each
section has its wadera, with whom is associated a mukaddam, who acts
as the wadera1 s executive officer and communicates with the motabars
or headmen of sub-sections. Each tribe was thus completely equipped
for taking the offensive. In pre-British days a share of all plunder,
known as pa?ijot/i, was set aside for the chief; headmen of clans then
received their portion, and the remainder was divided among those
who had taken part in an expedition. Side by side with this system
there still exists, among the Marris and the Pairozani Nothani clan of
the Bugtis, a system of periodical division of all tribal land. The
three important clans of the Marris are the Gaznis (8,100), to whom
the Bahawalanzai or chief's section belongs ; the Loharani-Shirani
(6,400); and the Bijrani (4,700). The Bugtis include the clans of
Pairozani Nothani (4,700), Durragh Nothani (1,800), Khalpar (1,500),
Massori (2,900), Mondrani (500), Shambani (2,900), and Raheja (880).
The chief's section belongs to the latter. The chiefs levy no revenue,
but usually receive a sheep or a goat from each flock when visiting
different parts of their country.
The early history of both tribes is obscure. The Marris are known
to have driven out the Kupchanis and Hasnis, while the Bugtis
conquered the Buledis. Owing to the great poverty of their country,
both tribes were continuously engaged in plunder and carried their
predatory expeditions far into the adjoining regions. They came in
contact with the British during the first Afghan War, when a force
under Major Billamore penetrated their hills. In April, 1840, a small
detachment was sent, under Captain Lewis Brown, to occupy Kahan
and guard the flank of the lines of communication with Afghanistan ;
but it was invested for five months and two attempts at relief were
beaten off. The fort was, however, only surrendered after a safe
retreat had been secured from Doda Khan, the Marri chief. In 1845
Sir Charles Napier conducted a campaign against the Bugtis, who fled
to the Khetrans, and the expedition was only a qualified success.
General John Jacob, after much trouble with both tribes, but especially
with the Bugtis, settled some of the latter on irrigated lands in Sind
in 1847, but many of them shortly afterwards fled to their native hills.
Both tribes were subsidized by the Khan of Kalat after the treaty of
1854; but in 1859 Mir Khudadad Khan was obliged to make an
expedition against the Marris, accompanied by Major (afterwards
Sir Henry) Green. Another unsuccessful campaign followed in 1S62.
212 MARR1-BUGTI COUNTRY
Anarchy ensued; and in 1867 Captain (afterwards Sir Robert) Sande-
man, then Deputy-Commissioner of Dera Ghazi Khan, entered into
direct relations with them and took some of them into the service of
Government. The result of the Mithankot conference, which took
place between Punjab and Sind officials in 1871, was to place
Sandeman in political control of the Marri-Bugti country under the
orders of the Superintendent, Upper Sind Frontier.
On the establishment of the Baluchistan Agency in 1877, British
relations with the Marris and Bugtis became closer, and service and
allowances were given to them. The Bugtis have throughout behaved
well. The Marris, in August, 1880, plundered a convoy marching
along the Harnai route and killed 42 men, whereupon a punitive
expedition was dispatched under General Sir Charles Macgregor, to
whom the Marri chief and his headmen tendered their submission.
They paid Rs. 1,25,000 in cash, out of a fine of Rs. 1,75,000 inflicted
on them, and agreed to surrender half of the revenue of the Kuat-
Mandai valley until the balance of Rs. 50,000 had been paid off.
Since then the Marris have given little trouble, with the exception
of the part they took in the Sunari outrage in 1896, when they
killed 11 men, and some unrest which occurred in 1898 and ulti-
mately ended in the son of the Marri chief emigrating temporarily
to Afghanistan.
Both tribes are under the control of the Political Agent in Sibi, with
the Extra-Assistant Commissioner of the Sibi subdivision in subordinate
charge. Direct interference in the internal affairs of the tribes is, so
far as possible, avoided, the chiefs being left to decide all such cases
in consultation with their sectional headmen and in accordance with
tribal custom. The task of the Political officers is chiefly confined
to the settlement of intertribal cases either between the Marris and
Bugtis themselves, whose relations are frequently strained, or with the
neighbouring tribes of Loralai District and the Punjab. A code of
penalties for the infliction of particular injuries, such as murder, the
loss of an eye or tooth, Szc, was drawn up between the Marris and
Bugtis in 1897, and is followed in ordinary circumstances. Cases of
extraordinary importance are referred to the Shahi jirga, and the
Political Agent sees that the award is carried out. Large services
have been given to both tribes, to enable the chiefs to secure control
over their followers. The Marri tribal service consists of 1 head-
man, 206 mounted levies, 5 footmen, and 8 clerks and menials ; 35 of
these men are stationed at seven posts in Loralai District and 109 at
thirteen posts in the Administered area of Sibi District. The re-
mainder hold three posts in the Marri country. The total monthly
cost amounts to Rs. 5,600. The Bugti service includes 3 head-
men, 136 mounted levies, 4 footmen, and 6 clerks, costing Rs. 3.800
MASAR 213
monthly. The posts on the south of the Bugti country are controlled
from the Naslrabad tahsll.
Marriw. — Petty State in the Khasi Hills, Eastern Bengal and
Assam. The population in 1901 was 2,289, an<^ tne gross revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 380. The principal products are rice, millet, and
maize. Lime is found in the State, but is not worked.
Martaban. — Ancient Talaing capital in Thaton District, Lower
Burma. See Thaton District.
Marutvamalai. — Isolated hill, forming the southernmost extremity
of the Western Ghats, in the Agastlswaram taluk of Travancore State,
Madras, situated in 8° 8' N. and 770 35' E., about 5 miles north-west
of Cape Comorin. Tradition regards it as having been dropped from
the Oshadhi Parvatam, or ' medicine hill,' while this latter was being
taken by Hanuman from the Himalayas to cure the wound of Laksh-
mana sustained during the battle with Ravana's forces. It is still
believed to be the abode of sages and to contain many species of rare
medicinal herbs.
Marwar. — Another name for the Jodhpur State in Rajputana,
but in former times applied to about half of the Agency. Marwar is
a corruption of Maru-war, classically Marusthala or Marusthan, also
called Marudesa, whence is derived the unintelligible Mardes of the
early Muhammadan writers. The word means the 'region of death,'
and hence is applied to a desert. Abul Fazl thus described it in
1582 : 'Marwar is in length 100, and in breadth 60 kos. The sarkars
of Ajmer, Jodhpur, Sirohi, Nagaur, and Blkaner are dependent on it.
The Rathor tribe have inhabited this division for ages past. Here
are many forts, of which the following are the most famous : namely,
Ajmer, Jodhpur, Blkaner, Jaisalmer, Umarkot, and Jainagar.' In
Tod's Rajasthan it is said that 'its ancient and appropriate applica-
tion comprehended the entire desert from the Sutlej to the ocean.'
The tract has given its name to the numerous enterprising traders
known as Marwaris or Marwari Banias, who have spread far and wide
over India, and acquired an important share in the commerce of the
country.
Marwat Tahsll. — Tahsll of Bannu District, North-West Frontier
Province, lying between 320 16' and 320 53' N. and 700 23' and
710 16' E., with an area of 1,198 square miles. The whole tahsll is
one large sandy plain. Its population in 1901 was 96,332, compared
with 84,145 in 1891. It contains the town of Lakki (population,
5,218), the head-quarters; and 145 villages. The land revenue and
cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 1,30,000.
Masar. — Village in the head-quarters subdivision of Shahabad
District, Bengal, situated in 250 t,^' N. and 840 35' E., a little to
the south of the East Indian Railway, about 6 miles west of Arrah.
2T4 MASAR
Population (tooi), 3,073. Masar has been identified with the Mo-
ho-so-lo of the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen Tsiang, and from his account
must then have stood close to the Ganges. The river now flows
9 miles to the north, but traces of the high banks of its old channel
still remain. The old name of Masar, as proved by seven inscriptions
in the Jain temple of Parasnath, was Mahasara ; but the original name
is said to have been Sonitpur, famous as the residence of Bana Raja,
whose daughter Usha was married to a grandson of Krishna1. There
is a Jain temple here with several Brahmanical images and an inscrip-
tion dated 1386. Dr. Buchanan-Hamilton discovered some Buddhist
images in a heap of mud and bricks to the west of the village, which
he assigned to the Cheros. There are fourteen fine old wells and
numerous tanks. The population of the old town has been estimated
at about 20,000. At present it is only a straggling village. A colossal
image found at Masar was in 1882 removed to Arrah, and the frag-
ments being pieced together, it was set up in the public garden at that
place ; it appears to be of the Gupta period. Among other statues,
those of Mahamaya and Bhairab are noteworthy.
Masein. — Southern township of the Upper Chindwin District,
Upper Burma, extending from the Yoma in the west across the
Chindwin river to Shwebo District in the east, between 230 io" and
23° 35' N. and 940 15' and 940 58' E., with an area of 1,334 square
miles. The population, which is wholly Burman, was 12,646 in 1891,
and 14,365 in 1901, distributed in 156 villages. Masein (population,
1,118), on the Chindwin river, about 30 miles below Kindat, is the
head-quarters. The whole of the township is a network of small hills
and narrow valleys. The area cultivated in 1903-4 was 26 square
miles, and the land revenue and thathameda amounted to Rs. 40,000.
Maskhal; — Island in Eastern Bengal and Assam. See Maiskhal.
Mastuj. — Village, fort, and district subject to Chitral, in the Dir,
Swat, and Chitral Agency, North-West Frontier Province, situated
in 360 17' N. and 720 33'' E. The village lies on the left bank of the
Mastuj river, near its confluence with the Laspur, at an elevation of
7,800 feet above sea-level. Mastuj is not, properly speaking, part
of Chitral State. It has often been conquered by Chitral and has at
times conquered it. At present Mastuj is governed by a Mehtarjao,
an uncle of the Mehtar of Chitral, who is independent of him, though
Mastuj is part of the Chitral Agency. The climate in winter is severe,
owing to the cold winds which blow down the valleys. An inscription
at Barenis, a neighbouring village on the right bank of the Mastuj
river, shows that Chitral was included in the kingdom of Jaipal,
king of Kabul, about a.d. 900, and that its inhabitants were then
1 Tezpur in Assam also claims to have been called Sonitpur, and to have been
the capital of this Raja.
MASULIPATAM TOWN 215
Buddhists. Its history is that of Chitral, and it has a population
of about 6,000.
Masulipatam Subdivision. -- Subdivision of Kistna District,
Madras, consisting of the Bandar taluk.
Masulipatam Town (in Hindustani Machhlipatan = ' fish-town ' j
popularly known as Bandar = ' the port '). — Head-quarters of the
Kistna District, Madras, situated in i6c n' N. and 8i° 8' E., on
the Bay of Bengal, 215 miles north of Madras City. The town is
made up of three parts : the fort, the native quarter, and the European
quarter. Of these the fort, which is situated close to the sea, is now
little more than a memory. The barracks and arsenal, which fell into
decay after the withdrawal of troops (first in 1834 and finally in 1864),
have now been pulled down ; the churches are in ruins, and the private
houses that formerly stood here were destroyed by the great cyclone
of 1864. Round the fort stretches a vast expanse of waste land,
swamp during the rainy season but firmer in summer, over which a
causeway about two miles in length, running in a westerly direction,
leads to the native town. In this part of Masulipatam it is still pos-
sible to distinguish the separate stations of the various nationalities
which traded here centuries ago. French-pettah, occupying a space
of about 1,300 square yards, the ownership of which (though not the
sovereignty) is vested in the French Government, and English-palem
are here ; while some distance to the north-west lies Valanda-palem
(Hollander-town) with the old Dutch graveyard. Close at hand is the
former council chamber of the Netherlands East India Company, now
used as a court-house. North of the native quarter along a sand ridge
are built the houses of the European residents.
Unless the railway recently sanctioned from Bezwada should revive
its commercial importance by connecting it again with the outside
world, the interest of Masulipatam will continue to lie in the past.
Its manufactures, principally chintzes and coloured cloths, have been
crushed out of the market by English piece-goods ; and, since the
opening of the railway to Bombay, that city has superseded Masuli-
patam as the port for the Nizam's Dominions. The East Coast Rail-
way has also contributed to the extinction of the sea-borne traffic
formerly carried on between Masulipatam, Cocanada, and the
southern coast of India. The annual imports are now valued at
only Rs. 7,11,000, and the exports at Rs. 10,31,000.
As to the origin of Masulipatam we have no certain information,
and its real history begins early in the seventeenth century. In 161 1
the East India Company dispatched the ship Globe, commanded by
Captain Hippon, to open a trade with the Coromandel coast ; and in
161 2 the vessel took a cargo of cotton goods and other fabrics to
Bantam and Siam, returning to Masulipatam in the following year.
2 ib MASULIPATAM TOWN
With Captain Hippon sailed, in the capacity of a supercargo, Peter
Floris, a Dutchman, who has left a diary describing how English trade
was begun at the place. For many years disputes raged between the
new-comers and the Dutch. In 1628 the English were compelled to
remove to Armagon on the Nellore coast, but in 1632 they returned
to Masulipatam, having obtained a farman from the Sultan of Gol-
conda. By this time the town had become of much importance ; and
it is described by a Dominican friar, who visited it in 1670, as being
' famous all along the coast of Coromandel,' and as ' resembling Babel
in the variety of tongues and the differences of garbs and costumes.'
In 1686 the Dutch seized the government of Masulipatam and
ordered the English not to trade outside the town. The English,
undaunted, warned the Dutch not to interfere with their trade ' on
account of the ill consequences that may be'; and in 1690 the
Madras Government obtained a farman from the Mughal emperor
authorizing them to reopen their factories along the coast. Trade,
however, appears to have been on a very small scale; for in 1726
the Masulipatam and Madapollam factories were maintained at a cost
of 628 pagodas per annum, while the Vizagapatam factory at the same
date cost 6,000 pagodas.
In 1750 Masulipatam was seized by the French under the orders
of Dupleix, and continued in their possession until 1759. In 1758,
with a view to divert the attention of the French, who were then
preparing for a strenuous effort in the Carnatic and the siege of
Madras city, an expedition, consisting of 300 Europeans and 1,400
sepoys under Colonel Forde, was dispatched by Clive from Calcutta
to Vizagapatam. This force speedily found itself hampered on all
sides, and it seems to have been a counsel of despair that prompted
Colonel Forde to march on Masulipatam. Arrived there, he found
a means of escape in the ship Hardivicke, which, with two other
vessels, was at anchor in the roads. Before resorting thereto, how-
ever, Colonel Forde resolved on the desperate enterprise of endeavour-
ing to storm the fort. Although it was held by a force superior to his
own, and a French corps with native auxiliaries manoeuvred in his
rear, fortune favoured him, and the attack, delivered early in 1759,
was successful. The Subahdar of the Deccan, the most powerful
auxiliary of the French, was shortly afterwards forced to negotiate
with the English, owing to the attack made on his kingdom by his
brother Nizam All; and under a treaty signed on May 14, 1759,
Masulipatam with the adjacent territory passed to the Company.
Thereafter its political history was uneventful.' It became the head-
quarters of a Chief and Council. These were abolished in 1794,
and a Collector was appointed. In 1834 the occupation of the fort
by European troops was discontinued, and the native garrison was
MAT 217
withdrawn in 1864. The trade of the port has steadily diminished.
The opening of the Bezwada-Masulipatam canal in 1863 gave promise
of a revival, but these hopes were dashed to the ground by the tidal
wave of 1864, which practically wiped much of the town off the face
of the earth. As many as 30,000 people perished in this catastrophe.
In 1 90 1 the population of Masulipatam was 39,507 : namely,
34,126 Hindus, 4,635 Musalmans, 714 Christians, and 32 'others.'
It was constituted a municipality in 1866. During the ten years
ending 1902-3 the municipal receipts and expenditure averaged
Rs. 56,000. In 1903-4 they were Rs. 62,000 and Rs. 57,000 respec-
tively. Most of the income is derived from house arid land taxes,
tolls, and fees from markets and slaughter-houses.
The Masulipatam carpet industry, formerly famous, is now almo.it
extinct ; and the beautiful carpets which used to be largely exported
to England are seldom seen. Printed cloths are still manufactured,
but the lessening demand for them will soon kill the industry. There
is a tannery in the town, which sends out annually skins worth from
Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 60,000. The principal educational institution is the
Church Missionary Society's first-grade college, called after its founder,
Dr. Noble. The Hindu high school is a private institution teaching
up to the matriculation standard.
Masura. — Town in the Malvan tdluka of Ratnagiri District, Bom-
bay, situated in 160 10' N. and 730 32' E., 8 miles north-east of Malvan.
Population (1901), 8,855. ^ nas been identified as the Muziris of
Ptolemy and the Periplus, one of the chief marts of Western India ;
but the identification is disputed.
Mat (Mant). — North-eastern tahsll of Muttra District, United
Provinces, conterminous with the pargana of the same name, lying
between 270 35' and 270 58' N. and 77° 31' and 770 50' E., with an
area of 223 square miles. Population rose from 89,451 in 1891 to
97,370 in 1901. There are 142 villages, but no town. In 1903-4 the
demand for land revenue was Rs. 2,65,000, and for cesses Rs. 43,000.
The density of population, 437 persons per square mile, is much below
the District average. The Jumna forms the western boundary of the
tahsll, and parallel to its course lie a series of depressions marking
an old bed. Nohjhil, the most northern of these, was formerly a lake
6 miles long by a mile broad, but it has been drained. The Motiy////
in the south, which is smaller, still contains water, and is celebrated
for the number of fish caught in it. A small stream called the Patwaha
is used as a canal escape. Eight and sandy soil prevails in the tahsiL
which forms a long strip of land stretching along the Jumna, the valley
being narrow and badly defined. Up to 1903 canal-irrigation was
confined to very few villages, and in 1903-4 only 53 square miles were
irrigated (chiefly by wells), out of a cultivated area of 170 square miles.
218 MAT
The new Mat brunch of the Upper Ganges Canal now commands
a considerable area.
Matabhanga River (or Hauli). — One of the three Nadia Rivers
of Bengal, the other two being the BhagIrathi and JalangI. All
these rivers are offshoots of the Ganges, and form the head-waters
of the Hooghlv river. The Matabhanga has its principal off-take
from the Ganges in 240 4' N. and 88° 48' E., about 10 miles below
the point where the JalangI diverges from it. The off-take is subject
to the same shifting and changing as that of the BhagIrathi. Lower
down, the Matabhanga is a comparatively narrow stream with well-
defined banks throughout. It flows first in a south-easterly, and
afterwards in a tortuous south-westerly direction, to Krishnaganj, due
east of Krishnagar, the head-quarters of Nadia District. During the
past century it has had many vicissitudes. It had formerly an outlet
to the east of the delta ; but, owing to the gradual silting up of this
tract, it subsequently left its bed and turning west occupied in turn
parts of the channels of the Kumar, Ichamati (2), and ChurnI rivers.
It now joins the Hooghly near Chakdaha, in 230 9' N. and 88° 29' E.,
after a course of 129 miles. For the first 40 miles after leaving the
Ganges it is still known as the Hauli or Kumar, while the true Kumar
river, locally known as the Pangasi, is now connected with it only
during the rains. The Ichamati is now merely an offshoot of the
Matabhanga. During the rainy season the Matabhanga is navigable
by large boats and river steamers, but during, the dry season it is
almost always closed to traffic.
Matabhanga Village.— Head-quarters of a subdivision of Cooch
Behar State, Bengal, situated in 260 23' N. and 890 50" E., on the
emigration road to Assam. Population (1901), 1,283. It contains
a high school.
Matamuhari. — River of Eastern Bengal and Assam. Rising in the
range of mountains dividing Arakan from Chittagong, in 210 14' N.
and 920 36' E., it flows north-west through the Chittagong Hill Tracts,
and, turning westward as it leaves the hills, forms a broad delta as it
pours into the Bay of Bengal, in 210 45' N. and 910 57' E., after a
course of 96 miles. It was up the mouths of this delta that the storm-
wave of October, 1897, rushed with tremendous violence, destroying
every living creature within its range. The delta is of Sundarban
character, consisting of groups of islets intersected by a network of
tidal creeks and covered by mangrove jungle. This is rapidly being
cleared ; the lands are being embanked to exclude the salt water, and
the creeks are silting up, and rich crops of rice are grown with but
scanty tillage on these virgin soils built up by river silt. The principal
place on its banks is Chakiria, a good-sized village where there is
A police station.
MATHER AX
2 19
Matar. —Western tdluka of Kaira District, Bombay, lying between
22° 26' and 220 50' N. and 72° 30' and 720 47' E., with an area of
216 square miles. Besides the main portion, some isolated villages
lie separated from the rest by belts of Baroda and Cambay territory.
The tdluka contains one town, Matar (population, 4,001), the head-
quarters : and 81 villages. The population in 1901 was 61,522, com-
pared with 79,285 in 1891. The density, 285 persons per square mile,
is much below the District average. The land revenue and cesses
in 1903-4 amounted to more than 3 lakhs. The country lacks natural
drainage, so that the climate is malarious during the rains. Rice lands
are found in many parts.
Matari. — Town in the Hala tdluka of Hyderabad District, Sind,
Bombay. See Matiari.
Mathabhanga. — River in Bengal. See Matabhanga.
Mathabhanga. — Town in Cooch Behar State, Bengal. See Mata-
bhanga.
Matheran ('The wooded head,' or 'the mother's wood;). — Hill
sanitarium in the Karjat tdluka of Kolaba District, Bombay, situated
in 180 58" X. and 730 16' E., 2,460 feet above sea-level, about 30 miles
east of Bombay city. The hill was explored in May, 1850, by Mr. Hugh
Malet, of the Bombay Civil Service, and to him belongs the credit of
making its advantages known. It is delightfully situated on an outlier
of the Western Ghats, commanding noble views of the plain which
separates the mountain chain from the sea. The traveller proceeds
from Bombay by the Great Indian Peninsula Railway to Neral station
(54 miles), at the north-east foot of the hill, and thence to Matheran
(7 miles) by palanquin or pony. The road winds upwards through rich
forests, and though broad enough for two ponies is unfit for carriages
or carts. Matheran has recently been connected with Neral station by
a 2-ft. gauge mountain railway, similar to the Siliguri-Darjeeling line.
The summit, which has an area of about 8 square miles, consists
of a main central block and two smaller side ridges or wings, thickly
wooded and affording good riding ground. The central block has an
average breadth of about half a mile, and stretches nearly north and
south from the narrow ridge of Hart Point to the rounded bluff of
Chauk in the south. It may be roughly divided into three parts :
a north, middle, and south section. For about a mile from Hart Point
to the Church plateau the northern section is thinly peopled, with only
a broken line of houses separated by stretches of wood. On the Church
plateau the houses stand closer together, and along the edge of the
eastern cliff groups of huts and small shops cluster round the market-
place. The slopes of the central portion are the thickest peopled part,
with rows of closely grouped houses stretching across nearly the whole
breadth of the hill.
vol. xvn. P
2 2o MATHER AN
The peculiar charm of Matheran is its Points. These form, as it
were, rocky promontories jutting into mid-air, from which the spectator
looks down upon the valleys more than 2,000 feet below. In the
morning the mist lies over the plains, and, as it gradually melts before
the rising sun, discloses one by one the villages and fields which it has
concealed beneath. The six leading Points or headlands are the Hart
at the north and Chauk at the south of the central hill ; Panorama
Point at the north and Garbat at the south of the east wing ; and
Porcupine Point at the north and Louisa at the south of the west
wing. In addition to these, three other spots are known as the Artist,
Sphinx, and Bartle Points. Of the several smaller bluffs the seven
most important are : Alexander, Little Chauk, One Tree Hill, Danger,
Echo, Landscape, and Monkey.
A very striking view is obtained, especially in the evening light, from
Panorama Point. The level plain extends from the foot of the hill to
the broken coast-line, about 40 miles off. The great city of Bombay,
with its towers and shipping, lies under the sunset, and the ocean
stretches beyond. Besides the beauty of the summit and of its views,
a great charm in Matheran is the plateau or terrace that almost
encircles the hill from 200 to 300 feet below its crest. This belt has a
rich soil, yearly freshened by mould washed down from the higher land.
The hill-sides are scarred by several small streams, which, though dry
during the greater part of the year, bear in their clean-swept rocky
channels traces of the strength of their monsoon floods. The rides
through the woods have a special freshness from the sea-breeze ; and,
although the elevation is not lofty enough to counteract the heats of
summer, it suffices to render Matheran a cool and salubrious retreat
for the citizens of Bombay during the spring and autumn months.
In spite of the heavy rainfall, even the largest streams cease to flow
soon after Christmas. Of eleven springs, only two — Harrison's on the
east and Malet's on the west of the main hill-top — last throughout the
year. The latter has never been known to fail, and supplies the only
drinking-water used by European visitors. Matheran is singularly free
from malaria ; there is no marsh on any part of the hill, every stream
bed is a bare rock, and in almost all seasons the forest can be entered
without risk. This freedom from malaria makes Matheran a healthy
place to most visitors. The returns for the ten years ending 1903 give
an average yearly rainfall of 251 inches. The thermometer readings
show that, on an average, December and January are the coldest
months, with a mean maximum of 66°, and May and June the
warmest, with a mean of 820.
According to the Census of 1901, the total number of inhabitants,
inclusive of the local hill-men, was 3,060, rising to 4,738 in the hot
season. The majority of visitors to Matheran are Parsis, of whom the
MATIARI 221
greatest number come from Bombay. As a place of resort Matheran
has two seasons : after the rains in October and November, and from
April i to the middle of June. The management of the station is
entrusted to the Civil Surgeon, who, with the title of Superintendent,
has within its limits the powers of a first-class Magistrate. Subject to
the Collector of Kolaba, he has the entire management of the station,
looking after the repairs of roads, settling the charges of palanquin-
bearers, pony-keepers, and porters, and regulating the use of water,
the conservancy arrangements, and the market. A municipality was
established in 1905. The receipts are estimated at Rs. 15,000.
The chief public buildings ate the post and telegraph offices, the
Bairamji Jijibhoy Hospital, the Superintendent's residence, the police
lines, the resthouse, the hotels, market, the library, gymkhana, a church,
and a Catholic chapel. There is one school. The leading Points on
the hill-top may be comfortably seen in three rides or walks from one
of the hotels. Excursions may also be made to Prabal Point, where
there is a fort of the same name, which signifies ' mighty.' For this
place the excursionist starts from Louisa Point, which overlooks
a majestic cliff, whence in the rainy season a cataract 100 feet in
width falls into the valley below by a single leap of 1,000 feet. Until
within the last fifty years, Matheran hill was inhabited solely by wild
forest races of non-Aryan origin and predatory habits — Dhangars,
, Thakurs, and Kathkaris. These still linger on the slopes and at the
foot of the hills, but their little communities have considerably declined
in numbers. Some of them may still be seen at the weekly Sunday
bazar on the hill. Interesting accounts of Matheran have been pub-
lished by J. Y. Smith, M.l). (Edinburgh, 1871), and by Mrs. A. K.
Oliver (Bombay, 1905).
Mathura.— District, tahsi/, and city in the United Provinces. See
MUTTRA.
Mathwar. — Thakurat in the Bhopawar Agency, Central India.
Matiari (Matdri). — Town in the Hala ialuka of Hyderabad Dis-
trict, Sind, Bombay, situated in 250 36' N. and 68° 29' E., on a
slight eminence, 20 miles south of Hala town, and r6 miles north
of Hyderabad. Population (190 1), 6,608. The local trade includes
grain, oilseeds, cotton, silk piece-goods, and sugar. Matiari is said to
have been founded in 1322, and possesses, besides a fine Jama Masjid,
built in 1803, the tombs of two saints of renowned sanctity. At these
shrines annual fairs are held in September and October, and each is
attended by from 2,000 to 3,000 Muhammadans. The municipality,
established in 1868, had an average income during the decade
ending 190 1 of Rs. 9,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 3,650.
The town contains a dispensary and four schools, of which one is.
for girls.
p 2
222 MA TLA
Matla. — Village in the District of the Twenty-four Parganas, Bengal.
See Canning, Port.
Matra Timba. — Petty State in Kathtawar, Bombay.
Mattancheri. — Commercial capital of Cochin State, Madras, and
head-quarters of the Cochin taluk, situated in 90 57' N. and 760
15' E., on the backwater opposite to Ernakulam and adjoining the
British town of Cochin. Area, 2-| square miles : population (1901),
20,061, of whom 9,466 are Hindus, 5,607 Christians, 4,489 Musal-
mans, and 474 Jews. It is the centre of a considerable export and
import trade, which is almost entirely in the hands of Banias and
Cutchi Mentions from the Bombay Presidency. There are several
steam oil-mills in the neighbourhood, and a hydraulic press in the
centre of the town. Mattancheri is said to have been formerly the
capital of the State, and contains a spacious old palace of quaint
Dutch design, where the Rajas of Cochin are still installed. Histo-
rically the most interesting part of the place is what is known as the
Jews' Town, which is exclusively inhabited by the White and Black
Jews. They settled here after their expulsion from Cranganur by the
Portuguese in the sixteenth century, and formed a prosperous colony.
But of late years they have been declining in both numbers and
affluence. They have three old synagogues in the town. Among
modern institutions of note are the large and richly endowed Konkani
temple of Tirumala Devaswam, and the women and children's hospital,
which contains accommodation for 20 in-patients.
Mau Tahsil (1). — Eastern tahsll of Banda District, United Pro-
vinces, conterminous with the pargana of Chhibun, lying along the
Jumna, between 250 5' and 250 24' N. and 8i° 7' and 8i° 34' E., with
an area of 316 square miles. It is included in the Kanvi subdivision
of the District. Population fell from 73,658 in 1891 to 64,921 in
1 90 1. There are 164 villages and one town, Rajapur (population,
5,491). The demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 86,000,
and for cesses Rs. 14,000. The density of population, 205 persons
per square mile, is slightly below the District average. In the south
the outer range of the Vindhyas crosses the tahsll in three terraces.
The forests and jungles are gradually diminishing, owing to the export
of wood to Allahabad. In t 903-4 less than one square mile was
irrigated, out of 132 square miles under cultivation.
Mau Tahsil (2). — Tahsll of Jhansi District, United Provinces, con-
terminous with the pargana of the same name, lying between 250 6'
and 250 29' N. and 780 49' and 790 19' E., with an area of 439 square
miles. Population fell from 115,724 in 1891 to 100,298 in 1901.
There are 164 villages and only one town, Mau-Ranipur (population,
17,231), the tahsil head quarters. The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 1,23,000, and for cesses Rs. 21,000. The density of
MAU TO WW 22$
population, 228 persons per square mile, is considerably above the
District average. The tahs'U is bounded on the east by the Dhasan
river, but towards the south and west is much intermixed with portions
of Orchha State. The southern portion is generally wild and hilly,
dotted with artificial lakes and fertile irrigated valleys, but displaying
also great tracts of barren waste. In the centre the country is more
open and there is little irrigation. Farther north again the soil is
chiefly black soil, deteriorating near the wild nullahs which fringe the
Dhasan : this part has suffered much from the inroads of kans (Saccha-
rum spontaneum). In 1902-3 the area under cultivation was 190 square
miles, of which 13 were irrigated, wells supplying more than three-
fourths of the irrigated area.
Mau Town (1). — British cantonment in Indore State, Central
India. See Mhow.
Mau Town (or Maunath Bhanjan) (2). — Town in the Muhammad,
abad tahsll of Azamgarh District, United Provinces, situated in 250 57'
N. and 830 34/ E., on the right bank of the Tons and on the Bengal and
North-Western Railway, at the junction of the branch from Shahganj
through Azamgarh town with the line from Gorakhpur to Benares.
Population (1901), 17,696. The town is of some antiquity, though
the date of its foundation has not been ascertained. It is mentioned
in the Ain-i-Akbarl as the head-quarters of a mahdl or pargana ; and
during the reign of Shah Jahan that emperor bestowed the town upon
his daughter, Jahanara Begam, and it received in a special degree the
royal favour. A sarai built by this lady still exists. At that period
the town is said to have contained 84 mukallas, or wards, and 360
mosques. At the time of the cession to the British, Mau was held in
jaglr by one of the Oudh Begams ; but the town had suffered severely
from previous misrule, and has never regained its former prosperity.
A commercial resident was appointed for Mau and Azamgarh in 1802 ;
and in addition to the ordinary country traffic, investments in Mau
cloths were made for some years on behalf of the Company. Private
enterprise kept up the trade for a time after the abolition of the
Company's monopoly ; but the introduction of English-made yarn and
cloth gave a great blow to it. Since the opening of the railway, how-
ever, trade has revived to some extent, and fewer weavers leave the
town to seek employment in the mills of Bombay and Calcutta. The
population largely consists of fanatical Julahas (Muhammadan weavers),
and religious friction is always present. In 1893 Mau was the scene of
sanguinary riots, arising from the agitation against the slaughter of kine.
There are no public buildings besides the dispensary, police station,
and post office ; but Mau is an important railway centre, and contains
the head-quarters of an Engineer, a District Traffic Superintendent,
and a Locomotive Superintendent. It is administered under Act XX
224 MAU TOWN
of 1856, with an income of about Rs. 3,000. Muslin and satin are
largely woven, and there is a small manufacture of silk. There
are two schools for boys with 83 pupils, and two for girls with 77.
Mau Aimma. — Town in the Soraon tahsil of Allahabad District,
United Provinces, situated in 250 42' N. and 8i° 56' E., on the
metalled road from Allahabad city to Fyzabad and on a branch
of the Oudh and Rohilkhand Railway. Population (1901), 6,769.
This was the first place in the District in which plague broke out
in 1899, having been imported direct from Bombay. Mau Aimma
is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about
Rs. 1,000. It was once celebrated for its cotton cloth ; but the
industry has declined and many of the Julaha inhabitants (Muham-
madan weavers) now seek work in Bombay. There is, however, a
flourishing local traffic in grain, cloth, cotton, sugar, and tobacco, which
is likely to increase since the opening of a railway. The school
has about 64 pupils.
Ma-ubin District (Ma-it tree, Nauclea Cadamba).— District of the
Irrawaddy Division, Lower Burma, lying between i6°3o/and i7°25/N.
and 950 15' and 950 55' E. It is bounded on the north by Henzada
District ; on the east by Hanthawaddy ; on the west by Myaungmya
and Bassein ; and on the south by Pyapon. The District is at the
head of the lower delta of the Irrawaddy, which enters it on the north,
and shortly afterwards, at the upper end of what is known as Ma-ubin
Island, sends an important offshoot called the To
PhvsiC3.1 ■ • •
as ts or China Bakir river to the east. The main stream,
under the name of the Yazudaing, passes on to the
south-west, and divides into a number of other tidal channels in
Myaungmya and Pyapon Districts. The surface of the country
is generally low, the greater part being subject to annual inundation,
except where protected by embankments. During the rains the
Irrawaddy rises about 25 feet higher than in the dry season, and,
where unhindered by dikes, spreads over the country and forms
vast lakes, out of which the higher lands emerge like islands. As
is the case with all silt-depositing rivers, the surface of the country
close to the banks is higher than it is inland, so that between the
main streams there is not a watershed but a depression. These
low-lying plains are covered with long grass interspersed with trees,
and, though very fertile, are generally too deeply flooded to be
cultivable. Eying within the main banks of the river are numerous
large sandbanks and islands, flooded during the rains, but furnishing
excellent ground for vegetable gardens in the dry season and extensive
grazing grounds for the cattle. The permanent cultivation, except
where there are embankments, is practically confined to the land
immediately adjoining the main banks of the river.
MA-UBIN DISTRICT 225
The District is an alluvial flat, unbroken by any rising ground, and
it cannot be said to possess any geological features worthy of record.
The vegetation, which is largely swamp, resembles that in Haxtha-
waddy District, in the tracts farther from the sea. The fauna is
similar to that of Myaungmya and Pvapon. The elephant and
tiger are scarce, but leopards are not uncommon and crocodiles
abound.
The climate is generally healthy, but at the same time most
enervating. The approximate mean temperature is about 820. Low-
lying and moist, the District swarms with mosquitoes. The European
houses at the head-quarters are provided with rooms of which the
doors and windows are made of perforated zinc to keep out these
pests, and in places the villagers have to protect not only their
own bodies but those of their cattle at night by means of gauze
curtains. Though the District is wet and flat, disastrous floods are
extremely rare, owing to the embankments ; and when they occur,
they are restricted to small areas.
The rainfall is heaviest in the south, averaging 92 inches at Ma-ubin,
83 inches at Pantanaw, 80 inches at Yandoon, and 72 inches at the
northernmost station, Danubyu, or an annual average of 82 inches
for the District altogether. In the north it is more variable than
in the south, but on the whole it is fairly regular and seldom
insufficient.
Danubyu, in the north of the District, on the western bank of the
Irrawaddy, is the only place of historical importance. It is famous
for the stand made against the British by the
Burmese general, the Maha Bandula, in 1825.
The side of the fort facing the river was nearly a mile long, and
behind it was a garrison of 20,000 men. This position was unsuccess-
fully attacked by two columns under General Cotton, the greater part
of the troops engaged being killed or wounded. Reinforcements were
applied for, and the Commander-in-Chief, Sir Archibald Campbell,
brought up his batteries. On the first day of the bombardment
the Maha Bandula was killed by the bursting of a shell, and the
Burmans thereupon evacuated the place. In the War of 1852 no
attempt was made to hold Danubyu ; but after the occupation of
Prome a force was gathered by an ex-thi/gyi named Nga Myat Tun,
who repeatedly drove back, with considerable loss, the small detach
ments sent against him. After some delay his stronghold was carried
by a larger British force, and the country gradually settled down.
Part of the fort walls are still to be seen at Danubyu, occupied by
monasteries ; and under the shadow of the Nandawgon pagoda is
a small cemetery containing the remains of those who fell in the
second War,
2 6
MA-UBIN DISTRICT
Originally part of Henzada and Rangoon, a new District, embracing
the present Ma-ubin District, and called after the village of Thongwa
near Ma-ubin, was formed in 1875. This area was divided, in conse-
quence of the rapid spread of cultivation and large increase in the
population, first in 1893 on the formation of Myaungmya District,
and again in 1903 when the District of Pyapon came into existence.
At the last change the name of Ma-ubin was substituted for that
of Thongwa.
The population of the area now forming Ma-ubin District was
176,000 in 1881 ; 216,930 in 1891 ■ and 283,122 in 1901. Its
distribution in 1901 is shown in the following table: —
Township.
<u
'-
cS
3
»a
«H
k.
<
^22
483
331
305
Number of
c
0
"3
C
O
Ph
Sji
g'i
3 3
0 U)
(Li
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and 1 901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
u5
c
0
H
I
I
I
7
&
be
>
Ma-ubin .
Pantanaw .
Yandoon .
Danubyu .
District total
118
92
Si
127
77,792
62,374
57,923
85,033
M9
1 29
175
278
+ 58
+ 29
— I
+ 39
21,800
16,416
14,285
18,087
1,641
418
283,1 22
173
+ 30
70,588
The chief towns are Yandoon and Ma-ubin, the District head-
quarters. The decrease of population in the Yandoon township
during the ten years ending 1901 is largely due to a falling off in
the inhabitants of Yandoon town, the trade of which was killed
by the opening of the railway to Mandalay. Elsewhere the growth
during the decade in question has been conspicuous, being largely
due to the attractions presented by the rich delta areas to the in-
habitants of the poorer tracts farther north. The stream of immi-
gration flows mainly from the Districts of Magwe, Myingyan, Mandalay,
Pakokku, and from the Upper and Lower Chindwin. By far the
greater part of the population is Buddhist ; in 1901 Musalmans
numbered 3,500 and Hindus 4,800. In all 200,000 of the population
spoke Burmese, and 70,000 Karen.
Between two-thirds and three-fourths of the population are Burmans ;
of the balance the greater part is made up of Karens, who numbered
70,000 in 1 90 1, forming nearly half of the population of the Pantanaw
township, one-fourth of that of the Yandoon township, and a fifth
of that of the Ma-ubin township. Not quite 60 per cent, of the popu-
lation is agricultural. Owing to territorial changes, it is not possible
to show from the census figures the occupations of the remainder,
most of whom are doubtless petty traders or fishermen.
The native Christian population in 1901 numbered 5,100 (mainly
AGRICULTURE
22"
Karen converts). The American Baptist Mission works among the
Karens (Pwos and Sgaws), and Roman Catholic missionaries have sta-
tions at Ma-ubin and Yandoon. Both these missions maintain schools.
The soil is a stiff yellow clay, deficient in lime, but well adapted
to the cultivation of rice. It is so rich that systematic ploughing
is rarely resorted to. Large areas, especially in the .
inundated tracts, are not ploughed at all, but the
long grass is cut down and burnt, and the rice sown broadcast
without transplanting. The lands along the margins of the rivers,
enriched by an annual deposit of silt, produce tobacco, chillies, and
other crops. The whole of the Danubyu and most of the Ma-ubin
township, with parts of Pantanaw and Yandoon, are protected by
embankments. The largest of these is the Ma-ubin Island embank-
ment, nearly 80 miles in length, which encloses a large area to the
west of the town of Ma-ubin. A somewhat smaller area to the east
is protected by the Thongwa Island embankment, between 30 and
40 miles in length. In the north of the District is the southern
end of the Henzada embankment, which extends along the western
bank of the Irrawaddy for nearly 40 miles, ending near the town
of Pantanaw. The area thus protected is approximately 360 square
miles. On unprotected lands the deposit of silt is artificially increased
by cutting channels through the high banks, at right angles to the
river, to the low-lying country beyond. This artificial raising of the
level enables crops to be grown on stretches which would otherwise
be too low for cultivation.
The cropped area increased from 312 square miles in 1S90-1
to 562 in 1900-1. For 1903-4 the main agricultural statistics (in
square miles) are as follows : —
Township.
Total.
Cultivated.
2l6
125
109
I78
1
Irrigated.
Forests.
Ma-ubin ....
Pantanaw
Yandoon
Danubyu
Total
522
48.3
331
3°5
0-2
O-I
o-3
0.4
I
- 20
1,641
628
1
20
The area under rice (all kaukkyt) in 1903-4 was 533 square miles,
and that under plantains and other fruit trees 17,000 acres. Tobacco,
mostly in Danubyu, covered 3,500 acres, and chillies in Pantanaw
6,300 acres. The average rice holding measures a little over 20 acres.
Holdings are smaller in the north than in the south.
There is a certain amount of cattle-breeding. Few ponies are
kept, as there is little use for them. Reserves for grazing are more
than 45,000 acres in extent.
228 MA-UBIX DISTRICT
The fisheries are usually in fresh-water lakes and streams con-
nected with the Irrawaddy, and subject to tidal influence, but affected
to a much greater extent by the monsoon floods.
Fisheries
They are mostly in the southern townships of Panta-
naw and Ma-ubin. All but a small part ' of the revenue is derived
from leased fisheries, which realized more than 7A lakhs in 1903-4,
almost one-third of the total revenue in the Province from this
source. The waters leased are carefully demarcated and mapped,
and the right to fish is let by auction every three years. Licences
for netting are also issued and are made use of in the navigable
waterways. These yielded in the same year Rs. 12,800. The leased
fisheries are usually worked by means of weirs and bamboo traps.
An exhaustive inquiry made by Major Maxwell between 1897 and
1899 resulted in the larger fisheries being subdivided, and none
now yields much over Rs. 7,000 a year. The fresh fish is taken
to Rangoon and other places by boat. A great deal is made into
fish-paste (ngapi), and exported to all parts of Burma. The industry
has declined with the spread of cultivation, the rule being that where
the interests of the fisherman and the cultivator are irreconcilable
those of the former must yield. The construction of embankments,
the chief enemy of the fisherman, has now probably reached its
limit, and to avoid disputes the spheres of interest of the fisherman
and the cultivator have been delimited. The fisherman's average
profits are lower than the cultivator's, partly because the industry is
highly speculative and, though the takings are occasionally enormous,
losses are very common ; partly because fishing is the hereditary
occupation of the earlier Talaing inhabitants, who cling to it for
sentimental reasons. The fisheries are looked after by a special
staff of two i/ikunwutts and four inspectors.
The forests are unimportant, consisting of five small Reserves in
the Yandoon subdivision, with an area of only 20 square miles.
No artistic work is produced in the District. The manufacture
of fine mats from the reed called thin (Phrynium dichotomum) gives
employment to a number of women in the north.
Trade and The rQ, after jjejn„ steeped in water, is split and
communications. . ,',,«. • , ™, . • ■>
the rind peeled off m two layers. The outer rind
is smoother than the rest and is woven separately into a fine mat,
under which a coarser one, made of the inner rind, is placed. The
two are then tacked together and the result is the thinbyu, the
Burman's ordinary bed. A smart mat-weaver can turn out a mat
6 feet 'by 2-| feet in one day. A few rice-mills are worked in the
District.
The principal exports are rice, fish-paste {n^o.pi) dispatched from
Yandoon to all parts of Burma, and horns and hides. They are
AD MINTS TRA TIOX 2 2 9
practically all river-borne. A good deal of firewood goes to Rangoon.
The imports consist for the most part of hardware, piece-goods, and
kerosene oil.
In 1903-4, 48 miles of metalled roads and 18 miles of unmetalled
roads were maintained from the District cess fund. In addition,
a number of unmetalled roads are kept up from Provincial funds,
but the numerous waterways provide the chief communications.
The majority of the larger creeks and streams, with which the
southern areas are intersected, are navigable by light-draught steamers,
launches, and boats. Ma-ubin is well served by the steamers and
launches of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company, and to a small extent
also by launches and boats belonging to natives. There are 14
licensed ferries.
For administrative purposes the District is divided into two sub-
divisions : Ma-ubin, comprising the Ma-ubin and Pantanaw town-
ships ; and Yandoon, comprising the Yandoon
and Danubyu townships. These are under the mmis ra 'on-
usual executive officers, assisted by 422 village headmen. The
District forms a subdivision of the Myaungmya Public Works divi-
sion, and is included in the Henzada-Thongwa Forest division.
Ma-ubin forms part of the Delta (judicial) Division, and the
Divisional Judge tries sessions cases. Till recently the judicial work
was performed by the executive staff: but the new scheme has pro-
vided a special District Judge, with head-quarters at Myaungmya,
who exercises jurisdiction in Ma-ubin, Myaungmya, and Pyapon,
a subdivisional judge for Ma-ubin, and three township judges, one
for Ma-ubin, one for Pantanaw and Yandoon, and one for Danubyu.
The crime of the District presents no special features.
The method of assessing land revenue under the Burmese regime
varied in different localities, but the recognized demand was based
on the number of yoke of plough cattle used by the cultivator, and
amounted to about half the gross out-turn. The first settlement was
made in 1S68, when a uniform rate of Rs. 1-12 per acre was levied
on all classes of cultivation in the Danubyu township. In 1S69-70
further portions of the District were settled. The rates of assess-
ment then imposed ranged from Rs. 1-4 to Rs. 2-4 per acre, accord-
ing to the distance of the land from Rangoon and the fertility of
the soil. In 1879-80 these were summarily enhanced in certain
circles by amounts varying from 6 to 25 per cent. ; and in 1SS9 91
the rates ranged from Rs. 1-8 to Rs. 2-8. The first regular
settlement of the whole District was made between 1888 and 1891,
when rates were fixed ranging from Rs. 1-8 to Rs. 3 per acre for
rice cultivation, and from Rs. 2 to Rs. 3 for orchards: vegetables,
tobacco, &c, were assessed at Rs. 2 per acre.
23°
MA-UBIN DISTRICT
The following table shows, in thousands of rupees, the growth of
the District revenue since 1881 : —
1 880-1.
1 890- 1.
1 900- 1.
1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
3,oo
14,00
6,00
15,00
8,00
16,00
9-53
26,64
The District cess fund is made up of a rate of 10 per cent, on
the land revenue, with receipts from markets and other sources,
bringing the total to 1-4 lakhs in 1903-4. About a fourth of this
is contributed to Provincial funds, and Rs. 17,300 is spent on educa-
tion, Rs. 10,000 on District launches, Rs. 13,500 on postal com-
munications, Rs. 5,300 on hospitals, and the balance mostly on
roads and resthouses. Yandoon and Ma-ubin are municipalities,
and Danubyu is managed by a town committee.
Under the District Superintendent of police are 2 Assistant Super-
intendents in charge of the two subdivisions, with a subordinate
force consisting of 4 inspectors, 7 head constables, 30 sergeants,
and 203 constables, distributed in 6 police stations and 8 outposts.
The total strength of military police is 155 of all ranks, with 3 native
officers. Of these, 90 are stationed at the District head-quarters, the
rest being distributed at the three outlying township head-quarters ;
their duties are mainly the escort of prisoners and treasure.
Ma-ubin possesses a District jail, with accommodation for 389
prisoners. The usual industries are carried on ; but special reference
may be made to the manufacture of jute money-bags, which are
supplied by Ma-ubin to all the Government treasuries in the Pro-
vince. The jail is almost self-supporting, as it grows its own rice
and manufactures its own ngafii.
The percentage of literate persons in Ma-ubin District in 1901 was
41 in the case of males and 7 in that of females, or 25 for both
sexes, which for a delta District with a considerable Indian immi-
gration is fairly high. In 1904 the District contained ir secondary,
185 primary, and 167 elementary (private) schools, with a total
attendance of 7,394 boys and 1,377 girls. The expenditure on edu-
cation amounted to Rs. 28,600, including Rs. 17,300 from Local funds,
Rs. 4,300 from municipal funds, Rs. 5,100 from fees, and Rs. 1,700
from Provincial funds. Subscriptions amounted to only Rs. 200.
There are hospitals at Ma-ubin, Yandoon, and Pantanaw, and a
dispensary at Danubyu. The hospitals have accommodation for 52 in-
patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 22,420, including
659 in-patients, and 873 operations were performed. The income
amounted to Rs. 11,000, towards which municipal funds contributed
Rs. 8,000, and the District cess fund Rs. 2,500.
MAUD AH A TAHSIL 231
Vaccination is compulsory within the limits of the Vandoon and
Ma-Ubin municipalities. In 1903-4 the number of successful vacci-
nations was 6,136, representing 13 per 1,000 of population.
[H. M. S. Mathews, Settlement Report (1893); Major F. D. Maxwell,
Report on Inland and Sea Fisheries (1904); B. Samuelson, History
of Embankments, Henzada Division (1899).
Ma-ubin Subdivision. — Subdivision of Ma-ubin District, Lower
Burma, consisting of the Ma-ubin and Pantanaw townships.
Ma-ubin Township.— Township of Ma-ubin District, Lower Burma,
lying between 160 30' and 160 56' N. and 950 27' and 950 52' E., with
an area of 522 square miles. The head-quarters are at Ma-ubix
(population, 6,623), a's0 tne head-quarters of the District. In addition
to the town of Ma-ubin, it contained 118 villages in 1901, and at the
Census of that year had a population of 77,792, compared with 48,200
in 1891. The township, which is a dead level throughout, lies in the
heart of the delta country, being bounded on the west by the Irrawaddy
and traversed by the To or China Baklr river. The great majority of
the population are Burmans, about one-fifth being Karens. The area
cultivated in 1903-4 was 216 square miles, paying Rs. 3,44,000 land
revenue.
Ma-ubin Town. — Head-quarters of the District of the same name,
Lower Burma, situated in 160 44' N. and 950 42' E., along the right
bank of the China Baklr stream, in the heart of the delta country.
Population (1901), 6,623. Approximately three-quarters of the popu-
lation are Burmans. Hindus number rather less than 1,000, and
Musalmans are about half as numerous as Hindus. The town is of
comparatively recent creation and had achieved no notoriety before
1874, when it was chosen as the head-quarters of the new delta District
of Thongwa. It is fiat and barely above flood-level, and during the
greater part of the year swarms with mosquitoes. The jail and the
usual public buildings stand near the river bank. Ma-ubin was con-
stituted a municipality in 1888. The receipts of the municipal fund
during the ten years ending 1 900-1 averaged Rs. 24,500, and the
expenditure Rs. 24,600. In 1903-4 the municipal income amounted
to Rs. 54,000, the chief sources being markets, &c. (Rs. 18,000), and
area and frontage tax (Rs. 2,500) ; and the expenditure amounted to
Rs. 34,000, including conservancy (Rs. 7,300), hospital (Rs. 4,500),
and education (Rs. 2,500). The principal schools are those maintained
by the American Baptist and Roman Catholic Missions, while the
municipality keeps up a hospital. Ma-ubin is one of the principal
ports of call in the delta for the steamers of the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Company, and is a thriving trade centre for paddy and ngapi.
Maudaha Tahsil. — Tahsil in Hamirpur District, United Pro-
vinces, comprising the parganas of Maudaha and Muskira, and lying
232 MAUD AH A TAHSIL
between 250 30' and 250 52' N. and 790 43' and 8o° 21' E., with an
area of 452 square miles. Population fell from 103,900 in 1891 to
87,322 in 1901, or by 19 per cent. There are 130 villages and one
town, Maudaha (population, 6,172). the head-quarters. The demand
for land revenue in 1904-5 was Rs. 1,76,000, and for cesses Rs. 36,000.
The density of population, 193 persons per square mile, is below the
District average. On the east the tahsil is bounded by the Ken, and
on the west by the Birma. It contains a large proportion of fertile
black soil ; but the north-west is very inferior, and the land near the
rivers is cut up by ravines. In 1902-3 the area under cultivation was
230 square miles, of which only 2 were irrigated.
Maudaha Town. — Head-quarters of the tahsil of the same name,
in Hamirpur District, United Provinces, situated in 250 40' N. and
8o° 7' E., on the Cawnpore-Saugor road. Population (1901), 6,172.
According to tradition a Muhammadan, named Husain, with the help
of some Parihar Rajputs, expelled the Kols who resided here and took
possession of the place. In 1730 Diler Khan, a son of the governor of
Allahabad, was slain here, and his tomb attracts a considerable number
of votaries. The fort was first built by Khuman Singh and Guman
Singh of Charkharl, and on the same site All Bahadur of Banda
afterwards erected a stone fort. The town contains a tahsili, and
is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about
Rs. 1,100. The silver ware produced here in small quantities has
some merit. There is a branch of the American Mission, and a middle
school with 1 01 pupils.
Mauganj Tahsil. — North-eastern tahsil of Rewah State, Central
India, lying between 24°32/ and 240 54' N. and 8i°4i'and 820 20' E.,
north of the Kaimur range, with an area of 784 square miles. Most of
the tahsil is part of the alluvial plain on which the town of Rewah
stands, and is covered with fertile soil. To the north it is traversed
by the easternmost section of the Panna range, known locally as the
Binjh hills. The population fell from 123,486 in 1891 to 99,534 in
1 90 1, giving a density of 127 persons per square mile. There are 609
villages, the head-quarters being at Mauganj. The land revenue is
2-1 lakhs.
Mauganj Village. — Head-quarters of the tahsil of the same name
in Rewah State, Central India, situated in 240 40' N. and 8i° 52' E.
Population (1901), 1,804. The village is composed of the two separate
hamlets called Mau and Ganj. It stands on the great Deccan road,
40 miles to the east of Rewah town, 61 from Mirzapur, and 80 from
Satna. An inspection bungalow, a school, and a British post office are
situated at Mauganj.
Maulavibazar. — Head-quarters of the South Sylhet Subdivision,
Sylhet District, Eastern Bengal and Assam. See Sylhet, South.
MAU-RANIPUR 233
Maulmain. — Town in Amherst District, Lower Burma. See
MOULMEIN.
Maungdaw. — Westernmost township of Akyab District, Lower
Burma, lying between 200 18' and 210 27' N. and 920 n' and 920
43' E., with an area of 426 square miles. It consists of a strip of coast
land on the shore of the Bay of Bengal, abutting on the southern end
of the Chittagong District of Bengal. The population was 65,407
in 1 89 1 and 83,247 in 1901, giving a density of 195 persons per
square mile. There are 377 villages. It is a favourite resort for
immigrants from Chittagong, and about three-fourths of its inhabitants
profess the Musalman faith. This foreign element has caused the
population of the township to increase during the last decade 27
per cent. The head-quarters are at Maungdaw (population, 1,735),
on the eastern shore of the Naaf estuary, which separates Burma
from Bengal. Away from the coast the land is hilly. The area
cultivated in 1903-4 was 128 square miles, paying Rs. 1,80,000 land
revenue.
Mau-Rampur. — Head-quarters of the Mau tahsil of Jhansi Dis-
trict, United Provinces, situated in 25° 15' N. and 790 9' E., on a
branch of the Great Indian Peninsula Railway. Population (1901),
17,231. The municipality includes two towns, Mau and Ranipur,
separated by a distance of about four miles. Mau was a small
agricultural village till the latter part of the eighteenth century, when
the exorbitant demands of the Raja of the neighbouring State of
Chhatarpur led to an exodus of merchants and others who settled
here. The place became noted for its manufacture of the coarse red
_ 4 ...
cotton cloth known as kharua. It was for long the chief town in the
District, but the restoration of Jhansi city to the British and the
alteration in trade routes made by railways have increased the impor-
tance of the latter place. Mau is also losing its trade in kharua, as
the vegetable dye which was used in its preparation is giving way
to aniline. Besides the ordinary offices Mau contains a dispensary.
It is a remarkably picturesque town ; its houses are built with deep
eaves between the first and second storeys, and hanging balcony
windows of unusual beauty. The principal temple is that of the Jains
(who form an important commercial body), which is very little enclosed,
and presents a fine appearance with its two solid spires and many
cupolas. Mau has been a municipality since 1869. During the ten
years ending 1901 the income and expenditure averaged Rs. 16,000.
In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 21,000, chiefly from octroi (Rs. 15,000) ;
and the expenditure was Rs. 18,000. As stated above, the trade in
cloth is decreasing, but agricultural produce is still largely exported.
There is a small manufacture of brass, and an important cattle fair is
held here. Six schools have about 209 pupils.
234 MAURAWAN
Maura wan. —Town in the Purwa tahsil of Unao District, United
Provinces, situated in 260 26' N. and 8o° 53' E., on the road from
Unao town to Rae Barell. Population (1901), 7,911. The place first
became of importance early in the nineteenth century as the resi-
dence of a Khattri banker, who gradually acquired a large tahika.
During the Mutiny the talukddr, Gauri Shankar, behaved with
unshaken loyalty and was one of the five talukdars whose estates
were exempted from confiscation. He was rewarded with the title of
Raja, and a permanent settlement at a reduced revenue. Maurawan
contains a dispensary and three schools with 150 pupils, one school
being maintained by the talukddr. There is little trade, but the
jewellery and carpentry produced here have some reputation.
Maval. — Taluka of Poona District, Bombay, lying between 180 36'
and 180 59' N. and 730 20' and 730 46' E., with an area of 385 square
miles. It contains two towns, LonaulI (population, 6,686) and
Talegaon-Dabhade (5,238); and 162 villages. The population in
1901 was 65,176, ^compared with 66,876 in 1891. The density,
169 persons per square mile, is below the District average. The
demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was 1-2 lakhs, and for cesses
Rs. 8,000. Three leading spurs from the Western Ghats cross the
taluka. The largest passes east and west across its whole length in
the south, a second penetrates to the centre, and the third forms the
norlh-east boundary for about 20 miles. Maval is fairly wooded.
The principal soils are red and grey ; black soil is found only on the
banks of rivers and large streams, of which the chief are the Indra-
yani and Andhra. Rice is everywhere the principal crop. The rainfall
varies greatly in different parts. It is heavy close to the Ghats and
considerably lighter near the eastern boundary. Hot winds are almost
unknown, and the climate is generally cooler than in the east of the
District. The south-east line of the Great Indian Peninsula Railway
and the Bombay road both cross the taluka. The villages, along or
at short distance from the road, derive considerable advantage from the
sale of grass for the numerous droves of cart- and pack-bullocks that
daily halt at the different stages. The head-quarters are at Wadgaon,
a small village near the station of the same name on the Great Indian
Peninsula Railway.
Maw (Burmese, Baw). — The northernmost and second largest of
the States of the Myelat division of the Southern Shan States, Burma,
lying between 210 11' and 210 43' N. and 960 19' and 960 50' E., with
an area of 550 square miles. It is bounded on the north by the
Veyaman tract of the Kyaukse District of Upper Burma ; on the east
by Lawksawk ; on the south by Yengan ; and on the west by Kyaukse
District. The State falls into two natural divisions : the valley of the
Zawgyi, its only important waterway, with the hills to the north of that
MA WAX A TOWN 235
stream ; and the Myelat plateau to the south. On the north, east, and
west the State is bounded by mountain ranges, with peaks exceeding
5,000 feet in height. Rice, the chief crop, is grown in taungyas and on
irrigated land in the Zawgyi valley ; garden crops and thanatpet are
also cultivated, but the total area under cultivation is not much more
than 2,300 acres. The population in 1901 was 7,743 (distributed in
70 villages), of whom 6,884 were Burmese-speaking Danus, the rest
Shans, Taungthus, and Palaungs. The principal village, where the
Ngwegunhmu resides, is Myogyi (population, 1,002), close to the
borders of Kyaukse. The revenue in 1904-5 amounted to Rs. 11,000,
and the tribute to the British Government is Rs. 5,750.
Mawa. — Petty State in Kathiawar, Bombay.
Mawana Tahsil. — North-eastern tahsil of Meerut District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Hastinapur and Kithor, and lying
between 280 50' and 290 16' N. and 770 47' and 780 8' E., with an area
of 431 square miles. The population rose from 177,868 in 1891 to
200,399 in 1901. There are 248 villages and four towns, the largest
of which are Mawana (population, 9,207), the tahsil head-quarters,
ParIchhatgarh (6,278), and Phalauda (5,214). In 1903-4 the
demand for land revenue was Rs. 3,56,000, and for cesses Rs. 57,000.
The tahsil is the most sparsely populated in the District, containing
only 465 persons per square mile against an average of 654. It con-
sists of two distinct portions. The greater part lies in the upland area,
which descends by a series of ravines to the Ganges khadar on the
east. The uplands are intersected by well-marked ridges of sand, and
have profited enormously by the irrigation supplied from the Anupshahr
branch of the Upper Ganges Canal, as wells are difficult and costly to
make. The khadar is damp, and immediately below the edge of the
upland lies a series of swamps marking an old bed of the Ganges,
which now flows on the eastern boundary ; a great part of it is fit only
for grazing. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation was 273 square
miles, of which 89 were irrigated.
Mawana Town. — Head-quarters of the tahsil of the same name in
Meerut District, United Provinces, situated in 290 6' N. and 770 57' E.,
17 miles north-east of Meerut city. Population (1901), 9,207. The
town, according to tradition, was founded by Mana, a huntsman
employed by the Kauravas. It contains a large brick-built tank, and
on the banks of another, now ruined, stands a fine temple built in the
sixteenth century. The municipality was constituted in 1886. During
the ten years ending 1901 the income and expenditure averaged
Rs. 5,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 7,000, chiefly from a tax
on circumstances and property (Rs. 3,000) ; and the expenditure was
Rs. 8,000. There is little trade, and most of the inhabitants are
cultivators. The town contains two middle schools with r36 pupils.
VOL. XVII. Q
236 MA WAN A TOWN
besides six primary schools with 164 pupils. The American Methodist
Mission has a branch here.
Mawkmai (Burmese, Mauktne). — State in the extreme south of
the eastern division of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying astride
the Salween river, between 190 35' and 200 26' N. and 970 25' and
980 32' E., with an area (including the trans-Salween dependencies
of Mongmaii and Mehsakun) of 2,787 square miles. The State is
bounded on the north by Mongsit and Mongnai : on the east by
Mongpan and its trans-Salween dependencies, which lie between it
and Siam ; on the south by Siam and Karenni ; and on the west by
Hsahtung. The central portion of the State proper is a wide fertile
rice plain, to the east of which are hills extending to the cultivated
Nam Teng valley. The lower part of this valley is chiefly given up to
rice cultivation, and the upper part to tobacco, though considerable
quantities of sesamum and sugar-cane are grown as well. Over the
east of the State taungya (shifting) cultivation prevails. A large area
is covered with forests, which in 1904 gave a revenue of Rs. 18,500.
The Mehsakun dependency across the Salween is comprised in the
basin of the Nam Hsakun, and is inhabited by Shans. West of it is
the Mongmaii dependency, a mountainous tract only the south-eastern
corner of which has any population. The title to these two dependen-
cies was finally affirmed by the Anglo-Siamese Boundary Commission
of 1892-3. The total population in 1901 was 29,454, distributed in
443 villages. About 23,000 were Shans, about 5,000 Taungthus, and
the remainder Karens and other tribes. The head-quarters of the
Sawbwa are at Mawkmai (population, 1,375), on tne Nam Nyim,
a tributary of the Nam Teng. The revenue in 1903-4 amounted to
Rs. 42,000 (mainly from thaihameda) ; the chief items of expenditure
were Rs. 18,000 tribute to the British Government, Rs. 10,000 officials'
salaries and general administration charges, Rs. 9,700 privy purse, and
Rs. 4,000 public works.
Mawlu. — Northern township of Katha District, Upper Burma, lying
between 240 18' and 250 7' N. and 950 50' and 960 36' E., on both
sides of the Sagaing-Myitkyina. railway, with an area of 1,344 square
miles. The population was 6,206 in 1891, and 17,178 in 1901, dis-
tributed in 281 villages. The head-quarters are at Mawlu (population,
581), on the railway. The township is situated in the Meza and upper
Namyin (or Mohnyin) valleys, and is separated from Katha by the
Gangaw range, on which the Kachin population lives. The rapid
increase of population and cultivation apparent since 1891 is due to
the railway, which has brought in a large number of immigrants. The
township contained 18 square miles under cultivation in 1903-4, and
the land revenue and ihathameda amounted to Rs. 46,400.
Mawnang (Burmese, Bawnin). — Small State in the Myelat divi-
MAYAVARAM TOWN 237
sion of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 20° 38' and
200 44/ N. and 960 44/ and 960 51' E., with an area of 40 square miles.
It borders on Hsamonghkam on the west, and on the other sides on
Yawnghwe. Rice is grown in the swampy ground in the north, but
the rest of the State is rather arid, and the total cultivated area is only
about 700 acres. The population in 1901 was 3,755 (distributed in
43 villages), of whom more than 2,000 were Taungyos, and the rest
Taungthus, Shans, and Burmese-Shans. The residence of the Myoza
is at Mawnang (population, 198), a little south of the Thazi-Fort Sted-
man road. The revenue in 1904-5 amounted to Rs. 3,900, and the
tribute to the British Government is Rs. 2,000.
Mawson (Burmese, Bawzaing). — Small State in the Myelat divi-
sion of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 200 52' and
210 3' N. and 960 43' and 960 50' E., with an area of 40 square
miles. It is bounded on the north by Lawksawk ; on the east by
Yawnghwe ; on the south by Poila ; and on the west by Pangtara. The
country consists of open rolling downs, like the greater part of the
Myelat. The population in 1901 was 3,557 (distributed in 31 villages),
of whom about 1,500 were Danus, 1,300 Taungthus, and the rest
Taungyos. The residence of the Ngwegunhmu is at Mawson (popu-
lation, 203), in the south of the State. The revenue in 1904-5
amounted to Rs. 2,900, and the tribute to the British Government is
Rs. 1,500.
Mayavaram Subdivision. — Subdivision of Tanjore District,
Madras, consisting of the taluks of Mayavaram and Shiyali.
Mayavaram Taluk. — Coast taluk in the north-east of Tanjore
District, Madras, lying between io° 58' and n° 15' N. and 790 31'
and 790 52' E., with an area of 283 square miles. The population in
1901 was 247,019, compared with 244,835 in 1891. In density it
stands sixth of all the taluks in the Presidency, this being due to its
great agricultural advantages. It is situated wholly in the delta of the
Cauvery river, and more than 99 per cent, of the arable land is under
occupation. Moreover, as it lies near the sea, it receives as much as
from 50 to 53 inches of rain. Most of the land is irrigated, and on
this rice is usually grown, though ground-nuts and gingelly are also
raised in fair quantities. Mayavaram Town, which is the head-quarters
of the taluk, is a municipality with a population of 24,276. The old
Danish settlement of Tranquebar, which lies 18 miles south-east and
is now a declining port, has a population (inclusive of its suburb
Poraiyar) of 13,142. Besides these two towns, there are 186 villages
in the taluk. The demand for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 8,88,000.
Mayavaram Town (Mayuram). — Head-quarters of the taluk of
the same name and the station of a Deputy-Collector, Tanjore District,
q 2
238 MAY AVAR AM TOWN
Madras, situated in n° 6' N. and 790 39' E., on the banks of the
Cauvery, and at the junction of the South Indian Railway main line
with the District board railway. Population (1901), 24,276. The town
is held particularly sacred by Hindus. During the Tula Cauvery
festival (October and November) pilgrims gather from all parts of the
Presidency to bathe in the holy river simultaneously with the idol of
the local shrine. A large Vishnu temple stands on the northern bank
of the Cauvery in Tiruvilandur. The principal shrine, dedicated to
Mayuranathaswami, is a mile to the south of the river. Here Parvati
is said to have worshipped Siva in the form of a peacock (mayfini), and
the name of the town is supposed to have been derived from this
incident. Kornad, a suburb of Mayavaram, has long been famous as
a weaving centre. The cloths woven here are worn by women of the
higher classes throughout India. They are made of a mixture of silk
and cotton thread, and are dyed in durable dark blue, red, and other
colours. The industry is not prosperous, owing to the inability of the
vegetable dyes used to hold their own against imported mineral dyes ;
and with its decline Mayavaram is tending to become a mere market
for agricultural produce. The town was constituted a municipality in
1866. The receipts and expenditure during the ten years ending
1902-3 averaged Rs. 39,000. In 1903-4 the income, most of which
was derived from school fees and house and land taxes, was Rs. 43,200;
and the expenditure was Rs. 42,300. The municipal high school is
a flourishing institution, and the fees derived from it now amount to
more than a third of the total income of the municipality. Sanitation
is hindered by the fact that the place lies low and has no proper
drainage.
Maymyo Subdivision. — South-eastern subdivision of Mandalay
District, Upper Burma, containing the Pyintha, Maymyo, and Wetwin
townships.
Maymyo Township. — Hill township of Mandalay District, Upper
Burma, lying between 210 48' and 220 6' N. [and 960 24' and
960 46' E., with an area of 396 square miles, composed almost entirely
of stretches of undulating scrub-covered upland. The population was
7.993 in 1891, and 13,730 in 1901, distributed in 101 villages and one
town, Maymyo (population, 6,223), tne head-quarters. The inhabitants
are mostly Danus. The thathameda collections in 1903-4 amounted
to Rs. 30,000.
Maymyo Town. — Principal hill station of Burma, in Mandalay
District, situated in 220 1' N. and 960 28" E., on the Mandalay-Lashio
railway, at an elevation of 3,500 feet, and 422 miles by rail from
Rangoon. The station occupies an undulating plateau, surrounded by
hills covered with thin oak forest and bracken, and enjoys a temperate
and, on the whole, a salubrious climate. The clearing of the jungle in
MAYMYO TOWN 239
the immediate neighbourhood, and the draining of the swamps which
used to occupy its low-lying areas, have made Maymyo much healthier
than it was when first occupied ; but even now it is not free from
sickness at the beginning and end of the rains. As regards tern
perature, the average maxima in May, July, and December are 86°
770, and 670, and occasionally the thermometer reaches 90°. The
average minima during the three months mentioned are 66°, 66°,
and 3&0, but as much as six degrees of frost has been recorded in
the winter. The rainfall is comparatively light for a hill station. It
averages 58 inches per annum, and is heaviest in May, June, Sep-
tember, and October.
Maymyo (formerly Pyinulwin) was the seat of a ne-ok (practically
a township officer) under the government of Ava, and after its occu-
pation by British troops in 1886 frequent operations were necessary to
pacify the surrounding country, the last being in 1890. Since that
date the town has prospered, the population in 1901 being 6,223
(including 2,016 Hindus and 821 Musalmans), compared with 1,665
in 1891. The rapid extension of the station has attracted many China-
men and natives of India, the former chiefly as carpenters and masons,
the latter as general traders and coolies. There are now 23 miles of
metalled roads, including a portion of the main road from Mandalay
to Lashio which passes through the town, and a large number of
buildings, public and private, all the more pretentious of which are
of brick. The latter include a residence for the Lieutenant-Governor,
a circuit-house, the Secretariat, and several dak and inspection bunga-
lows, besides offices for the subdivisional officer and the various officials
of the Public Works and Forest departments who have their permanent
head-quarters at Maymyo. Maymyo is now the head-quarters of the
Lieutenant-General commanding the Burma division. The canton-
ment extends on both sides of the railway, partly on the high ground
at the foot of the hills lying west of the town, where quarters are to
be built for a British regiment. The permanent garrison consists of
a Gurkha battalion.
The affairs of the town are administered by a committee, the income
of which in 1903-4 was Rs. 83,000, devoted largely to conservancy.
The cantonment fund had an income of Rs. 5,000 in the same year.
A trade registration station is situated on the Mandalay-Lashio road to
the east of the town. A reservoir in the hills to the west was completed
in 1902, and the town is now supplied with excellent water. An
additional reservoir is being constructed. When it is finished, the
reserve water-supply will exceed 20 million gallons. Educational insti-
tutions include a Government high school, a girls' school supported by
the Church of England, and a Roman Catholic school. The civil
hospital, a collection of brick buildings built in 1903-4, has accommo-
246 MAYMYO TOWN
elation for 20 in-patients. Near the hospital is the bazar, where a
market is held once every five days.
Mayni. — Town a in the Khatao taluka of Satara District, Bombay,
situated in 17° 26' N. and 740 35' E., 40 miles south-east of Satara
town. Population (1901), 5,312 (including 1,622 persons returned
in a famine relief camp). The municipality, which was established in
1867, had an income during the decade ending 1901 averaging
Rs. 1,400. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 1,650. The small stream
on which Mayni stands has been dammed about a mile to the east,
to increase the water-supply of the inhabitants as well as for irriga-
tion purposes.
Mayo Mine. — Salt mine in the Pind Dadan Khan tahsiloi Jhelum
District, Punjab, situated in 320 39' N. and 730 3' E. The mine lies
in the Salt Range at the village of Khewra, 5^ miles north-east of the
town of Pind Dadan Khan ; and the mineral occurs in vast quantities,
the deposits extending towards the summit of the hill above the village
(1,650 feet above sea-level) and going down to a great depth below the
present floor-level of the mine. When the salt was first worked is not
known ; but excavations existed on the spot as far back as the time
of Akbar, and the miners have a tradition that their first settlement
dates from the sixth century of the Muhammadan era. The existing
mine was named after Lord Mayo in 1870. Under Sikh rule several
mines were working in the hill ; but the excavations were not made
with any regard to economy or safety, and in consequence they have
all either fallen in or are in danger of so doing. In 1869-70 a qualified
mining engineer was appointed and a scientific system of working was
introduced.
It is estimated that 534,512 tons had been excavated up to 1850, and
from that year to the end of March, 1904, the out-turn was 2,572,705
tons. It is calculated that a further supply of 8^ million tons is easily
accessible in the part of the hill which has been explored, and that
large quantities exist in its unexplored parts beyond the limits of the
existing mine. The mine has a maximum length of 1,405 feet, and is
2,691 feet broad at its widest part.
A bridge across the Khewra gorge carries a tramway by which the
salt is conveyed to the depot from which it is issued. This bridge is
929 feet above sea-level, and as the mine is higher than the bridge, the
working is greatly facilitated. Ample space for extension exists on
the north, south, and east, but on the west the gorge precludes
tunnelling without going much deeper than the existing floor. West
of the gorge, however, stands a hill with four times the mass of the
mine hill, and undoubtedly, containing rich deposits as yet untouched.
In 1903-4 the mine gave daily employment to 1,205 persons, chiefly
: Mayni was not treated as a town at the Census of iyoi.
MAYURBHANJ 241
belonging to the mining community, whose occupation is hereditary.
They work in family parties, the women and children over twelve years
of age assisting in the carriage of the salt from the excavations to the
loading stations. A few outsiders are employed as porters and in
loading or moving the trucks. The miners receive 10^ pies per cubic
foot of space excavated, the payment covering the stacking of salt at
the loading stations on the tramway. Government paid 1-4 lakhs in
wages during 1903-4 for the mining and issuing of salt at Khewra and
the special work connected therewith. For mining purposes the hill is
divided into parallel blocks not exceeding 45 feet in width and running
in the direction of the prevailing dip of the salt strata, alternating with
similar blocks not less than 25 feet wide, in which no excavation is
permitted except for tunnels, travelling ways, and loading stations for
the tramways. These blocks, or pillars, which support the mine roof,
are now generally 30 feet thick, and they are further strengthened by
beds of marl which lie between the salt seams, and which are not
removed when the salt is being excavated. The marl is impure salt,
lying in beds of varying thickness between the seams of salt and
thinning out as it dips down in the hill until eventually its place is
taken by salt. Three tramways run through the mine, two of them
being connected by a self-acting incline on which the loaded trucks
draw the empty trucks up. The whole of the salt is carried to the
depot outside the gorge in trucks which run by gravitation, but are
hauled back empty by mules and ponies or are pushed back by men.
The mine is intersected with tunnels which serve for ventilation as well
as travelling ways. Rain-water is kept out by a network of drains
at the surface, and most of the little water that percolates into the
mine is caught up inside in masonry drains and flows out. In 1903-4
the Mayo Mine supplied 2,264,187 maunds, or 87-6 per cent, of the
salt issued from the Cis-Indus and Kalabagh Mines division. Of this,
98-8 per cent, was removed by the North-Western Railway, which runs
to the salt depot at Warthganj at the mouth of the Khewra gorge, for
distribution over the Punjab (including Kashmir and other Native
States), the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, Bihar and (in small
quantities) Lower Bengal, Sind, Baluchistan, and the Central Provinces.
The revenue (duty) realized from the sale of Mayo Mine salt in 1903-4
amounted to 46-9 lahhs.
Mayurbhanj. — The most northerly of the Tributary States of
Orissa, Bengal, lying between 210 17' and 220 34' X. and 850 40'
and 870 10' E. It is by far the largest of the Orissa States, and has
an area of 4,243 square miles. It is bounded on the north by the
Districts of Singhbhum and Midnapore : on the east by Midnapore
and Balasore : on the south by Balasore and the Xilgiri State : and on
the west by Keonjhar.
242 MAYURBHANJ
Mayurbhanj presents every variety of soil and scenery. A block
of hills occupies an area of about 1,000 square miles in the centre
of the State, and abounds in rich valleys and dense timber forests.
This region is almost unexplored at present, but efforts are being
made to open it out by roads. In the south the MeghasanI hill
attains a height of 3,824 feet above the sea. Large herds of
elephants roam through the mountains and forests, and successful
khedda operations are carried on from time to time.
It is related in native chronicles that the principality of Mayurbhanj
was founded about 1,300 years ago by a relative of the Raja, of Jaipur
in Raj pu tana. The family title is Bhanja ('breaker'), which, it is said,
was assumed after the overthrow of a chieftain named Mayuradhwaj,
an event which is also believed to account for the present name of the
State. The chief's emblem is a peafowl {tnayiir), and there is another
tradition which alleges that his family originally sprang from a pea-
fowl's eyes ; the killing of this heraldic bird is strictly prohibited
throughout the State. The remains of ruined temples, tanks, &c, at
Khiching, near Udaipur, indicate a condition of considerable pros-
perity in the past. The State came under British control with the
conquest of Orissa in 1803, prior to which it had been feudatory to
the Marathas ; and in 1829 a treaty engagement was entered into
between the British and the Raja.
The enumerated population rose from 258,680 in 1872 to 385,737
in 1881, to 532,238 in 1891, and to 610,383 in 1901. A great deal
of this remarkable increase must be ascribed to the defective character
of the earlier enumerations. In the last decade the growth amounted
to 14-7 per cent., and in 1901 the density was 144 persons per
square mile. The climate is on the whole fairly healthy, except in
the hills and jungle tracts, which are very malarious. The inhabitants
are contained in one town, Baripada (population, 5,613), and 3,593
villages, of which the most important are Bahalda and Karanjia, the
head-quarters of the Ba.mangha.ti and Panchplr subdivisions. Hindus
number 507,738, Animists 98,485, and Muhammadans 3,785. The
majority of the people are of aboriginal origin ; the most numerous
castes are Santals (185,000), Hos (68,000), Bhumijs (56,000), Kurmis
(36,000), Bhuiyas (32,000), Gaurs and Bathudis (30,000 each), Pans
(25,000), and Khandaits (15,000). A Baptist mission is at work at
Baripada and a Roman Catholic mission at Nangalkata, 8 miles from
Baripada on the Balasore road.
The people are almost entirely agricultural and lead an uneventful
and contented life, so long as the harvests are good. About one-third
of the State is under cultivation, and the remainder is either forest or
waste. There is ample room for the extension of tillage, and large
tracts are reclaimed each year under leases granted by the State. Rice
MAYURBHANJ 243
is the staple crop ; rabi crops and peas and pulses are cultivated along
the river banks, and sugar-cane and tobacco are also grown. Experi-
ments are being made in the growth of long-stapled cotton. Forest
conservancy now forms an important branch of the administration,
but the forests are suffering severely from the ruthless destruction of
former times.
A geological survey of the Slate was recently undertaken, and it is
reported that its iron ores are possibly the richest and most extensive
in India. They occur in all parts of the State, but especially in
Bamanghati, where there are a considerable number of smelters working
with crude apparatus. It is proposed to construct a branch line to
carry the ore to Sini on the Bengal-Nagpur Railway, where large iron
and steel works are to be built. Limestone in the shape of tufa or
travertine is found in several localities, also red and yellow ochres ;
and the clays underlying the laterite near Baripada constitute an
excellent material for pottery. Gold is washed for in the Subarnarekha
river on the northern confines of Mayurbhanj proper, and in the Kadkai
and Bonai rivers in the Bamanghati subdivision : at the head-waters
of the latter river there is a tract of about 2 square miles where almost
the entire alluvium is auriferous, and separated from it by a low range
of hills is another area of placer deposit of similar extent. In these
two localities about 70 families obtain a livelihood by gold-washing,
but they only scrape the surface soil ; nuggets weighing as much as
2 or 3 tolas are said to be found occasionally. Mica occurs extensively
in both the Mayurbhanj and Bamanghati subdivisions, but the plates
obtained are small ; and agate, flint, and jasper are found in some
profusion in the latter subdivision.
• The rearing of tasar cocoons and the cultivation of lac are exten-
sively carried on, especially in Bamanghati. There is a considerable
trade in forest produce, such as timber, lac, myrabolams, nux-vomica,
honey, resin, and fuel. Horns and hides, rice, oilseeds, and cereals
are also exported.
A narrow-gauge branch line connecting Baripada town with Rupsa
junction on the Bengal-Nagpur Railway, a distance of 32 miles, was
opened in 1905. The town is also connected by metalled roads with
Bahalda and Karanjia, the head-quarters of the outlying subdhisions,
and with the towns of Balasore and Midnapore ; and several fair-
weather roads lead from it to other parts of the State.
The head-quarters are at Baripada Town, which contains the
residence of the chief and the seat of the administration. There are
two outlying subdivisions, Bamanghati and Panchplr, with head-
quarters at Bahalda and Karanjia respectively.
The administration of the State is conducted on British lines under
the personal supervision of the chief, who has been vested with higher
244 MA YURBHANJ
criminal powers than any of the other tributary chiefs, being em-
powered to pass sentences of imprisonment for five years. He is
assisted by a Diwan and three Assistant Diwans, and the judicial
officers include a State Judge, a Subordinate Judge, and two Munsifs ;
of the latter the Subordinate Judge and one Munsif have the powers
of a magistrate of the first class, while the other Munsif has second-
class powers. The subdivisional officers are vested with limited
revenue, criminal, and civil powers. The Educational department is
controlled by a Superintendent, the Public Works department by
a State Engineer, and the police and jails by a Superintendent ; the
' reserved ' forests are under the management of a Forest officer, while
the protected forests are under the revenue authorities. The State has
a revenue of 9^ lakhs, the current land revenue demand being 7 lakhs ;
and the tribute payable to the British Government is Rs. 1,068.
The police force consists of 33 officers and 201 men, in charge of
a European officer. A masonry jail has accommodation for 89 prisoners.
Education has made rapid progress during the last twenty years, and
in addition to a high school at Baripada 284 schools of all kinds
are scattered over the State. The State contains six dispensaries ; the
people are beginning to appreciate them, and the number of patients
is gradually rising.
Mayureswar.— Village in the Rampur Hat subdivision of Birbhum
District, Bengal, situated in 230 59' N. and 870 46' E., on the road
from SQri to Murshidabad. Population (1901), 2,535. The inhabitants
are principally engaged in rearing silkworms, and in silk-spinning and
weaving.
Mazalgaon Taluk.— North-eastern taluk of Bhir District, Hyder-
abad State, with an area of 775 square miles. The population in 1901,
including jagirs, was 122,135, compared with 132,658 in 1891, the
decrease being due to the famines of 1897 and 1899- 1900. The taluk
contains one town, Mazalgaon (population, 5,698), the head-quarters ;
and 223 villages, of which 51 are jagir. The land revenue in 1901 was
3 lakhs. The country is very fertile, being composed of black cotton
soil. The Godavari river flows through the northern portion.
Mazalgaon Town.— Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name
in Bhir District, Hyderabad State, situated in 190 9' N. and 760 13' E.,
on the left bank of the Sindphana, a tributary of the Godavari.
Population (1901), 5,698. It is a rising town, the principal trade being
in grain, while indigo was once largely dealt in.
Mazar-i- Sharif.— Capital of the province of Afghan-Turkistan,
situated in 360 43' N. and 670 7' E., 318 miles from Kabul; 1,235 feet
above the sea. The place is held sacred as the alleged burial-place of
All, the son-in-law and cousin of Muhammad; and a tomb consisting
of two lofty cupolas was built to him by Sultan All Mirza in the first
MEDAK DISTRICT 245
half of the fifteenth century. As a matter of fact, All was not buried
at Mazar, but at Najaf, in Turkey. In the early half of the last century
Mazar was subject to Murad Beg of Kunduz. In 1852 it was taken by
the governor of Balkh and has since remained in Afghan hands. The
present prosperity of the town dates from the time of Muhammad
Alam Khan, Amir Sher All's governor. Since 1869 it has become the
seat of government of Afghan-Turkistan and a not unimportant com-
mercial centre. The old portion of the town is enclosed by a thin
wall, now in ruins, and is mainly occupied by the tomb and a large
straggling bazar. Around this the new town has grown rapidly, and
buildings and gardens have sprung up on all sides in the neighbour-
hood. Mazar now resembles a mass of inhabited gardens and orchards
rather than a regular town. The population of the town and suburbs
is about 6,000 families, mainly Uzbegs, but including a few Hindu
traders.
Medak District. — District in the Medak Gulshanabad Division of
Hyderabad State, lying between 170 25' and 180 19' N. and 770 48'
and 78° 31' E., with a total area of 2,005 square miles, including
856 square miles of jaglr and paigah lands1. It is bounded on the
north-east and north by Karimnagar and Nizamabad ; on the east and
south by the Atraf-i-balda District ; and on the west by Bidar District
and paigah estates. There are numerous low hills. One range extends
from Ramayampet in the north to the southern
portion of Nizamabad, and then turning to the south aspects
again enters the District. Another range extends
from the north-western corner to the east. The fort of Medak stands
on the summit of one of these hills to the west of the town.
The most important river is the Manjra, which enters Medak from
Bidar, and passes through its western and north-western tdluks, its total
length in the District being 60 miles. The Haldi or Paspaver, a tribu-
tary of the Manjra, which enters the District from the north, flows
under Medak town ; its length is only 10 miles.
The rock formation is the Archaean gneiss.
The trees commonly found are teak, bijasal (Pterocarpus Marsu-
pium), nallamaddi (Terminalia tomenlosa), tppa (Hardzuichia binata),
mohwa (Bassia latifolia), mm [Melia Azadirachtd), mango, tamarind,
tarvar (Cassia auricula /a), and various species of Fie us.
The District contains large tracts of woody and scrubby jungle,
where nilgai, spotted deer, sdmbar, and wild dogs are found. Partridge,
quail, duck, teal, snipe, &c, abound everywhere.
The climate is very healthy from September to June; but during
the rainy season malarial fevers and agues prevail, the taluks of
1 Except where otherwise stated, the statistics in this article relate to the District as
it stood before the changes of 1905 referred to in the section on Population.
246
MEDAK DISTRICT
History.
Ramayampet, Medak, and Baghat being especially liable to these
ailments, owing to the excessive humidity of the atmosphere. The
temperature during the winter falls to 450, while in May it rises to
100° The annual rainfall averages 31 inches ; but in 1899 the amount
received was only 17^ inches, and in 1902 about 13 inches.
This District formed part of the ancient kingdom of Warangal. In
1309 Ala-ud-din's general, Malik Kaffir, marched with a large army
against the Raja of Warangal, and took Medak on
his route. In the fourteenth century Medak formed
part of the Bahmani kingdom, and subsequently passed to the Kutb
Shahi dynasty of Golconda. On the fall of Golconda, it was annexed
to the Mughal empire, from which it was detached in the early part of
the eighteenth century on the foundation of the Hyderabad State.
The District contains many places of archaeological interest. The
fort of Medak stands about 300 feet above the surrounding plain.
Patancheru, 16 miles north-west of Hyderabad, contains some old
Hindu underground temples, where ancient coins have recently been
discovered. Andol and Komatur have old mosques of note; and
Chatkur, Kalabgur, Kandi, Nandj, Patancheru, and Venkatapur,
ancient Hindu temples. At Yedupailu, south-east of Medak, where
seven tributaries of the Manjra meet, a large religious fair is held
annually.
There are 634 towns and villages in the District. The total popula-
tion at each Census in the last twenty years was: (1881) 326,72c,
(1891) 364,735, and (1901) 366,722. The towns are
Medak and Lingampet in the Medak taluk, Siddi-
pet1, and Sadaseopet. Sangareddipet is the District head-quarters.
About 90 per cent, of the population are Hindus, and nearly all the
rest Muhammadans. Telugu is the language chiefly spoken. The
following table shows the distribution of population in 1901: —
Population.
V
Number of
**- -'.
0
rt
C
w C J - .
•^ u
Think.
ft
C
V
2
3
0.
0 c
I-
3 s
« 5.2 - <*>
u-u 3 H =
mber o
ons abl
ail ant
write.
<
2
>
i,
56,495
O w
04
192
h " g.
a.
Medak
294
70
+ 4-4
Ramayampet
273
79
55.485
203
* 2-9
■£>
Baghat
25
'5
5.544
222
+ 125-3
£
Kalabgur
234
I
85
56,313
240
- 18.8
L «*
Andol .
2J2
. . .
77
48,849
230
+ 3-7
rt
Tekmal
i ri
. • .
45
20,684
lS6
- 1.1
O
lagirs, &c. .
District total
856
2,005
3
260
631
123,352
I44
+ 3.2
9.360
366,722
•S3
+ 0.5
1 Siddipct was transferred to this District from Karimnagar in 1905.
A GRTCUL TURE 247
In 1905 Tekmal was merged in Andol, and Ramayampet partly in
Medak and partly in the Kamareddipet taluk of Nizamabad (Indur)
District. Ibrahlmpatan was transferred from Mahbubnagar District
and added to Baghat, while Siddipet was transferred to this District
from KarTmnagar (Elgandal). In its present form the District consists
of five taluks : Medak, Siddipet, Baghat, Kalabgur, and Andol, besides
the four large estates of Hatnura, Narsapur, Narsingi, and Nawabpet,
and other minor jaglrs.
The most numerous caste is that of the Kapus (69,000). Next
come the Madigas or leather-workers (40,300), and the Malas or Dhers
(32,400), both of whom work also as agricultural labourers. There are
37,400 Brahmans, 32,300 Gollas or shepherds, and 13,600 Komatis,
who form the trading and money-lending caste. Nearly 42 per cent,
of the population depend directly upon agriculture, and 1 1 per cent, on
general labour and earthwork.
The total number of Christians, according to the last Census, was
373, of whom 327 were natives. A Wesleyan mission at Medak town
was started in 1887, and has a staff of 8 Europeans and 45 natives.
The adherents are chiefly of the Mala caste. The mission maintains
a school and a hospital. The former was opened in 1887 and the latter
in 1895, a large zanana ward being added in 1902.
There is hardly any difference in the agricultural condition of the
several taluks. The soils on the highlands are mostly sandy and
gravelly, while black soil is found in small patches .
?,»,/, , Agriculture,
in hollows or depressed areas.
The tenure of lands is chiefly ryotwari. In 1901 the District con-
tained 1,149 square miles of khalsa lands, of which 489 were cultivated.
Of the remainder, 114 were cultivable waste and fallows, 387 were
forests, and 159 were not available for cultivation. The staple food-
crops are rice, MJra, and jowdr, the areas under which were 106,
207, and 168 square miles respectively. The rice in this District
compares favourably with the finest qualities produced elsewhere.
Next in importance are kodro, lach/ia, and various pulses. Sugar-
cane is grown in all the taluks, covering about one square mile.
The cattle are of the ordinary kind, and buffaloes are extensively
employed in rice and sugar-cane cultivation. No special breed of
ponies or horses is indigenous to the District, those found being very
inferior. At Rajampet, near Sangareddipet, there is a State stud farm,
where several stallions are kept with the object of improving the breed,
but ryots are slow in taking advantage of the facilities offered them in
this respect. Sheep and goats of the ordinary description are reared.
The total area of irrigated land in 1 900-1 was 109 square miles, or
more than 22 per cent, of the cultivated area. The different sources of
irrigation and the areas supplied by each are as follows : Canals and
248 MEDAK DISTRICT
channels, 17 square miles; tanks, 68; and wells, 24. Tank-irrigation
is the mainstay of the District, which contains 351 large and 1,658 small
tanks. The number of wells is 2,018 ; and the other sources of irriga-
tion are small anicuts, called mathris, of which there are 74. The
Malkapur tank irrigates the lands of 1 2 villages. Generally two crops
of rice are raised with tank and well irrigation. Water is raised from
wells in leathern buckets. A large canal taking off from the Manjra
has been constructed at a cost of over 10 lakhs, which is estimated to
irrigate 10,000 acres of land, and to yield a revenue of 2 lakhs. It
was opened in 1904. Another project, called the Manjra Extension,
when completed will cost 6\ lakhs and irrigate 7,000 acres, securing
a revenue of i\ lakhs. The District has always been immune from
famine, owing to the large number of tanks it contains.
Medak contains no protected forests, but there are 387 square miles
of unprotected forest.
No minerals of any value are found. In the hills of Lingampet
nodular ironstone is smelted, and the iron is largely employed in the
local manufacture of agricultural implements.
There is no important hand industry in the District. Cotton cloth
is printed with fast dyes for use as screens, tablecloths, floor-cloths,
«Scc. Coarse cotton cloth and silk stuffs of superior
Trade and quality are made, the latter after European patterns,
communications. , ^ , , ir --ox.
and are largely used lor coats, sans, occ. brass
vessels are made at Lingampet and Ramayampet. Sivanagar and
Jogipet contain tanneries, whence leather is exported to Hyderabad,
Bombay, and Madras. The Chamars prepare leather for the manu-
facture of water buckets and sandals for the ryots. The Hyderabad
Spinning and Weaving Mill is situated near Mushirabad, in the Baghat
taluk, north of the city of Hyderabad.
The main exports are rice, both fine and coarse, unrefined sugar,
jaggery, jowar, tobacco, mahtia oil, cotton, gram, other cereals and
pulses, brass and copper vessels, cattle, and leather : while the chief
imports are salt, opium, salted fish, gold and silver, copper, brass,
sulphur, kerosene oil, refined sugar, silk and cotton piece-goods. Rice
is sent to Hyderabad and other parts of the State, and leather to
Madras and Bombay. Imported articles are brought to Sadaseopet
from Shankarpalli, on the Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway ; and
from Mirzapalli, on the Hyderabad-Godavari Valley Railway to Rama-
yampet, and thence distributed to Sangareddipet, Jogipet, Lingampet,
Medak, &c, whence they find their way to distant parts through weekly
bazars. Komatis, Marwaris, and Baljawars are the trading castes,
and they also lend money.
The Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway enters Medak from the west
at Gullaguda and passes out at Lingampalli in the east, a distance of
ADMINISTRATIOX 249
22 miles. The Hyderabad-Godavari Valley Railway runs almost due
north and south through Manoharabad, Masaipet, and Mirzapalli on
the eastern border of the District.
The total length of roads is 183 miles, of which 81 miles are metalled.
The metalled roads are in three sections : Sadaseopet to Kukatpalli,
32 miles; Shankarpalli to Sangareddipet, 14 miles; and part of the old
Nagpur road, 35 miles. Unmetalled roads lead to the remaining head-
quarters of taluks.
This District, though a small one, has been divided into three sub-
divisions. The Medak and Siddipet taluks are under a Third Talukdar,
Andol under the Second Talukdar of Andol, and 4J .
, „ , , , r, 1 rr^-i 1 Administration.
Kalabgur and Baghat under another Second taluk-
dar. There is also another Third Talukdar who acts as Assistant to
the First Talukdar, the First Talukdar or Collector overlooking the
revenue and magisterial work of his subordinates. Each taluk is under
a tahsildar.
The District civil court at Sangareddipet is presided over by the
Nazim-i-Dlivani or Civil Judge, who is also a Joint-Magistrate in
the absence of the First Talukdar from head-quarters. The First
Talukdar is the chief magistrate. The tahsildars exercise third-class
civil and magisterial powers, and preside over taluk civil courts. The
Second and Third Talukdars exercise second-class magisterial powers.
There is not much serious crime in ordinary years, but dacoities and
cattle-thefts increase in number during the dry season when the roads
are open.
Little information is available as to the revenue history of the
District. Formerly groups of villages or taluks were farmed out by
the State to contractors, who received 10 per cent, for collection.
This was followed by the batai or share system, under which the State
received three-fifths of the produce of lands irrigated from tanks, and
an equal share from lands supplied by wells. In 1866 the ryotwari
system was introduced, and revenue was collected in cash from indi-
vidual ryots. Kalabgur was regularly settled in 1892, Andol in 1898,
Ramayampet and Medak in 1900, Tekmal in 1901, and Baghat taluk
in 1905. Sugar-cane was charged Rs. 200 per acre under the old
system, but now water rates are levied for ' wet crops ' according to
the class of land. Before the commencement of the survey, the records
showed an area of 67,400 acres of 'wet' lands and 119,463 acres of
' dry.' The result of the survey was a decrease of 3 per cent, in the
'wet,' and an increase of 103 per cent, in the 'dry' lands, while the
settlement raised the revenue by 2 lakhs or 16 per cent, in the i\\e
taluks surveyed. The average assessment on 'dry' land is Rs. 2
(maximum Rs. 4, minimum R. 0-4), and on ' wet ' land Rs. 1 3
(maximum Rs. 20 minimum Rs. 6). The rates given for 'wet' lands
25°
MEDAK DISTRICT
are for the abi (rainy season) crop, the iabi (hot season) crop rates
being Rs. 35 maximum, Rs. 10 minimum, and Rs. 20 average.
The land revenue and the total revenue of the District for a series of
years are shown below, in thousands of rupees : —
1881.
1891.
1901.
1903.
Land revenue
Total revenue
8,50
n,45
8,40
M,i3
12,12
17,75
8,97
13,63
Owing to the changes in area made in 1905, the revenue demand is
now about 14-6 lakhs.
There is a municipality at Sangareddipet, and each of the other taluk
head-quarters has a small conservancy establishment. The District
board manages both the municipal and local affairs of the head-
quarters, and also supervises the work of the outlying taluk boards.
The expenditure in 1900-1 was Rs. 12,600, of which Rs. 497 was
laid out on roads. The income was, as usual, derived from a portion
of the land cess, levied at one anna in the rupee on the land revenue
assessments.
The First Talukdar is the head of the District police, with the Super-
intendent {Mohtamim) as his executive deputy. The force consists of
67 subordinate officers, 499 constables, and 25 mounted police, under
6 inspectors and one sub-inspector, distributed among 32 police
stations. There is a District jail at Sangareddipet, but only short-
sentence prisoners are kept there, the rest being sent to the Central
jail at Nizamabad.
The District takes a medium position in point of literacy, 2-6 per
cent. (4-6 males and 0-35 females) of the population being able to read
and write in 1901. The total number of pupils under instruction in
1881, 1891, 1901, and 1903 was 774, 2,293, I,9°7, ar*d 2,044 respec-
tively. In 1903 there were 25 primary schools and one middle school,
with 159 girls under instruction. The total expenditure on education
in 1901 was Rs. 13,100, and the fee receipts amounted to Rs. 731.
The District contains 4 dispensaries, with accommodation for 1 1 in-
patients. The total number of cases treated at these during 1901 was
200 in-patients and 31,422 out-patients ; and the number of operations
performed was 920. The total expenditure amounted to Rs. 11,200.
The number of persons successfully vaccinated in 1901 was 540, or
only 1-47 per 1,000 of population.
Medak Taluk. — TEluk in Medak District, Hyderabad State, with
an area of 359 square miles. Its population in 1901, including jagirs,
was 65,852, compared with 63,066 in 1891. The taluk contains two
towns, Medak (population, 8,511), the head-quarters, and Linoampet
(5,102); and 89 villages, of which 19 are jagtr. The land revenue
MEDCHAL
25*
in 1 90 1 was 32 lakhs. The taluk is somewhat hilly, and its soils are
mostly sandy. Rice and sugar-cane are largely raised by tank-irriga-
tion. The Hyderabad-Godavari Valley Railway passes through the
eastern portion. The paigah taluks of Narsapur, Hatnura, and Nawab-
pet lie to the south, with populations of 15,567, 14,183, and 6,179
respectively. The two former consist of 39 villages each, and the
latter of 8 villages. Their respective areas are about 130, 128, and
26 square miles. The jagir taluk of Narsingi, with 1 1 villages and
a population of 8,093, also lies to the south, and has an area of about
36 square miles. In 1905 some villages were added to the taluk from
Ramayampet, while others were transferred from it to Kamareddipet
and Yellareddipet in Nizamabad.
Medak Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in
Medak District, Hyderabad State, situated in 180 3' N. and 780 26' E.
Population (1901), 8,511. The town is built on the northern and
eastern sides of a high hill, which was at one time strongly fortified.
The fortifications are said to have been built originally by a Warangal
Raja, but the present fort was constructed about the middle of the
sixteenth century. It contains a brass gun 10 feet long, cast at Rotter-
dam for the Dutch in 1620. A Persian inscription on a slab in the
taluk office alludes to the building of a mosque in 1641, on the ruins
of a demolished temple. A large mission school, with 180 pupils, and
several mission buildings stand north-east of the town.
Medak Gulshanabad Division. — Division of the Hyderabad
State, formed in 1905 from the old Bidar Division. It includes four
Districts, as shown below : —
District.
Area in square
miles.
Population,
1901.
Land revenue
and cesses,
in thousands
of rupees.
Nizamabad (Indur)
Medak .
Mahbubnagar
Nalgonda
Total
3,282
3,447
5,842
4,9 1 3
467,367
536,027
613,771
823,121
16.II
15,52
8,S6
15,53
'7,484
2,440,286
56,02
The density of population is 1,396 persons per square mile ; and the
Division contains n towns and 2,747 villages. The chief places of
commercial importance are the towns of Nizamabad, Medak, Sadasko-
pet, Siddipet, Mahbubnagar, Naravanpet, Nalgonda, and Bhox-
gir. Medak, Nalgonda, and Bhonglr are also places of historic interest.
The head-quarters of the Subahdar or Commissioner are at Patancheru.
Medchal. — Crown taluk in the north-east of the Atraf-i-balda Dis-
trict, Hyderabad State, also called the ShimCxli or ' northern ' taluk,
with an area of 634 square miles. The population in 1901, including
VOL. XVII. K
252
ME DC HAL
jdgirs, was 80,520, compared with 91,113 in 1891. The tahtk contains
167 villages, of which 106 are jdgir; and Medchal (population, 3,019)
is the head-quarters. The land revenue in 1901 was one lakh.
Medchal is well supplied with tanks from which much rice is irrigated.
The jdgir taluk of Allabad, with a population of 3,201, 2 villages,
and an area of about 8 square miles, lies to the east of Medchal.
Medinipur. — District, subdivision, town, and canal in Bengal. See
Midnapore.
Meeanee (1). — Village in the District and taluka of Hyderabad,
Sind, Bombay. See Miani (2).
Meeanee (2). — Town in the Dasuya tahsil of Hoshiarpur District,
Punjab. See Miani (3).
Meeanee (3). — Town in Shahpur District, Punjab. See Miani (4).
Meean Meer. — Former name of Lahore Cantonment, Punjab.
Meerut Division. — Division on the north-western border of the
United Provinces, extending from the outer ranges of the Himalayas
across the valley of the Dun and its southern boundary, the Siwalik
range, to the middle of the Doab. It lies between 270 29' and 310 2' N.
and 770 2' and 780 38'' E., and is bounded throughout by the Jumna
on the west and the Ganges on the east. The head-quarters of the
Commissioner are at Meerut City. The total population of the
Division increased from 5,141,204 in 1881 to 5,326,833 in 1891, and
5,979^7 i 1 in 1901, the increase during the last decade having been
greater than in any other Division of the Provinces. The total area is
11,302 square miles; and the density of population is 529 persons per
square mile, compared with 445 for the Provinces as a whole. The
Division is the fifth largest in area and the third in population. In 1901
Hindus numbered 75 per cent, of the total and Musalmans 23 per cent.;
other religions include Jains (37,941), Aryas (33,718), Christians (29,294,
of whom 22,864 were natives), and Sikhs (4,148). The Division con-
tains six Districts, as shown below : —
District.
Area in square
miles.
Population,
1 go 1.
Land revenue
and cesses,
1903-4,
in thousands
of rupees.
Dehra Dun
Saharanpur
Miizaffarnagar .
Meernt ....
Bulandshahr
AlTgarh ....
Total
1,209
2,228
1,666
2,354
1,899
1,946
178>195
1,045,230
877)iS8
',540,175
1 ,138,101
1,200,822
1,09
17,76
17.57
32,6l
23,31
27,97
1,20,31
1 1,302
5,979,7 "
Dehra Dun lies chiefly between the Siwaliks and the Himalayas,
stretching up into both ranges ; Saharanpur reaches the Siwaliks, but
MEERUT DISTRICT 253
lies chiefly in the great plain ; and the other Districts are entirely sepa-
rated from the hills. The Division contains 112 towns and 7,713
villages. The largest towns are Meerut (population, 118,129 with
cantonments), Aligarh (70,434), Saharanpur (66,254), Hathras
(42,578), Khurja (29,277), Dehra (28,095 with cantonments), Har-
dwar (25,597), Muzaffarnagar (23,444), and Deoband (20,167).
The chief places of commercial importance are Meerut, Saharanpur,
Aligarh (Koil), Hathras, Khurja, and Muzaffarnagar ; but many other
smaller towns are important centres of the grain trade. Hardwar and
Garhmuktesar are famous for their religious associations. Hastina-
pur, now a tiny hamlet, is reputed to have been the capital of the
Pandava kingdom. At Kalsi there is a rock inscription of Asoka ;
Baran or Bulandshahr, AlIgarh or Koil, and Sardhana have special
associations, referred to in the articles on those places, while Meerut
city was the place where the great Mutiny first broke out in Northern
India in May, 1857.
Meerut District (Merath). — District in the United Provinces, lying
between 280 3$' and 290 18' N. and 770 7' and 780 12' E., with an area
of 2,354 square miles. It is bounded on the north by Muzaffarnagar
District and on the south by Bulandshahr, while the Ganges divides it
on the east from Moradabad and Bijnor, and the Jumna on the west
from the Punjab Districts of Karnal and Delhi. On
the banks of these great rivers are stretches of Physical
inferior low-lying khddar land. The rest of the
District is, for the most part, a level upland, the edges of which are
scored by ravines. This may be divided into three main tracts. The
western division, stretching almost to the Upper Ganges Canal, has an
extraordinarily rich and uniform soil, except immediately above the
rivers Jumna and Hindan. East of this lies a shallow depression with
poor natural drainage. The third tract, extending to the high banks
of the Ganges, is characterized by the presence of sandy dunes, which
are scattered in various directions in the eastern portion, but form
a well-defined ridge in the west.
Besides the Jumna and the Ganges, the most important river is the
Hindan, which runs through the west of the District and has a con-
siderable area of khddar land. Two small streams called Chhoiya, and
a cut called the Abu Nala, carry off part of the drainage of the central
depression and the eastern tract into the ill-defined bed of the East
Kali Nadi. In the extreme east of the District the Burhganga, or
' Old Ganges,' forms a chain of swamps close below the old high bank.
Meerut is situated entirely in the Ganges alluvium, and kankar and
saline efflorescences are the only minerals.
The botany of the District presents no peculiarities. There is very
little natural jungle, and grazing land is chiefly found in the Ganges
r 2
254 MEERUT DISTRICT
and Jumna khadars, and to a less extent along the Hindan. The
District is, however, well wooded, and groves cover 21 square miles.
The commonest tree is the mango ; but the bel and guava are largely
grown for fruit, and the shisham is planted in the road and canal
avenues.
Leopards are fairly common in the Ganges khadar and ravines, but
tigers are extremely rare. Antelope are numerous in most parts of
the District ; Meerut is famous for wild hog, and the pig-sticking com-
petition held annually for the Kadir {khadar) Cup in March or April is
well-known. Other animals found include the wolf, fox, jackal, hog
deer, and nilgai. Game-birds are numerous. Duck and teal are found
along the Burhganga and other rivers, and in the^ larger swamps in the
interior. Snipe, geese, black and grey partridges, quail, pigeons, and
sand-grouse are also common.
The comparatively high latitude and elevated position of Meerut
make it one of the healthiest Districts in the plains of India. From
November to March the weather is cool and invigorating, hoar-frost
being frequently found in January at an early hour of the day. The
hot westerly winds begin in April, and the rains set in about the end
of June. The mean temperature is about 770, ranging from 570 in
January to 910 in May or June.
The District is practically the meeting-place of the Bengal and
Bombay monsoon currents. The annual rainfall for thirty years has
averaged 29 inches ; but it varies in different parts, and the south-west
of the District receives less than the north-east. Considerable fluctua-
tions occur; during the five years ending 1895 the rainfall averaged
as high as 47 inches, while it sometimes falls below 20 inches.
The District is connected with the earliest traditions of the Lunar
race of the Hindus. A small hamlet on the high bank of the Ganges
is believed to mark the main site of Hastinapur, the
capital of the Kauravas and Pandavas, which was
washed away by the Ganges. The Asoka pillar, now standing on the
Ridge at Delhi, is said to have been removed from near Meerut city,
and remains of Buddhist buildings have been discovered near the
Jama Masjid. In the eleventh century a.d. the south-western part of
the District was held by Har Dat, the Dor Raja of Baran or Buland-
shahr, who was defeated by Mali mud of Ghazni in 1018. According
to tradition, the north of the District was held by the Tagas, who were
driven south and east by the Jats. The Meos were called in by the
Gahlots and expelled the Dors. The first undoubted Muhammadan
invasion was that of Kutb-ud-din, the general of Muhammad Ghori,
in 1 1 92, when the city of Meerut was taken and all the Hindu temples
were converted into mosques. Under succeeding Sultans we hear little
of the District, which may therefore be considered to have escaped
HIS TOR Y 255
any notable misfortune, until the Mongol invasion of 1398. Timur
swooped down upon Meerut with more than ordinary barbarity, and
was met with equal Hindu obstinacy. At the fort of LonI, many of the
Rajputs burned their houses, with their women and children within,
and then sallied out to sell their lives as dearly as they could. After
the capture, Timur ordered the massacre of all the Hindu prisoners in
his camp, whom he himself represents as numbering 100,000 persons.
He then went on to the sack of Delhi, and returned to the town of
Meerut, then ruled by an Afghan chief named I lias. Timur first made
his approaches by mining, and on the second day carried the walls by
storm. All the males were put to the sword, and the fortifications and
houses of the Hindus razed to the ground. Thence his army pro-
ceeded northward along the two great rivers, taking every fort, town,
and village they passed.
The firm establishment of the Mughal dynasty in the sixteenth
century, and the immediate neighbourhood of their court, gave Meerut
a period of internal tranquillity and royal favour. The valley of the
Jumna became a favourite hunting resort for the imperial family and
their great officers. Pleasure-gardens and game-preserves were estab-
lished in the low-lying tracts just opposite Delhi ; while it was for the
purpose of watering one of these that the Eastern Jumna Canal was
first designed. After the death of Aurangzeb, Meerut, though nomi-
nally subject to the Delhi emperor, was really ruled by local chieftains :
the Saiyids of Muzaffarnagar in the north, the Jats in the south-east,
and the Gujars along the Ganges and in the south-west. It was also
exposed to the same horrors of alternate Sikh and Maratha invasions
which devastated the other parts of the Upper Doab ; while the Jats
and Rohillas occasionally interposed, to glean the remnant of the
plunder which remained from the greater and more fortunate hordes.
From 1707 till 1775, Meerut was the scene of perpetual strife; and
it was only rescued from anarchy by the exertions of a European
military adventurer, Walter Reinhardt or Sombre, one of the many
soldiers of fortune who were tempted to try their destinies in Upper
India during the troubled decline of the Delhi dynasty. After per-
petrating the massacre at Patna, 1763, Reinhardt established himself
at Sardhana in one of the northern parganas of Meerut ; and on his
death in 1778 left his domains to his widow, generally known as the
Begam Sumru, from the assumed name of her husband. This remark-
able woman was of Arab descent, and originally followed the trade of
a dancing-girl. After her marriage with Reinhardt, she was baptized
into the Roman Catholic Church, to which she became a considerable
benefactress. Meanwhile, the southern portion of the District still
remained in its anarchic condition under Maratha rule, until the fall
of Delhi in 1803, when all the country in the possession of Sindhia
256 MEERUT DISTRICT
between the Jumna and the Ganges was ceded to the British. The
Begam, who had up till that time given assistance to Sindhia, there-
upon made submission to the new Government, to which she remained
constantly faithful till her death in 1836.
Meerut has few historical incidents to show during the early British
period ; but it has been rendered memorable by the active part which
it took in the Mutiny of 1857, being the place where the first outbreak
occurred in Upper India. From the beginning of the year disquieting
rumours had been afloat among the native troops, and the 'greased-
cartridge ' story had spread widely through their ranks. In April a
trooper named Brijmohan informed his comrades that he had used
the new cartridges, and all would have to do so shortly ; but within
a few days Brijmohan's house was set on fire, and from that time acts
of incendiarism became common. On May 9 some men of the
3rd Bengal Cavalry, who had refused to use the cartridges, were con-
demned to ten years' imprisonment. Next day, Sunday, May 10, their
comrades took the fatal determination to mutiny ; and at 5 p.m. the
massacre of Europeans in the city began.
The subsequent events belong rather to imperial than to local
history, and could not be adequately summed up in a brief resume.
It must suffice to say that, throughout the Mutiny, the cantonments
remained in the hands of the British forces, and the District was on
the whole kept fairly clear of rebels. Meerut was more than once
threatened by Walidad Khan, the rebellious chieftain of Malagarh in
Bulandshahr District ; but his demonstrations were never very serious.
The greatest peril lay in the threatened attack by rebels from Rohil-
khand, which was successfully warded off. Indeed, it is a noticeable
fact that the very city where the Mutiny broke out, and where the first
massacre took place, was yet held by a small body of Europeans,
surrounded by thousands of disaffected natives, under the very shadow
of Delhi, from the beginning to the end of that desperate struggle.
Though many places are connected by tradition with the events
related in the Mahabharata, such as Hastinapur, Baghpat, Garh-
muktesar, Parichhatgarh, Puth, and Barnawa, very ancient temples
or other archaeological remains have not been discovered. A mosque
built by Balban stands at Garhmuktesar, and there are a few Muham-
madan buildings dating from the Mughal dynasty at Meerut City.
The District contains 27 towns and 1,494 villages. The population
is rising steadily. The number at the last four enumerations was as
Bftnil1a,n follows: (1872) 1,276,167, (1881) 1,313,137,(1891)
1,391,458, and (1901) 1,540,175. lhe increase in
the last decade (io-6 per cent.) was six times as great as the Provincial
average. There are six tah&ls — Meerut, Ghaziabad, Mawana,
Baghpat, Sakdhana, and Hapur— the head-quarters of each being
popula rioy
257
at a town of the same name. The ehief towns are the municipalities
of Meerut, the District head-quarters, Hapur, Sardhana, Ghaziabad,
and Mawana, and the 'notified areas' of Baraut, Baghpat, Pilkhua,
and Shahdara. The principal statistics of population in 1901 are
shown below : —
U
3
Cm
Number of
c
0
- — ~i
<-— = .■
w £
4J
0 n rt -
Tahsil.
!0
1
0
3
5 "-C'-S C -
5.5.2 gT3
umb
ons
ead
writ
U
<
H
>
P*
a.—
C r/t
ft,
|?|*«
Z C u
u
18.048
Meerut
364
5
2 So
342,143
940
+ 4-9
Ghaziabad
493
9
332
276,518
562
4- I 1-9
7,122
Mawana .
43i
4
-'4s
200,399
465
+ 12.7
3,398
Baghpat .
405
6
218
297,506
735
+ J4-4
7,285
Sardhana .
250
r
124
l80,I4I
721
+ 6-8
5, '9s
Hapur
District total
411
2
292
243,468
592
654
+ 14-8
+ 10.7
6,910
-•354
27
1 ,494
1,540,175
47,96i
Of the total population, 74 per cent, are Hindus, 23 per cent.
Musalmans, 1 per cent. Jains, 8 per cent. Christians, while Aryas
number 5,000. The great density in the Meerut tahsil is due to the
large city of Meerut, while Mawana, which has the lowest density,
includes a considerable area of Ganges khadar. More than 99 per
cent, of the inhabitants speak the Hindustani dialect of Western
Hindi.
Among Hindus the most numerous caste is that of the Chamars
(leather-dressers and labourers), who number 223,000, and form 20 per
cent, of the Hindu population. They are followed by the Jats, 184,000,
who are the most industrious agriculturists and hold a larger area both
as proprietors and cultivators than any other caste. Brahmans number
121,000; Rajputs, 79,000; Banias, 59,000; Gujars, 58,000: Tagas,
41,000; Ahlrs, 25,000; and Bhangis or sweepers, 44,000. The fats,
Gujars, and Tagas are not found in the centre and east of the Pro-
vinces, and the Tagas (agriculturists) are more numerous here than in
any other District. The most numerous Muhammadan tribe is that of
the Shaikhs, 50,000; followed by Rajputs, 46,000; Julahas (weavers),
33,000; Pathans, 19,000; Saiyids, 15,000; and Tagas, 20,000. More
than 49 per cent, of the population are supported by agriculture,
11 per cent, by general labour, 10 per cent, by personal services, 3 per
cent, by weaving, and nearly 3 per cent, by grain-dealing.
In 1901 there were 9,315 native Christians in the District, of whom
7,400 were Methodists and 1,100 Roman Catholics. The four missions
at work are the Roman Catholic, the Church Missionary Society, the
American Methodist, and the Reformed Presbyterian Churches. Sar-
dhana is the chief station of the Roman Catholics, who commenced
2^8
ME E RUT DISTRICT
Agriculture.
work there at the end of the eighteenth century under the Begam
Sumru. The Church Missionary Society's Mission dates from 1815,
and the other two missions are of recent institution. The latter admit
converts easily, and chiefly labour among the lower classes.
As is usual in the Upper Doab, the Jats are the best cultivators, and
all good land is manured whether near the village site or not. The
soil varies from sand to thick clay ; but the greater
portion is a fertile loam, and most of the District is
capable of irrigation from canals or wells. The Ganges and Jumna
and, to a smaller extent, the Hindan khddars are precarious tracts ;
but the District as a whole ranks as one of the finest in the United
Provinces.
The tenures are those common in the United Provinces. More than
50 per cent, of the total area is held in bhaiyachara tenure ; nearly
22 per cent, in imperfect patfidari; and the rest in perfect pattldari
and zamlndari in equal proportions. The main statistics of cultivation
for 1903-4 are shown below, in square miles : —
Tahsil.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
Meernt
Ghaziabad .
Mawana
Baghpat .
Sardhana .
Hapur
Total
364
493
431
4°5
250
411
277
349
2 73
1$
201
320
122
180
89
190
82
112
29
69
94
22
18
34
2,-354
i,75<5
775
266
Wheat and gram are the most important food-grains, covering an
area of 634 and 241 square miles respectively, or 36 and 14 per cent,
of the net area cropped. Maize and Jowdr, with 189 and 164 square
miles, are also important. The most valuable of the other crops are
sugar-cane (179 square miles) and cotton (60 square miles).
In the khddar, cultivation depends chiefly on the season, and in dry
years considerable areas may be sown. The striking feature of the
District during the last thirty years is the increase by about 50 per
cent, in the area under sugar-cane, which is now the crop from which
the tenants pay their rent and the zamindars their revenue. The area
cropped in two consecutive harvests in the same year, especially with
maize in the autumn and wheat mixed with peas, &c, in the spring,
is also increasing. The area under cotton has declined, and indigo is
grown only by a few of the large zamindars. There is a small, but
steady, demand for loans under the Agriculturists' Loans Act, amounting
to about Rs. 2,000 annually ; but advances under the Land Improve-
ment Loans Act are rarely taken. Out of Rs. 16,000 lent during
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 259
the ten years ending 1900, Rs. 11,000 was advanced in the last year.
A great deal has been done to improve the drainage of the District,
by deepening and straightening some of the rivers, such as the East
Kali Nadi and its tributaries, the two Chhoiyas, and by making cuts in
other places. In the south-west of the District an embankment
has been made to prevent flooding from the Jumna.
Private enterprise has done something to improve the ordinary
inferior breed of cattle, and several zaminddrs have imported good
bulls from Hissar. The best of the cattle have been imported from
the same place, but many good animals are now bred locally. Horse-
breeding has become an important business. Stables for a Government
stud were established at Babugarh near Hapur in 1823, and many
zaminddrs turned their attention to horse-breeding. The mares were
subsequently disposed of, though stallions are still kept by Government.
There has been a considerable improvement in the last thirty years,
and chargers are bred for the native cavalry and mounted police.
Besides the stallions at Babugarh, twelve others were maintained by
Government in 1903, when the supervision of horse-breeding was
transferred from the Civil Veterinary to the Remount department.
Good mules are also bred from Government donkey stallions. The
sheep and goats of the District are of the ordinary inferior breed.
About 40 to 60 per cent, of the cultivated area is irrigated according
to the season. In 1903-4 canals irrigated 494 square miles, wells 271,
and other sources 10. The west of the District is supplied by the
Eastern Jumna Canal, the centre by the Upper Ganges Canal,
and the east by the Anupshahr branch of the latter. Canals have to
a large extent superseded wells ; and the area irrigated in the eastern
tract has benefited especially, as well-irrigation was rare. It is only in
parts of the Sardhana and Hapur tahs'ils that well-irrigation supplies
a larger area than canals.
The chief mineral product is kankar, which occurs in blocks as well
as in nodules, and is used for road-metalling and for making lime, as
well as for building purposes. Up to 1833 salt was largely manufac-
tured, and a little saltpetre is still prepared. The saline efflorescence
called reh, which contains carbonate of soda, is used for making
country glass, and also in dyeing and washing clothes.
The most important industry is tanning, though there is no large
tannery. Much of the out-turn is exported to Cawnpore and Calcutta,
but a fair amount is made up on the spot into shoes
and sent to Delhi. Cotton-weaving is carried on :«.«*,•«„„
° communications.
largely at Meerut and several other places, but only
for the local market. More than half the raw cotton grown is exported
to Cawnpore and Calcutta. Two cotton-presses at Hapur employed
263 persons in 1904. A European company for soap manufacture
260 MEERUT DISTRICT
at Meerut employs about 40 hands, and an ice factory about 20.
There are also eleven indigo factories, and a small flour-mill and oil-
mill. Blankets are made at Nirpura in the Sardhana tahsil, ornamental
pottery at Bahadurgarh in the Hapur tahsil, and cheap cutlery, glass
bangles, jewellery, and furniture are turned out at a few centres.
The exports consist chiefly of wheat, sugar, oilseeds, and cotton,
while the imports are metals, cotton cloth, building materials, ghl,
drugs, and spices. The municipalities are the chief centres of trade,
especially Meerut, Hapur, and Ghaziabad. Internal traffic is very
large. The sugar goes largely to the Punjab and Rajputana, while
wheat is exported to Europe. A large proportion of the trade finds its
way to Delhi. Timber and bamboos are brought to Meerut from the
forests farther north by the Upper Ganges Canal and the Ganges.
Trade has been greatly fostered by the improvement of communica-
tions. The oldest railway is the East Indian, which just cuts across
the south-west corner of the District. It was followed by the North-
western, which passes through the middle. In 1900 a branch of the
Oudh and Rohilkhand Railway was opened, which traverses the
southern part. Another important branch of the same line connects
Meerut city with Hapur, and will be continued through Bulandshahr
to Khurja. The rich tract between the North-Western Railway and
the Jumna is to be opened up by a light railway from Shahdara on the
East Indian Railway opposite Delhi to Saharanpur.
The total length of metalled roads is 216 miles, which is only
exceeded in one District in the Provinces; of these, 92 miles are
Provincial and the rest local. There are also 392 miles of unmetalled
roads, maintained from Local funds. There are avenues of trees along
about 180 miles. The western part of the District is most in need of
better communications, which will be supplied by the light railway
referred to above.
The Upper Doab was ravaged by famine at frequent intervals before
British rule, and the disorders of the eighteenth century frequently
caused distress ; but Meerut is not specially men-
tioned by the native historians. There was frequent
distress in the early years of the nineteenth century, and the famine
of 1837 was exceptionally severe. In i860, after the disastrous effects
of the Mutiny, famine was imminent ; but the railway works in the
south-east of the District gave employment to thousands. The famines
of 1868 and later years hardly affected the District adversely, and relief
works have chiefly been required for starving immigrants. This result
is largely due to the extensive system of canal-irrigation and the sturdy
nature of the peasantry. In 1896-7, when famine raged elsewhere,
the Jats of Meerut prayed openly for a continuance of the high prices
which gave them such handsome profits.
ADMINISTRATION 261
The Collector is usually assisted by a Joint and Assistant Magistrate
belonging to the Indian Civil Service, and by five . . . . .
% 1, • 1 • T j- 11 -j- Administration.
Deputy-Collectors recruited in India, all residing at
Meerut. There is a tahslldar at the head-quarters of each of the six
tahsih.
The District and Sessions Judge has jurisdiction over the whole
District, and also civil jurisdiction over the Sikandarabad tahsll of
Bulandshahr District. He is aided by an Assistant Judge, a Subor-
dinate Judge, and two Munsifs. In 1904 there were two additional
Munsifs, and an additional Judge was sanctioned for three years.
A few Village Munsifs have also been appointed. There is a special
Cantonment Magistrate, with an assistant, at Meerut. As usual, the
most common forms of crime are burglary and petty theft ; but murder,
robbery, and dacoity are more frequent than in most Districts. Cases
of rioting and criminal trespass are very common, and the Gujars in
the Ganges and Jumna khadars are notorious cattle thieves. Female
infanticide was practised by Gujars and Jats, especially the former, but
has nearly died out.
The area comprised in the District was acquired in 1803, and was
at first administered as part of Saharanpur, of which it eventually
formed the southern division with a Collector at Meerut. In 1818
a separate District was made, which was further subdivided in 1824 by
the removal of parts of what are now Bulandshahr and Muzaffarnagar.
The early land revenue settlements were simply based on the previous
demands, and consisted of two for a year each and two for three years
each, the last being extended up to 181 5, when a settlement was
effected for five years. No records exist of the subsequent arrange-
ments till the first regular settlement was made between 1835 and 1837.
There were signs of the coming competition for land, but rents were
still mostly in kind. The assessment was based on rates ascertained
by converting average produce at market values, the rates being
modified according to the condition of villages. A large part of the
District had formed the jagir of the Begam Sumru, which lapsed in
1836. Her system had been one of rackrent, qualified by an intimate
knowledge of the cultivators and liberal advances. The total demand
fixed for the whole District was 18-3 lakhs. The second settlement
was made between 1865 and 1870, when the demand was raised to
21-8 lakhs, though the share of the rental 'assets' taken had been
reduced from 70 to 50 per cent. In this settlement, also, rates were
calculated on produce, having regard to soil classification. The last
settlement was completed in 1901. It was based on the rental 'assets,'
but involved a careful soil classification and the fixing of standard
circle rates, which were of special importance, as nearly half of the area
was not subject to cash rents, most of it being under proprietary
26:
MEERUT DISTRICT
cultivation. A very minute analysis of the rents actually paid was thus
required, and the proportionate rental value of different soils was
ascertained. The rents paid by occupancy tenants were enhanced in
many cases, and the revenue finally fixed was 29-9 lakhs, representing
48 per cent, of the corrected rental 'assets.' The incidence per acre
of cultivation is Rs. 2-14, being the highest for any District in the
Provinces. It varies in different parts from Rs. 2 near the Ganges
khadar to more than Rs. 4 in the west.
The collections on account of land revenue and total revenue are
shown below, in thousands of rupees : —
1 880-1.
1 890- 1.
1 900-1.
1903-4-
Land revenue
Total revenue
22,25
27,04
22,11
34>°°
26,30
4°,57
27.95
44,21
Besides the five municipalities, Meerut, Ghaziakad, Hapur, Sar-
dhana, and Mawana, four other towns which were formerly municipali-
ties became ' notified areas ' in April, 1 904. There are also eighteen
towns administered under Act XX of 1856. Beyond the limits of these
places, local affairs are managed by the District board, which has an
income of more than 2 lakhs. In 1903-4 the expenditure amounted
to 2-6 lakhs, of which i-i lakhs was spent on roads and buildings.
The District Superintendent of police is aided by an assistant and
six inspectors. There are 160 other officers and 633 men belonging to
the regular police, 439 municipal and town police, and 2,267 village
and road police. The District jail contained a daily average of 574
prisoners in 1903.
In 1 90 1 the percentage of the population able to read and write
was 3-1 (5-6 males and 0-3 females), which is exactly the Provincial
average. The proportion is, however, unduly raised by the consi-
derable number of Jains, Aryas, and Christians in the District, and
is distinctly lower in the case of Hindus (2-7) and Muhamma-
dans (2). In 1880-1 there were 214 public institutions with 6,677
pupils, and these had increased to 248 institutions with 9,849 pupils
in 1900-1. In 1903-4, 277 such schools contained 12,850 pupils,
of whom 550 were girls; and there were besides 391 private insti-
tutions with 5,235 pupils. Meerut City contains an Arts college,
a normal school, and three high schools. Of the public institutions,
162 are managed by the District or municipal boards and only 2 by
Government. About half the total expenditure on education of
Rs. 96,000 is met from Local and municipal funds, and a quarter
from fees.
In 1903 there were 14 hospitals and dispensaries, with accommoda-
tion for 183 in-patients. In the same year 134,000 cases were treated.
MEERUT CITY 263
of whom 1,839 were in-patients, and 10,214 operations were per-
formed. The expenditure was Rs. 19,000, chiefly met from Local and
municipal funds.
More than 50,000 persons were successfully vaccinated in 1903-4,
showing a rate of 2>Z Per J)000 of population. Vaccination is compul-
sory only in the municipalities and in the cantonment of Meerut.
[H. R. Nevill, District Gazetteer (1904); R. W. Gillan, Settlement
Report (1901).]
Meerut Tahsil. — Central northern tahsll of Meerut District, United
Provinces, co-extensive with the pargana of Meerut, and lying between
280 52' and 290 14' N. and 770 27' and 770 52' E., with an area of
364 square miles. On the west the Hindan divides it from Baghpat
and part of the Sardhana tahsif, but other boundaries are artificial.
The population rose from 326,054 in 1891 to 342,143 in 1901. There
are 280 villages and five towns, of which Meerut (population, 1 18,129),
the District and tahsil head-quarters, and La war (5,046) are the most
important. In 1903-4 the demand for land revenue was Rs. 5,22,000,
and for cesses Rs. 87,000. The tahsil has the highest density of
population (940 persons per square mile) in the District (average 654),
owing to the inclusion of Meerut city. Along the Hindan there is
a narrow stretch of khadar which is liable to deterioration, but more
than half the tahsil is a level upland of first-class soil. The eastern
portion is intersected by the East Kali Nadi and its tributaries the two
Chhoiyas and the Abu Nala, which flow in badly-defined channels.
The channel of the Kali Nadi has been deepened and straightened,
and other cuts have been made ; but the drainage is still defective, and
in this tract cultivation is continually interrupted by patches of reh.
It is sandy towards the north, and a well-defined sandy ridge strikes
from north to south on the eastern border. Between the Hindan and
the Kali Nadi the Upper Ganges Canal provides ample means of
irrigation ; but east of the Kali Nadi the villages depend chiefly on
wells, most of which are of masonry. In 1903-4 the area under culti-
vation was 277 square miles, of which 122 were irrigated.
Meerut City. — Administrative head-quarters of Meerut District,
United Provinces, and military cantonment, situated in 290 i' N. and
770 43' E., 970 miles by rail from Calcutta and 93 r miles by rail from
Bombay. The city is the seventh largest in the United Provinces, and
its population has risen considerably during the last thirty years. The
numbers at the four enumerations were as follows: (1872) 81,386,
(1881) 99,565, (1891) 119,390, and (1901) 118,129. Tne population
in 1901 included 62,700 Hindus, 50,317 Muhammadans, and more
than 4,000 Christians. Of the total, 78,740 persons reside in the
municipality and 39,389 in cantonments.
The derivation of the name is uncertain. According to one account
264 MEERUT CITY
it is derived from an architect named Mahl, in the time of King
Yudhishthira. The Jats allege that it was founded by a colony of
their caste belonging to the Maharashtra goira. The Asoka pillar
now standing on the Ridge at Delhi was removed from Meerut, and
remains of Buddhist buildings have been found near the Jama Masjid.
Meerut is said to have been captured early in the eleventh century
by Saiyid Salar Masud ; and about the same time Har Dat, Raja
of Baran (Bulandshahr), built a fort here, which was one of the
most celebrated in Hindustan for its strength. The fort was captured
by Kutb-ud-dln in 1192, and all the Hindu temples were converted
into mosques. In 1327 a Mongol chief, Tarmshirin Khan, made an
unsuccessful attempt on the city, but it was completely sacked and
destroyed by Tlmur in 1399. Under Mughal rule the place revived
and several fine buildings were erected. The brick fort is mentioned
in the Ain-i-Akbarl, and Akbar struck copper coin at Meerut. The
troubled times of the eighteenth century were unfavourable to the
growth of towns in the Upper. Doab, and in 1805 Meerut was described
as 'a ruinous, depopulated town, and a place of no trade.' In 1806
cantonments were first established, and population grew rapidly to
29,014 in 1847 and 82,035 m J^53- Meerut obtained an unenviable
notoriety in 1857 as the spot where the Mutiny broke out in Upper
India. Disquieting rumours had been abroad for some time, and
in April the troopers of the 3rd Cavalry refused to use the new
cartridges. On May 9, eighty-five men were condemned to long terms
of imprisonment ; and the next afternoon, Sunday, May 10, a cry was
raised that the Europeans were going to seize the magazines of the
native infantry. The men of the 20th Native Infantry took up arms,
and the Mutiny commenced. Several Europeans were shot down at
once, and the bad characters of the city gathered together, armed with
any weapons they could find. The convicted troopers were released
from jail without the slightest opposition by the guards, and the rest
of the prisoners broke out. The infuriated mob of sepoys, police,
hangers-on about the bazars, servants, and convicts burned and
plundered the cantonments, murdering every Christian they met. In
the civil station, which lies some distance away, nothing was known
of the outbreak until close on 7 p.m., when the people going to church
saw the blaze of burning bungalows. Even the native troops posted
there remained steady till relieved. The British troops cantoned near
the civil lines included a regiment of cavalry, 800 infantry, and a large
force of artillery ; but nothing was done by the superior military
authorities, and the general organization was defective. Many of the
Carabineers could not ride, and there was a want of horses. Much
time was wasted in a roll-call, and when the sepoys' lines were reached
after dark, they were found deserted. No pursuit was attempted, and
MEERUT CITY 265
the mutineers were allowed to reach Delhi in safety. The city was,
however, held throughout the disturbances, and was the base of a small
volunteer force known as the Khaki Risala, which helped materially
in the restoration of order.
The native city lies south of the cantonments and east of the railway
line. The streets are generally of mean appearance, and are badly
arranged. The oldest monuments are a mausoleum and dargah erected
by Kutb-ud-dfn in 1194, the former in the city, and the latter about
a mile away on the site of a famous temple to Nauchandi Debl. The
Jama Masjid is said to have been built in 10 19 by Hasan MahdT,
YVazir of Mahmud of Ghazni, and was repaired by Humayun. A fine
dargah of red sandstone was erected by Nur Jahan, wife of the
emperor Jahanglr, in 1628, in memory of a fakir named Shah Plr ;
and there are some other seventeenth-century mosques and tombs.
The great tank called the Suraj Kund, or 'sun tank,' constructed in
1714, is surrounded by numerous small temples and sati pillars.
The town hall, containing the Lyall Library, is an imposing building,
the foundation-stone of which was laid in 1884 by the Duke of
Connaught, then commanding the Meerut military district. In the
cantonments the finest building is the church, which was built in 182 1,
and has a handsome spire. There are also a Roman Catholic church
and a mission chapel, an asylum for the relief of distressed European
and native Christians, and a club. The Mall is one of the finest
station roads in India. Besides being the head-quarters of the ordinary
District staff, Meerut is the residence of the Commissioner of the
Division of the same name, Superintending Engineers of both the
Roads and Buildings and Irrigation branches of the Public Works
department, and two Executive Engineers in charge of divisions of
the Upper Ganges Canal. The Church Missionary Society and the
American Methodists have their principal stations here, besides several
branches in the District.
Meerut was constituted a municipality in 1864. During the ten
years ending 190 1 the income and expenditure averaged about
2-3 lakhs ; but the receipts include a loan of 7! lakhs for water-
supply in 1895, and the expenditure includes the cost of the works
and an annual sum on account of capital and interest. In 1003-4
the total income was 2-2 lakhs, chiefly derived from octroi (1-4 lakhs)
and municipal property, fines, &c. (Rs. 41,000). The expenditure
of 2-5 lakhs included : general administration (Rs. 2,000), collection of
taxes (Rs. 31,000), water-supply (Rs. 21,000), conservancy (Rs. 21,000),
public safety (Rs. 15,000), and repayment of loans with interest
(Rs. 65,000). A house tax has recently been sanctioned.
The water-works were completed in 1896. The supply is taken
from the Upper Ganges Canal, 9 miles away, at a place called Bhola.
266 MEERUT CITY
The engines by which the supply is raised are worked by turbines
turned by the water in the canal falls. In 1903-4 the daily consump-
tion of water amounted to between 4 and 5 gallons per head. The
drainage of the city is good, and all channels have been lined with
masonry and the whole system recast within the last few years.
The normal garrison in the cantonments consists of four regiments
of British and Native cavalry and infantry, and two horse and two
field batteries. The income of cantonment funds in 1903-4 was 1-4
lakhs, and the expenditure 1-2 lakhs. The chief taxes are octroi and
a house tax.
The prosperity of the city was originally due to the presence of
a large cantonment, and the population was in fact larger in 1853 than
in 1872. The extension of the North-Western Railway in 1867 and
1869, however, laid the foundation of a more extended trade than the
supply of local needs. In 1887 a bonded warehouse was opened about
a mile from the city station, with which it is connected by a branch
line, and 8 or 9 lakhs of maunds of grain, and nearly as much sugar,
pass through this every year. Cotton cloth, building materials, oilseeds,
spices, and ghi form the chief imports. Manufactures are not yet of
much importance, but there are a large soap factory and a flour- and
oil-mill. An important agricultural show is held annually near the
Nauchandi temple, a mile from the city. The exhibits include 1,800
horses, besides cattle, agricultural products and implements, &:c. ; and
valuable prizes are given.
The chief educational institutions are the Meerut College and the
normal school. The former was founded in 1892 at a cost of 2 lakhs
raised by subscriptions, and receives an annual grant of Rs. 8,000 from
Government. It had 123 pupils in 1903-4, of whom 15 were reading
for a degree and 35 were in the First Arts classes. The oldest school
belongs to the Church Missionary Society and has 129 pupils. There
are eight other secondary schools with about 800 pupils, and four
primary schools with 159 pupils, of whom over 100 are girls. Among
the secondary schools may be mentioned that supported by the Arya
Samaj, which is very strong here. The municipality spends about
Rs. 10,000 annually on education.
Meghasani. — Mountain peak in Mayurbhanj, one of the Orissa
Tributary States, Bengal, situated in 210 38' N. and 86° 21' E. Its
height is 3,824 feet ; there is a plateau on the top of the hill.
Meghna, The. — Great estuary of the Bengal delta, which conveys to
the sea the main volume of the waters of both the Ganges and the
Brahmaputra, and thus forms the outlet for the drainage of half
India. The name is properly applied only to the channel of the old
Brahmaputra, from Bhairab Bazar downwards, after it has received the
Surma or Barak from Sylhet, in 240 2' N. and 900 59' E. ; but some
THE MEGHNA 207
maps mark the head-waters of the Meghna as a small stream mean-
dering through the centre of Mymensingh District, and joining the
Brahmaputra near Bhairab Bazar. At the present time the main
streams of the Brahmaputra or Jamuna, and of the Ganges, unite at
Goalundo in Eastern Bengal, and, under the name of the Padma, enter
the estuary of the Meghna opposite Chandpur. The Meghna proper
runs almost due south, and forms the boundary between the Dacca
Division to the west and the Chittagong Division. It nowhere flows
between clearly defined banks ; and it enters the sea in 220 25' N. and
910 16' E., after a course of 161 miles, by four principal mouths, en-
closing the islands of Dakhin Shahbazpur, Hatia, and Sandwip.
The general characteristics of the Meghna are everywhere the same
— a mighty rolling flood of great depth and velocity, sometimes split
up into half a dozen channels by sandbanks of its own formation,
sometimes spreading out into a wide expanse of water which the eye
cannot see across. It is navigable by native boats of the largest bur-
den, and also by river steamers all the year round ; but navigation is
difficult and sometimes dangerous. At low tide the bed is obstructed
by shifting sandbanks and snags ; and when the tide is high or the
river is in flood, and especially when the monsoon is blowing, the
surface often becomes too boisterous for heavy-laden river craft to ride
in safety. The most favourable season for navigation is between
November and February ; but even in those months the native boatman
fears to continue his voyage after nightfall. Alluvion and diluvion are
constantly taking place, especially along the sea-board, where the
antagonistic forces of river and ocean are ever engaged in the process
of land-making. In Noakhali District the mainland is steadily ad-
vancing seawards ; while the islands fringing the mouth are annually
being cut away and re-deposited in fresh shapes. For some years past
the Meghna has shown a tendency to shift its main channel gradually
towards the west.
The tidal phenomena of the Meghna surpass those of any other
Indian river. The regular rise of the tide is from 10 to 18 feet ; and
at spring-tides the sea rushes up in a single wave, known as the ' bore.'
On the Meghna the bore is no mere spectacle for admiration, but a
justly dreaded danger to boatmen. It may be witnessed in its greatest
development at the time of the equinoxes, when navigation is some-
times impeded for days together, especially when the wind blows from
the south. Before anything can be seen, a noise like thunder is heard
seawards in the far distance. Then the tidal wave suddenly comes
into view, advancing like a wall topped with foam, of the height ot
nearly 20 feet, and moving at the rate of 15 miles an hour. In a few
minutes all is over, and the brimming river has at once changed from
ebb to flood-tide.
vol. xvn. s
268 THE MEGHNA
A still greater danger than the bore is the storm-wave which occasion-
ally sweeps up the Meghna in the wake of cyclones. These storm-
waves also are most liable to occur at the break of the monsoons in
May and October. In the cyclone of May, 1867, the island of Hatia
was entirely submerged by a wave which is estimated to have reached a
height of 40 feet. But the greatest of these disasters within the memory
of man occurred on the night of October 31, 1876. Towards evening
of that day the wind had gradually risen till it blew a gale. Suddenly,
at about midnight in some places, and nearer dawn in others, the roar
of the bore was heard drowning the noises of the storm. Two and
three waves came on in succession, flooding in one moment the entire
country, and sweeping before them every living thing that was not
lucky enough to reach a point of vantage. The destruction of human
life on that memorable night is credibly estimated at 100,000 souls in
the mainland portion of Noakhali District and on the islands of Sand-
wip and Hatia, or about 19 per cent, of the total population of these
places. As usually happens in such cases, the mortality subsequently
caused by cholera and a train of dependent diseases equalled that
due directly to drowning.
[A full account of this calamity will be found in the Report on the
Vizagapatam and Backer gunge Cyclones, 1876.]
Mehar Subdivision. — Subdivision of Larkana District, Sind,
Bombay, composed of the Mehar, Nasirabad, and Kakar talukas.
Mehar. — Tdluka of Larkana District, Sind, Bombay, lying between
2 70 2' and 270 21' N. and 670 30' and 68° 8' E., with an area of 328
square miles. The population in 1901 was 58,434, compared with
48,320 in 1 89 1. The tdluka contains 64 villages, of which Mehar is
the head-quarters. The density, 178 persons per square mile, greatly
exceeds the District average. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4
amounted to 2-8 lakhs. The tdluka is irrigated by the Western Nara
and one of its feeders, the staple crops being jowdr and rice. Prior
to the floods of 1874 Mehar was very fertile, but the water has now
become brackish and all the gardens have perished. Cultivation near
the hills on the west depends entirely upon the rainfall.
Meherpur Subdivision.— Northern subdivision of Nadia District,
Bengal, lying between 230 36' and 240 1 i' N. and 88° 18' and 88° 53' E.,
with an area of 632 square miles. The subdivision is a deltaic tract,
bounded on the north by the Jalangi ; a considerable portion con-
sists of a low-lying tract of black clay soil. The population increased
from 336,716 in 1891 to 348,124 in 1901, the density being 551
persons per square mile. The subdivision contains the town of
Meherpur (population, 5,766), the head-quarters; and 607 villages.
Meherpur Town {Mik?pur).—- Head-quarters of the subdivision of
the same name in Nadia District, Bengal, situated in 230 47' N. and
ME HID PUR TOWN 269
88° 38' E., on the Bhairab river. Population (1901), 5,766. Meherpur
was constituted a municipality in 1869. The income during the decade
ending 1901-2 averaged Rs. 4,400, and the expenditure Rs. 3,500.
In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 3,900, half of which was obtained from
a tax on persons ; and the expenditure was Rs. 3,800. The town con-
tains the usual public offices; the sub-jail has accommodation for 13
prisoners. The Church Missionary Society has a branch at Meherpur.
Good bell-metal ware is manufactured.
Mehidpur Zila. — District of the Indore State, Central India, lying
between 23°5/ and 230 48" N. and 750 32' and 760 35' E., in the Sondh-
wara division of Malwa, with an area of 840 square miles. It con-
sists of two separate sections : the main block, and the Sundarsi pargana
which lies south-east of the former. The country is typical of Malwa,
consisting of an open undulating plain covered with black cotton soil.
It is watered by the Sipra, Kali Sind, and ChhotI Kali Sind, and has an
annual rainfall of 25 inches. The population decreased from 120,869
in 1891 to 91,857 in 1901, giving a density in the latter year of 109
persons per square mile. The District contains two towns, Mehidpur
(population, 6,681), the head-quarters, and Tarana (4,490); and 432^
villages. The one-third village is due to the curious tripartite possession
of Sundarsi by the Gwalior, Dhar, and Indore Darbars, each State
having an equal portion of the place.
For administrative purposes the district is divided into five parganas,
with head-quarters at Mehidpur, Jharda, Tarana, Makron, and Sundarsi,
each in charge of an amin, while the whole is in charge of a Subah,
whose head-quarters are at Mehidpur. The total revenue is 4-8 lakhs.
The principal routes lead to Nagda on the Ujjain-Ratlam and Tarana
Road on the Ujjain-Bhopal Railways. The Nagda-Muttra branch of
the Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway, now under con-
struction, will pass through Godapur, 10 miles from Mehidpur.
Metalled roads run from Tarana to Sumrakhera and from Mehidpur
to Patparsi, and a portion of the Ujjain-Agar high road also traverses
the district. Several new roads are under construction.
Mehidpur Town (also Mahatpur or Mahidpur). — Head-quarters of
the district and pargana of the same name in Indore State, Central
India, situated in 230 29' N. and 750 40' E., on the right bank of the
sacred Sipra river, 24 miles north of Ujjain, 1,543 feet above sea-level.
Population (1901), 6,681. The town is divided into two separate
sections, known as the kila or fort and the purwa or hamlet. The
kila is an isolated quarter, surrounded by a bastioned stone wall, and
situated on the river bank. It was built in the eighteenth century by
the Vagh Saranjami sardars, locally known as the Vagh Rajas. Its
streets are dark and narrow, with tall stone houses on either side,
often ornamented by graceful balconies and windows of carved wood.
s 2
270 MEHIDPUR TOWN
Throughout the kila and on the ghats along its western front are
numerous remains of Hindu temples, destroyed during the Muhamma-
dan occupation. The purwa is also enclosed by a stone wall, and.
though formerly a place of importance, is entirely lacking in buildings
of merit or interest. To the east stands the tomb of Godar Shah,
a Muhammadan saint, from which a fine view of the town and river
and the surrounding country is obtained. To the south, along the
steep eastern bank of the river, lie the remains of the old cantonment,
with its long avenue of lofty Millingtonias and the remains of the
picturesquely situated bungalows ; to the west stands the panva
with the kila beyond it, and across the stream a wide open plain,
the field of the battle referred to below.
Mehidpur is supposed by Hindus to stand in the Mahakalban or
great sacred forest of Mahakal, which is said to have formerly covered
all the country round Ujjain. From this circumstance it derives special
sanctity; and in 1897, when cholera interfered with the attendance at
the great Sinhast religious fair at Ujjain, about 5,000 sadhus performed
their ablutions in the Sipra at Mehidpur instead. After the occupation
of Malwa by the Muhammadans, it was renamed Muhammadpur and
appears under that name in local documents, and in the Ain-i-Akbari,
where it is shown as the chief town of a mahal in the Sarangpur sarkar
of the Subah of Malwa. This name, however, has never come into
general use. About 1740 it was assigned as a saranjaml jagir by
Malhar Rao Holkar I to his feudatories the so-called Vagh Rajas,
who until 181 7, when Malhar Rao II confiscated their holding, virtually
ruled this part of Malwa. The descendant of the Vagh Rajas still
lives in the fort and holds a small grant of land.
About 2 miles to the south-west across the river the battle-field of
Mehidpur is still marked by a small cemetery, containing the graves
of nine officers who fell on that occasion. Sir John Malcolm, who
commanded the forces engaged in this battle, arrived at Gannia village,
20 miles south of Mehidpur, on December 19, 181 7. On the morning
of the 20th Tulsi Bai was murdered by Ghafur Khan, and all negotia-
tions fell through. Malcolm then pushed on along the right bank of
the Sipra. The enemy were drawn up on the left bank, so as to form
the chord of a bend in the stream. The river was forded under a heavy
fire and the position carried at the point of the bayonet. Except the
artillerymen, who, as usual, stood to their guns till they were bayoneted,
Holkar's troops offered no effective resistance. The losses, which were
entirely due to the fire of Holkar's guns, amounted to 174 killed,
including 9 British officers, and 606 wounded. Malcolm moved on to
Mandasor, where a treaty with Holkar was signed on January 6, 1818.
Mehidpur was selected as a station for the Mehidpur Contingent
raised under the treaty of 181 8, and remained a military station till
MEH.UA/K4BAJ) TALUK A 271
1882. On November 8, 1857, the troops were attacked by a number
of Rohillas from the town, the Muhammadans in the Contingent join-
ing with the mutineers. Two British officers were killed, the European
sergeant escaping to Indore, escorted by some Hindu troops of the
corps. After the Mutiny, Mehidpur became the head-quarters of
the Western Malwa Political Charge until i860, when they were trans-
ferred to Agar.
Trade is declining for want of good communications, though a con-
siderable amount of poppy is grown in the neighbourhood, and crude
opium is sent to Ujjain for manufacture. A municipality has recently
been constituted. Mehidpur contains the zila and pargana offices, a
British post office, several schools, a hospital, and an inspection bungalow.
Mehkar Taluk. — Southern taluk of Buldana District, Berar, lying
between 190 52' and 200 25' N. and 760 2' and 760 52' E., with an area
of 1,008 square miles. The population fell from 153,046 in 1891 to
120,792 in 1901, the density in the latter year being 120 persons
per square mile. The taluk contains 313 villages and one town,
Mehkar (population, 5,330), the head-quarters. The demand for land
revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 2,73,000, and for cesses Rs. 21,000. The
taluk lies in the Balaghat, in the south-western corner of Berar ; but
the valleys of the Penganga and the southern Puma, which traverse
it, contain fertile tracts.
Mehkar Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in
Buldana District, Berar, situated in 200 io' N. and 760 37' E. Popu-
lation (1901), 5,330. According to a legend, it takes its name from
Meghan Kara, a demon who was overpowered and slain by Sarangdhar,
an incarnation of Vishnu. A Muhammadan poet informs us that Mehkar
is 795 years older than the Hijrl era. A fine specimen of a Hemad-
panti temple is situated here. Mehkar is mentioned in the Atn-i-
Akbari. as the head-quarters of a sarkar, or revenue district. In 1769
Madhu Rao Peshwa, accompanied by Rukn-ud-daula, the Nizam's
minister, encamped here with the intention of punishing Janoji
Bhonsla, who had assisted Raghunath Rao's insurrection. General
Doveton also encamped here in 18 17 on his march to Nagpur against
Appa Sahib Bhonsla, who had broken the Treaty of Deogaon. Mehkar
formerly contained many weavers, Hindu and Muhammadan. The
latter were so rich that they not only undertook to fortify the place,
but could afford to build up the fallen rampart, as appears from an
inscription dated 1488 on the Mumins' Gate, still standing. Pindari
inroads reduced the town to great distress, and its ruin was completed
by the great famine of 1803, after which only 50 huts remained
inhabited. Excellent dhotis were formerly woven at Mehkar, but the
cheapness of European fabrics has lessened the demand for these.
Mehmadabad Taluka.— North-western taluka of Kaira District.
272 MEHMADABAD taluk a
Bombay, lying between 22° 44' and 22° 55' N. and 720 36' and
7 20 57' E., with an area of 171 square miles. It contains 66 villages
and two towns, Mehmadabad (population, 8,166), the head-quarters,
and Kaira (10,392), the District head-quarters. The population in 1901
was 75,926, compared with 92,367 in 1891. The density, 444 persons
per square mile, is almost equal to the District average. The land
revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to nearly 2-4 lakhs. The
tahtka consists of a rich level plain, mostly open and thinly wooded.
The land is poor, light, and sandy, but a portion is suited for rice
cultivation. The Meshvo and Vatrak are shallow streams running
south-west.
Mehmadabad Town [Mahmudabdd). — Head-quarters of the tahtka
of the same name in Kaira District, Bombay, situated in 220 50' N.
and 7 20 46' E., on the Bombay, Baroda, and Central India Railway,
17 miles south of Ahmadabad. Population (1901), 8,166. It was
founded in 1479 by Mahmud Begara, who ruled in Gujarat from
1459 to 151 1, and improved by Mahmud III (1537-54), who built a deer-
park with an enclosure 6 miles long. At each corner of the park was
a palace with gilded walls and roof. On the right-hand side of the
gates leading to the palaces were placed bazars. Of the existing
objects of interest, the most notable are two tombs in the village of
Sojale, about 2 miles to the north-east of the town, built in 1484 in
honour of Mubarak Saiyid, one of the ministers of Mahmud Begara,
and of his wife's brothers. Mehmadabad has been a municipality
since 1863, with an average income of Rs. 9,500 during the decade end-
ing 1 901. In 1903-4 its income was Rs. 9,600. The town contains
a dispensary and four schools, three (including an English middle
school with 57 pupils) for boys and one for girls, attended by 427 and
102 pupils respectively.
Mehndawal. — Town ' in the Khalllabad tahsll of Bastl District,
United Provinces, situated in 260 59' N. and 830 7' E., 27 miles
north-east of Bastl town. Population (1901), 10,143. Mehndawal
is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about
Rs. 1,000. It is the chief commercial centre in the District, being
a great mart for trade with Nepal ; but it has suffered from the open-
ing of railway stations elsewhere. Most of the town consists of mud
hovels, but there are several fine market-places. It also contains
a dispensary and a school with 88 pupils.
Mehsana Taluka. — Tahtka in the Kadi flrant, Baroda State, with
an area of 195 square miles. The population fell from 83,651 in 1891
to 75,254 in 1901. The taluka contains one town, Mehsana (popula-
tion, 9,393), the head-quarters; and 83 villages. Its aspect is some-
times that of an even plain, sometimes that of a gently undulating
country. The Rupen and Khari flow through the northern portion.
MEHWAS ESTATES 273
The surface soil is generally light and sandy. In 1904-5 the land
revenue was Rs. 2,51,000.
Mehsana Town. — Head-quarters of the taluka of the same name,
Kadi pnint, Baroda State, situated in 23^2' X. and 720 37' E. Popu-
lation (1901), 9.393. The town is chiefly important as a railway centre,
for here the Gaikwar's State railways from Kheralu, Patau, and Viram-
gam converge to meet the main line of the Rajputana Malwa. Railway.
It is the most central town in the prdnt, and in 1904 became the head-
quarters in place of Kadi. A magnificent building, which forms a con-
spicuous object close to the town, has recently been erected, partly for
the purposes of public offices and partly as a palace for the (iaikwar.
Otherwise there are no buildings of any great mark. Mehsana is
administered by a municipality, receiving an annual grant of Rs. 4,700.
It possesses Anglo-vernacular and vernacular schools, a dispensary,
a magistrate's court, and local offices.
Mehwas Estates.— A group of six estates in the West Khandesh
District of Bombay, lying between 210 30'' and 220 N. and 740 10' and
740 50' E., in the extreme west of Khandesh, situated partly among the
western extremities of the Satpuras, and partly on the low ground below
the hills, spanning the interval between the Narbada and Tapti rivers.
Population (1901), 14,639. The estimated gross yearly revenue is
Rs. 70,000. The tract is broken and wild, and more or less covered
with forest ; it is abundantly watered by mountain streams flowing
into the Narbada and Tapti. The climate is unhealthy and feverish
from October to March. The estates are inhabited chiefly by Bhlls,
with a sprinkling of Pavras. In all parts there is a great deal of rich
black soil, but cultivation has much decreased since the famine of 1900.
As the supply of grain does not meet the local demand, the people eke
out a living on fruits, roots, and other forest produce. The main
articles of trade are timber, mahua flowers and seed, and myrabolams.
The chieftains settle petty cases, but all important matters go before
the Collector and Assistant Collector, who are respectively Agent and
Assistant Agent. Civil and criminal justice are regulated by rules
framed under Act XI of 1846. The six estates are: —
I". states.
Chikhli .
Kathi
Raisingpur
Singpur .
Nala
Nawalpur
Total
Area in
square miles.
Number of
villages.
Population.
1901.
Gross
receipts.
Tribute paid
to Government.
200
500
200
20
23
20
3S
96
So
4
6
5
3,579
7,789
2?25S
23 a
-'57
Rs.
T5,8i3
22,298
19.706
8.129
3,440
645
Rs.
133
963 229
14639
70.031
133
-74
MEHWAS ESTATES
The ancestors of the Chikhli chieftain originally held lands from
RajpTpla : Jiva, the founder of the family, taking advantage of the
turbulent times, established his power over 84 villages. A sum of
Rs. 3,000, assigned by Government as an hereditary allowance, made
mainly for foot and horse police in lieu of the blackmail formerly
levied, was discontinued in the time of Ramsing (1854-74). The
ancestors of the Raisingpur (Gauli) chieftain were feudatories of
Rajplpla, and are said to have been ruined on its subversion by the
Gaikwar (1 763-1813). The remaining four chieftains were originally
dependants of the chief of Budhawal ; but in 1 845 the latter was
removed on suspicion of conniving at robberies in the neighbouring
British territories, and his lands have since lapsed to Government.
Meiktila Division.— South-eastern Division of Upper Burma, lying
wholly in the dry zone, between 190 27' and 220 i' N. and 940 43' and
960 54' E., with an area of 10,852 square miles. It comprises four
Districts : Kyaukse, Meiktila, Yamethin, and Myingyan. Kyaukse,
Meiktila, and Yamethin lie, one south of the other in the order named,
on each side of the Mandalay-Rangoon railway, while Myingyan
extends westwards from the borders of Kyaukse and Meiktila to the
Irrawaddy. The Division is bounded on the north by Mandalay and
Sagaing ; on the east by the Southern Shan States ; on the south by
Toungoo and Magwe ; and on the west by Minbu, Pakokku, and
Sagaing. The population was 901,924 in 1891 and 992,807 in 1901.
The distribution in the latter year is shown in the following table : —
District.
Area in
square miles.
Population.
Land revenue
and thathameda,
«903-4>
in thousands
of rupees.
Kyaukse .
Meiktila .
Yamethin .
Myingyan .
Total
J, 274
2,183
4,258
3, '37
MI,253
2.-2,305
243-I97
356,052
8,62
5»I3
5,20
6,68
10,852
992,807
25,63
There are 4,415 villages and 6 towns: Myingyan (population,
16,139), Pyinmana in Yamethin District (14,388), Yamethin (8,680),
Meiktila (7,203), Nyaungo-Pagan (6,254), and Kyaukse (5,420).
The head-quarters are at Meiktila, situated near the centre of the
Division, and connected by rail with the three outlying District head-
quarters. Myingyan is a commercial centre of some importance, and
Yamethin and Pyinmana are trade centres. The population is almost
exclusively Burmese, the total number of Burmans in 1901 being
963,228. The only other indigenous races found in any strength are
the Shans, inhabiting the hills on the borders of the Shan States, who
ME IK TIL A DISTRICT 275
numbered 2,071 at the last Census, and the Karens (2,718), who
approach their northernmost limit in Burma proper in the Yamethin
hills. There were 14,536 Musalmans and 5,143 Hindus in 1901, of
whom the greater number, though not all, were natives of India.
Meiktila District. — District in the Meiktila Division of Upper
Burma, lying between 2o°40/and 2i°25/N. and 95°28'and 96°35'E.,
with an area of 2,183 square miles. It is the most easterly of the
Districts forming the dry zone of Burma, and is bounded on the north
by the Districts of Kyaukse and Myingyan : on the south by Yamethin
and Magwe ; on the east by various small States of the Myelat division
of the Southern Shan States ; and on the west by Myingyan and
Magwe. The District slopes generally from west to
east until the Samon river is reached, after which it
aspects.
gradually rises again to meet the flanks of the outer-
most Shan hills. The central portion of the western boundary runs
along the crest of a ridge of moderate altitude, with parallel ridges of
lesser height on either side. Here the ground is rocky and boulder-
strewn, and the vegetation scanty, consisting mainly of stunted
trees and scrub. To the north and south of these ridges the country
in the west, though still high, becomes flatter, and for a considerable
distance east of the border the District is scored from north to south
by deep watercourses with precipitous sides. The Mahlaing town-
ship, occupying the north-western quarter, has an undulating surface,
characterized by ridges running north and south. It has few level
plains, and the valleys are often so narrow that the fields look like
a winding river of grain. The south-western corner, comprising the
Meiktila township, is also of a rolling character, though here the
broken ground extends to a greater distance from the western
boundary than farther north. Bounding the Mahlaing township on
the east, and bisecting the District, is a ridge called the Minwin
kondan, extending from the northern boundary of the District to a
little south of Meiktila town. The town of Meiktila itself is built on
this ridge, at an altitude of about 800 feet. Nearly parallel to the
kondan and about 12 miles distant from it on the east is another ridge,
known as the Pwemingyi kondan in the north, and the Tetbyindaung
in the south. Both ridges have a gravelly and practically uncultivable
soil. The intervening valley, 12 to 15 miles in width, runs the whole
length of the District, and is level and waterlogged in parts. Low
hills and stretches of rising ground, composed in part of nodular lime-
stone, are met with here and there, chiefly on the west. Meiktila is
almost the only District of Burma which possesses no navigable water-
ways. Its most important river is the Samon, which, rising in Yamethin,
enters Meiktila in the south-east near the foot of the Shan hills, and
flows due north into Kyaukse. It is not, however, navigable within
276 MEIKTILA DISTRICT
the limits of the District, being more or less dry, except during the
rains. Between it and the Pwemingyi ridge is a valley, 6 or 7 miles
in width, which gradually rises towards the south, and is irrigated by
numerous tanks. The Thinbon chaung rises on the eastern slopes of
L'opa, flows in a north-easterly direction through the Mahlaing and
Wundwin townships, and falls eventually into the Samon at the ex-
treme northern end of the District. Within the limits of Meiktila the
Panlaung is merely a mountain brook.
One of the main features is the Meiktila lake, situated on the
Minwin ridge, about 800 feet above sea-level. This artificial stretch
of water is about 7 miles long and 3^ square miles in extent, and at
the centre, near Meiktila, is so narrow as to be practically divided into
two sections, north and south. The northern lake is diminishing in
capacity yearly, owing to the deposit of silt from its feeder streams, the
Shanmange and the Mondaing ; and both sections are subject to very
rapid rises after heavy rain over their area of supply. Another impor-
tant piece of water is the Nyaungyan-Minhla tank or lake, situated near
the southern border of the District. It derives its water from the
Chaunggauk and Chaungmagyi streams, both of which rise in the west,
the former bounding the District on the south, the latter watering a
considerable area of Yamethin District. The Nyaungyan and Minhla
tanks were originally separated, but have now been joined by a canal.
The whole of the District is occupied by rocks of Upper Tertiary
(pliocene) age, covered to a great extent with alluvium. In the western
portion of the Mahlaing township the abrupt dip of the strata, visible
to the naked eye by reason of the erosive action of the streams, appears
to indicate that the tract has been the scene of violent volcanic up-
heavals, the slopes in some cases being not less than 700 to 8o° from
the horizontal. In the western areas the trunks of large petrified trees
are found in the alluvium, and in some cases large areas are strewn
with fragments of fossilized wood.
The vegetation of the District resembles that of Kyaukse. In the
plains it is of a very dry type ; and sparse scrub jungle, with cactus,
tamarind, cutch, and several species of capers, covers the greater
part of the non-cultivated area. On the hills in the east the growth is
more luxuriant, and the bamboo is found. Its main features are
described under the head of Forests below.
Tigers, bears, bison, elephants, and sdmbar are all found, but only
to the east of the Samon near the hills. Leopards are said to be
increasing in numbers. Other kinds of deer besides the sambar are
shot in the plains, and in the cold season ducks and snipe are plentiful.
As in most of the dry zone Districts, snakes (including the cobra, the
karait, and the Russell's viper) are very common.
Meiktila lies along the eastern edge of the dry zone of Upper
HISTORY 277
Burma. The climate is dry but very healthy, except in the tarai east
of the Samon river, where malarial fever is always prevalent. The
cold season begins in November and ends in February, while the hot
season lasts from February to June and the rains from June to October.
The most unhealthy period is at the close of the rains. The great heat
during the hot months is tempered by high winds, which blow con-
tinually from the south and south-west from March to May, and during
a large portion of the rainy season as well, and the daily range of
temperature is considerable. The minimum temperature in 1902 was
620 in January, while the maximum was 1010 in May, and the mean for
the year was 730 minimum and 890 maximum.
The rainfall is extremely capricious and always scanty. Only in
three years since annexation (1886) can it be said to have been timely
and abundant. Generally speaking, the annual amount received varies
from 25 to 30 inches over the whole District. In 189 1-2, however,
only i2i inches fell throughout the year, while in 1896-7, though the
total was 28 inches, more than half fell in June and July. The rain-
fall is not only capricious in time but in the choice of localities, some
tracts being left quite unwatered in some years, while others receive
more than their due share.
It is reported that in 1872 there was a flood caused by the overflow-
ing of the Samon river, which inundated a large portion of the country
and destroyed all the crops. It is seldom, however, that the District
suffers from an excess of water.
A tradition of doubtful authenticity relates that the name Matila
(meaning ' it does not reach ') was given by Anawrata, king of Pagan,
to the present town of Meiktila to commemorate the
j 1 r , • -- History.
death from exhaustion of a horseman sent to report
whether the lake extended to Popa, who returned with a negative
answer on his lips. From the earliest times the District formed an
integral part of the kingdom of Upper Burma, whether centred at
Pagan, Ava, Amarapura, or Mandalay. The first place of note in the
District mentioned in the Burmese chronicles is Pindale, now a village
in the Wundwin township, which is said to have been founded by
Sulathanbawa, a king of the Tharekhettra dynasty (see Prome Dis-
trict). Later, in the eleventh century, Anawrata is reported to have
visited Meiktila, and to have made the north embankment of the lake.
The same monarch is credited with the foundation of Hlaingdet (1030).
On the break up of the Pagan kingdom the country came under Shan
dominion, and formed a portion of the principalities that strove for
mastery in Upper Burma till the rise of the Toungoo dynasty. In
due course it was absorbed into the Burmese empire of Pegu and later
into the kingdom of Ava, of which it formed a part at the time of the
annexation of Upper Burma. The country was disturbed during the
278 MEIKTILA DISTRICT
cold season of 1885-6, but was occupied by troops from Pagan
in March, 1886, when a force advanced through Mahlaing and
Meiktila to Vamethin, a civil officer being left at Mahlaing and a
military post being established at Meiktila, which was for the time
made over to Yamethin District. At that time the Mahlaing township
formed part of Myingyan, but the present District was constituted in
October of the same year. The garrison of Meiktila was engaged
during 1886 with the Yamethin dacoits on the one side and the
Kyaukse dacoits on the other, while in the District itself were rebel
leaders who had served the'Myinzaing prince (see Kyaukse District).
These were driven out again and again from their head-quarters at the
foot of the Shan hills, whence they were in the habit of retiring to the
Yengan and Lawksawk States on being pressed. A former Burmese
cavalry officer, one Tun E, rendered valuable service at this time with
a strong force of horse and foot, which he raised and maintained at his
own expense. As time went on the outposts were gradually advanced,
and the bands were dispersed, with a loss, however, of about 1 1 officers
and 80 men during the year. In 1887 the dacoits at the foot of the
Shan hills were attacked by a combined expedition from Kyaukse and
Meiktila, and were driven with some loss from a strong position ; and
after that the District remained undisturbed, with the exception of the
south-east portion, bordering on Myingyan District, which was raided
from time to time by the cattle-lifters of Popa and the neighbouring
country. By 1888 the District was practically settled.
There are a number of notable pagodas in the Mahlaing, Wundwin,
and Thazi townships, the fame of some of which extends far beyond
the District limits. The chief of these is the Shwezigon at Pindale, to
which pilgrimages are made from all parts of Upper Burma. Others
are the Shwesiswe, the Sutaungbyi, the Shwemoktaw, and the Shwe-
yinhmyaw. Legend credits king Narapadisithu of Pagan with having
built the Sutaungbyi. The Meiktila township contains six remarkable
shrines, the Shwesawlu, the Nagayon, the Shwelehla, the Sigongyi, the
Nandawya, and the Shwemyindin. When Anawrata, king of Pagan,
came to repair the banks of the lake, he is said to have founded the
Shwelehla and Nagayon pagodas, while his son, Saw Lu, built the Nan-
dawya pagoda to the north of the Meiktila fort. This last is called,
indifferently, the Saw Lu or Nandawya pagoda, because in 1796 Bodaw-
paya, the consolidator of Alaungpaya's conquests, built a temporary
palace (Burmese, na?idaw) at the lake side opposite the pagoda. At
the same time his son founded the Sigongyi pagoda, north of the lake.
The population of Meiktila District was 217,280 in 1891 and 252,305
, . in 1901. Its distribution in the latter year is shown
Population. • , 1 , 1
in the table on the next page.
The only District from which there has been any considerable
POPULATION
279
immigration is Myingyan. The greater part of the emigration is
directed to Kyauk.se and Yamethin Districts and to Lower Burma.
In the hills in the east the villages are few and far between, but else-
where the population is thick enough to raise the density in the District
as a whole to over ioo persons per square mile. There are a certain
number of representatives of the religions of India, but 98 per cent, of
the community are Buddhist, and about the same proportion are
speakers of Burmese. Shan is .spoken far_ less than in the adjoining
District of Yamethin.
Township.
u
ti
s
r-* •
■ a
c —
1
466
426
696
595
Number of
Population.
Population per
square mile.
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween iK<)i
and 1901.
c
^- **
0 •-' —
X c ~ —
- ■r.-z'C
E = a S
sot.
SS1"
c.
m;;°3
u>925
S.035
7,004
i
0
r-
I
ui
t,
bo
_rt
>
Meiktila
Mahlaing .
Thazi
Wundwin .
District tolal
39°
250
316
277
76,656
62,890
49,824
62,935
164
148
72
I06
+ 17
+ 13
+ 27
+ II
2,183 1
'.233
252;305
ll6
+ 16
41,667
The number of Burmans in 1901 was 245,900, or slightly over
97 per cent, of the total population. In the hills in the east of the
District are about 1,300 Danus, who are regarded as Shans by the
Burmans and as Burmans by the Shans ; they are of mixed Shan and
Burmese blood, and talk bad Burmese. At Ywagyi a village is
inhabited by paydkyuns or pagoda slaves, alleged to be the descen-
dants of 400 men assigned to the pagoda by king Anawrata. The
Indian immigrants in 1901 numbered 2,700, out of a total of 2,600
Musalmans and 1,600 Hindus, so that about 1,500 of the repre-
sentatives of these Indian religions must have been born in the
country. In the Thazi township is a colony of Burmese-speaking
Muhammadans, who account for a large proportion of this last total.
They are the reputed descendants of a regiment in the army of king
Mindon, who were said to be the offspring of a force of 3,000 men
sent to Burma by the emperor of Delhi in the seventeenth or eighteenth
century. About half the Indian population is domiciled in Meiktila
town and cantonment. In 1901 the number of persons directly
dependent upon agriculture was 178,370, representing 71 per cent, of
the total population.
There are about 500 Christians, largely British soldiers, the majority
of whom are Anglicans or Roman Catholics. There is not much
active mission work in the District. The total of native Christians
is 234.
The agricultural conditions are typical of the dry zone, Meiktila
2 So
MEIKTILA DISTRICT
being probably the poorest of all the Districts lying in that area. Rice
is grown in suitable tracts ; where it cannot be raised, the ordinary
. , crops of the dry zone are cultivated. The soil in the
Agriculture*
valleys near the two ridges described above is covered
with kyatti, a yellowish soil, greasy and slightly clayey when wet, hard
when dry, and fit only for rice, of which it produces the poorest crops.
The best rice tract is composed of black cotton soil {sane net), a stiff,
tenacious, and adhesive clay. An ample supply of water is, however,
a more important factor in the production of rice in Meiktila than a
good quality of soil ; and the only good crops are obtained on the lands
irrigated from the numerous tanks in the Meiktila and Nyaungvan-
Minhla systems, and the weirs thrown across the Thinbon chaung. A
considerable area of rice land, especially the valley between the two
ridges mentioned above, is impregnated with natron or soda (satpya),
an element which necessitates constant supplies of clean water to the
crops. The beds of some of the streams unfortunately show abundant
traces of the presence of natron, and the evil is spreading. Even when
fresh water is constantly supplied, a .ra^'tf-impregnated field will not
produce the full crop of an ordinary field ; and if the water stands for
long it turns the colour of congealed blood, and the rice stalks are apt
to bend over and break and assume a bedraggled and rusty appearance.
The methods of rice cultivation do not differ from those in use in Upper
Burma generally. Practically all the kaukkyi (wet-season) rice is trans-
planted from nurseries. Joivar takes the place of kaukkyi on rice lands
in years of scanty rainfall. Cotton is cultivated for the most part on
the high ground in the north-west, and is only grown as a rule once
on the same ground in three years, ses&mum, jowdr, or beans inter-
vening. Early sesamum (/wanyin) is reaped between June and
September ; late sesamum and joivar between October and January.
Other crops cultivated in the District are chillies, peas and beans,
tomatoes, maize, onions, gram, sweet-potatoes, cucumbers, pumpkins,
brinjals, Goa beans, betel-vines, sugar-cane, and toddy-palms.
The following table gives the main agricultural statistics of the
District for 1903-4, in square miles: —
Township.
Total area.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Forests.
Meiktila
Mahlaing .
Thazi
Wundwia .
Total
466
426
696
595
180
143
103
117
32
5
47
52
I
r 4°5
2,183
543
136
405
The staple crop is rice (practically all kaukkyi or wet-season rice),
grown on 202 square miles, a figure approached only by that iox joivar,
AGRICULTURE 281
which covers 188 square miles. A large area (135 square miles) is
under sesamum, a crop generally followed by a second harvest of rice,
Jozudr, maize, or beans. Nearly 52 square miles in the Meiktila township
alone produce early sesamum. In 1903-4 about 40 square miles were
under cotton. Of this area, 31 square miles lay in the Mahlaing town-
ship, adjoining the main cotton-producing area in Myingyan District.
Meiktila grows the largest chilli crop in the Province, 17 square miles
being devoted to the cultivation of this condiment. The other crops
referred to in the preceding paragraph are produced on a smaller scale.
Toddy-palms are planted to a large extent in the north-western part of
the District. The average area of a holding is about 7 acres in the
case of rice land, and about 1 1 in the case of ya or uplands.
No loans have been made under the Land Improvement Loans Act.
Free recourse was had to the Agriculturists' Loans Act during the
scarcity of 1896-7, and since then the utility of this enactment has
been proved more than once. About Rs. 9,000 was advanced in
1900- 1, and the system was so much appreciated by the villagers that
during the following three years the loans averaged nearly Rs. 30,000
per annum.
Cattle-breeding is carried on to a considerable extent. Buffaloes
have been introduced from Lower Burma in small numbers, but are
not bred in the District.
There are no reserved grazing grounds, sufficient pasturage being
afforded by fallow and uncultivable lands, broken and hilly ground,
and scrub jungle. No difficulties are experienced in feeding live-stock,
except during a period of drought, when cultivators usually emigrate to
areas where there is no distress. The only expenditure incurred by the
owners of breeding cattle is the hire of the herdsman who takes the
beasts out to graze. Goats and sheep are reared with success by
natives of India in Meiktila town and in a few villages. Hogs are also
bred, but only in small numbers.
The chief sources of irrigation are the Meiktila lake, the Nyaungyan-
Minhla tank, the Inyin se (or dam), the Wundwin se, and the Nyaung-
binhla se. The Meiktila lake draws its supplies from the high land
east of Popa, having a catchment area of over 200 square miles. The
area irrigated from the system of tanks and distributaries fed by it
extends north-eastwards to Wundwin, and eastwards to Thazi, and the
total at present commanded by the lake is 43 square miles. The
portion of this total actually irrigated varies considerably from year to
year. The Nyaungyan-Minhla tank, described above, is really com-
posed of two tanks joined by a channel. New irrigation works have
considerably diminished its catchment area, which is now estimated at
200 square miles, the area commanded being 30 square miles, though
only 6,000 acres are at present actually irrigated. The Inyin se is a
282 MEIKTILA DISTRICT
stone crib-work weir (with flanking banks), thrown across the Thinbon
chaung near Chaunggon, a village to the north of Meiktila town. It is
capable of watering nearly 10,000 acres, but usually irrigates about half
that amount. The water passing over the weir is dammed below by
numerous temporary ses, which distribute the water over a considerable
area. The dam was seriously breached in September, 1905. The
Wundwin se is situated close to Wundwin, its supply being derived
chiefly from the Meiktila lake system and a watercourse known as the
Natmyaung. It irrigates as a rule about 4,500 acres. The Nyaung-
binhla se consists of a crib-work weir thrown across the Samon .river
just below where it enters the District in the south. It diverts the
water to the north-east, and serves on an average about 3,000 acres.
The District contains hundreds of small tanks, fed by weirs which hold
up the freshes in the streams ; they are, however, maintained by the
cultivators themselves, and are not Government works. Altogether
136 square miles were returned as irrigated in 1903-4. Of this total,
50,500 acres were served by the numerous private tanks scattered over
the country, and 35,600 acres by Government tanks and canals. The
irrigated land is almost wholly given up to rice cultivation.
Several types of forest occur in the District. The western areas are
covered with dry scrub growth, in which the principal species are sha
(Acacia Catechu), kan (Carissa Carandas), pyinzin
(Rhus paniculata), dahat (Tectona Hami/toniana),
and here and there a tanaung (Acacia leucophloea), or a group of
tamarinds. The only species of any importance is the sha, yielding
the cutch of commerce, but this has been overworked in the past.
Along the banks of the Samon chaung the growth improves, and in
places which have escaped the attention of contractors supplying fuel
to the railway it approaches the condition of high forest. The chief
species in this belt are than (Terminalia Olivert), dahat (Tectona
Hami/toniana), thainon (Niebuhria sp.)t nabe (Odina Wodier), and
tapauk (Dalbergia paniculata), with the myiniva (Dendrocalamus
strictus) as the common bamboo. None of these is of any commercial
importance, though the extract prepared from the bark of the than has
been reported on very favourably as a tanning material. On the slopes
of the hills draining into the Samon chaung the forest is of the familiar
indaing type, the principal species being in (Dipterocarpus tuberculatus),
thitya (Shorea obtusa), and ingyin (Pentacme siamensis), all yielding
building timber. Still farther to the west, in the basin of the Panlaung
chaung, mixed dry forests predominate, containing valuable timber
trees, such as teak, padauk, and pyingado (Xylia dolabriformis), as well
as the thitya, ingyin, and other growths. In 1903-4 the total area of
' reserved ' forests was 105 square miles, of which 49 square miles were
cutch Reserves ; and it was estimated that the unclassed forests covered
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 283
a further 300 square miles. With tire exception of about 30 acres of
paddy-fields acquired at settlement in the Aingtha and Thinbon chaung
Reserves, which were ploughed and sown broadcast with cutch seed,
no planting operations have been undertaken. The total forest receipts
in 1903-4 amounted to only Rs. 2,500.
Meiktila possesses few minerals of economic importance. Limestone
appears in small quantities in many parts of Mahlaing, but is said to
have no industrial value, though a very fair lime can be obtained from
it. The natron that accumulates on the soil in the satpya-Xaden tracts
is collected and used as a cosmetic. Coal has been found in the
Kyetkauk hill south-east of Hlaingdet in Thazi, and also in the Suban
circle ; and brine-springs occur in a few places in the Wundwin township.
The District is essentially agricultural, and the great majority of the
population depend wholly on husbandry for a livelihood, so that there
are few manufactures. Bamboo basket- and mat-
work is carried on to a limited extent, but the output Trade and
„ . r 1 1 • communications,
is not more than sufficient for local requirements.
The only special industry is the manufacture of rough pottery, carried
on in the Wundwin, Mahlaing, and Thazi townships. The experiment
of weaving cotton cloth by machinery is being tried in the villages of
Shawbin and Aingtha in Wundwin. A cotton-ginning factory has been
established at Mahlaing, and the cotton, after being ginned, is exported
to Lower Burma and Bhamo. Butter is manufactured at Meiktila, and
goes to Rangoon and Mandalay.
The District carries on a steady trade with the Southern Shan States
by way of the Thazi-Taunggyi Government road. A good deal of the
traffic that starts from Taunggyi is diverted into Yamethin ; a fair
portion of it, however, reaches Meiktila District and is registered at
Kywelebin. The imports from the Shan States by the Kywelebin
route were valued at 4 lakhs in 1903-4, the chief items being potatoes
(valued at Rs. 74,600), lac (Rs. 1,08,000), ponies, vegetables, and
various other articles, the most important of which is thanatpet for
cigar wrappers. The exports to the Shan States by the same route
were valued in the same year at 13-4 lakhs, including European cotton
piece-goods (6-8 lakhs), betel-nuts (Rs. 36,800), cotton twist and yarn
(Rs. 96,000), salt (Rs. 26,200), petroleum (Rs. 34,000), woollen goods,
wheat, iron-work, salted fish, ngapi, g/il, and sugar. To other Districts
in Burma Meiktila exports cutch and cotton, mainly to Rangoon and
Mandalay by train, and to Bhamo via Mandalay by steamer. Cotton
and silk goods and various manufactured commodities are brought in
by the railway.
Though absolutely without navigable waterways, Meiktila is excep-
tionally well off in the matter of land communications. The railway
line from Mandalay to Rangoon passes from north to south through
VOL. XVII. t
284 MEIKTILA DISTRICT
the District for 39^ miles, and has four stations within its limits.
The Myingyan branch from Thazi to the boundary at Ywatha runs
diagonally north-westwards for 40^ miles, with six stations, including
those at Meiktila and Mahlaing. Thus, except in the extreme east,
no portion of Meiktila is out of touch with the District head-quarters
or the outside world.
The chief roads maintained by the Public Works department are :
from Meiktila to Thazi (15^ miles, metalled), and thence via Hlaindet
into the Shan States, crossing the Shan States border near Nampandet ;
from Wundwin to Mahlaing (29 miles) ; from Meiktila to Pindale
(20 miles); from Meiktila to Mahlaing (31 miles); and on to Myin-
gyan. All but the first of these are unmetalled. Various tracks, some
of them maintained out of the District fund, connect the larger villages
with each other and with the railway. The total length of metalled and
unmetalled roads in 1903-4 was 24 miles and 107 miles respectively.
The rainfall is so light that the village roads can be used practically
at all seasons of the year.
The capriciousness of the rainfall is responsible for frequent failure of
the harvest. Scarcity occurred in 189 1-2 owing to light rains, and
caused considerable emigration to Lower Burma and
Kyaukse, necessitating the opening of relief works.
In severity, however, it was eclipsed by the famine of 1896-7. The
previous year had been a lean one, and the rains held off from the
middle of July till October, and ceased the same month. The needs
of the people were, however, supplied by private enterprise ; and
though the price of rice at first rose to 7 seers to the rupee, it fell
to 8 seers when food-grains were imported. The stringency of prices
was not accompanied by any marked increase of crime except cattle-
theft. During the period of famine cholera broke out in some parts
of the District, but was soon stamped out. The death-rate, however,
ordinarily between 25 and 30 per 1,000, rose in 1897 to 42 in March,
April, and May, dropping gradually to normal in the autumn. The
works undertaken for the relief of distress were the Thazi-Myingyan
railway, and the Wundwin-Pindale and Meiktila Lake roads. In
addition to other measures, advances were made in 1896-7 under the
Agriculturists' Loans Act to the amount of Rs. 41,000, and in the
following year to the amount of Rs. 53,000. The whole District was
affected, and many of the villagers migrated to other parts of Burma.
When the assessment of thathameda was made, it was found necessary
to abstain from levying anything from 3,863 households, while the rest
of the people were taxed at reduced rates of Rs. 3 and upwards. The
total number of units relieved from October, 1896, to November, 1897,
was 3 1 millions, the largest number in a month being 600,000 in
January.
ADMINISTRATION 285
The District is divided for administrative purposes into two sub-
divisions : Meiktila, comprising the Meiktila and Mahlaing town-
ships ; and Thazi, comprising the Thazi and
Wundwin townships. They are in charge of the Administration-
usual executive officers, under whom are 468 village headmen. At
head-quarters are an akunwun (in subordinate charge of revenue),
a treasury officer, and a superintendent of land records, with a staff of
5 inspectors and 50 surveyors. The District forms, with the rest
of the Division, the Meiktila Public Works division, and contains two
subdivisions. An Assistant Engineer is in charge of the Southern or
Meiktila subdivision of the Eastern Irrigation division. The District
forms part of the Kyaukse subdivision of the Mandalay Forest division.
The Commissioner is Sessions Judge for the District, and the
Deputy-Commissioner is District Magistrate and District Judge.
Four township courts and two subdivisional courts are subordinate to
the District court. The township officers dispose of both civil and
criminal work, as well as revenue business. It has been found
necessary to appoint one additional judge (who is also treasury officer
and head-quarters magistrate) to the Meiktila township court, and
a second to assist the township officers of Thazi and Mahlaing in
their civil work. A third additional judge spends half his time at
Wundwin and half at Pyawbwe in Yamethin District. Besides the
additional township judges, an additional judge (usually an Extra
Assistant Commissioner) has been posted to Meiktila and Yamethin
Districts, to relieve the District court of the greater part of its civil and
criminal work. He sits half the month at Meiktila and half at Yamethin.
A Cantonment Magistrate disposes of petty criminal cases within the
limits of Meiktila cantonment. Cattle-theft is one of the most preva-
lent offences, the facilities for this form of crime being great.
Under native rule the District revenue was derived from thathameda,
an irrigation tax, crown-land rents, bazars, and various law receipts.
State land at that time covered a comparatively small area. The
water revenue was collected by myaunggaungs or canal-keepers, who
superintended the distribution of the water under the kan-ok or super-
intendent of the Meiktila lake. The /nyai/nggauiigs received neither
pay nor commission, but doubtless took advantage of their position
to levy extensive blackmail. At annexation the revenue on most of
the state land was fixed at Rs. 16 per pe (1-75 acres), which was
supposed to represent the value of one-quarter of the actual produce,
but it was not long before this rate was reduced by about half. The
irrigation tax was continued at a maximum rate of Rs. 2 per acre, and
thathameda was collected at Rs. 10 a house, or the same rate as
before. Survey operations went on from 1891 to 1895 ; and the settle-
ment of the surveyed area, which included all the District west of the
T 2
2S6
ME IK TIL A DISTRICT
Samon, was begun in 1896 and completed in 1898. In 1901-2 the
rest of the District up to the foot of the Shan hills was surveyed, and
settlement rates will shortly be introduced there also. At the settle-
ment of 1896-8 the District was divided into two tracts : one comprised
the greater part of the District from the Samon westwards"; the other
consisted of a strip of relatively poor upland bordering on Myingyan
District in the west, containing very little state land, and only about
4,500 acres of cultivation. On the completion of the settlement, the
thathameda was reduced from Rs. 10 to Rs. 3 a household, and fixed
rates were introduced on state land, the rates on non-state land being
levied at three-fourths of the rate on corresponding state land. In the
first tract, rice land now pays from R. 1 to Rs. 5 per acre ; other crops
on rice land, R. 1 ; ya or upland crops, from 8 annas to Rs. 1-8
per acre ; onions and chillies, Rs. 3 ; garden crops, from Rs. 2-8
(on plantain groves) to Rs. 15 (on betel-vines); sugar-cane, Rs. 10 per
acre ; and solitary fruit trees, 4 annas each. In the second and poorer
tract, the rates on rice land vary from 7 annas to Rs. 3-8 ; and on
ya lands from 4 annas to Rs. 1-2 per acre.
The following table gives the revenue, in thousands of rupees, for
a series of years : —
1890-1.
1 900 -1.
1903-4.
Land revenue .
Total revenue .
10
4,00
5,20
7,83
3,59
6,35
At one time thathameda was the main source of revenue, but on the
introduction of settlement rates the receipts from this source fell below
those from land revenue.
The income of the District fund in 1903-4 was Rs. 59,000, and the
chief item of expenditure was public works, to which Rs. 52,000 was
devoted. There are no municipalities.
The District Superintendent of police has a force of 3 inspectors,
8 head constables, 23 sergeants, and 289 constables, 24 of whom are
mounted. There are 90 military police stationed at Meiktila and 30
at Thazi. Meiktila contains a District jail, with accommodation for
198 prisoners. The industries carried on are wheat-grinding, oil-
pressing, cactus and surkhi pounding, carpentry, rope-making, and
bamboo- and cane-work.
The standard of literacy according to the figures of the last Census
is somewhat low for Burma. The number of Indian immigrants and
backward hill tribes is not large, yet the proportion of literate males in
1901 (33 per cent.) was below that of any other District in the dry
zone of Upper Burma, and the female percentage (1-7) was higher only
than that of Magwe and a few of the most backward areas of the Pro-
MEIKTILA TOWN 287
vince. For both sexes together the proportion was 16 per cent. The
number of pupils was 630 in 1891, and 6,903 in 1901. In 1904 the
District contained 7 secondary, 82 primary, and 576 elementary
(private) schools, with an attendance of 8,399 pupils, including 495
girls. The expenditure amounted to Rs. 21,700, Provincial funds sup-
plying Rs. 16,900, fees Rs. 3,000, and subscriptions Rs. 1,800.
There are 2 hospitals, with a totai of ^ beds; and 10,664 cases,
of whom 444 were in-patients, were treated in 1903. The number of
operations in the same year was 242. The expenditure amounted
to Rs. 11,500, mostly derived from Provincial funds. Subscriptions
realized Rs. 600.
In 1903-4 the number of persons successfully vaccinated was
9,130, representing 36 per 1,000 of population.
[R. A. Gibson, Settlement Report (1900).]
Meiktila Subdivision. — Western subdivision of Meiktila District,
Upper Burma, comprising the Meiktila and Mahlaing townships.
Meiktila Township. — South-western township of Meiktila District,
Upper Burma, lying on both sides of the Meiktila-Myingyan railway,
between 20° 40' and 210 o' N. and 950 31' and 960 2' E., with an area
of 466 square miles. The population was 65,612 in 1891, and 76,656
in 1901, distributed in one town, Meiktila (population, 7,203), the
head-quarters of the District and township, and 390 villages. The
country is undulating and badly watered for the most part, except in
the neighbourhood of the Meiktila lake. In 1903-4 the area culti-
vated was 180 square miles, and the land revenue and thathameda
amounted to Rs. 1,38,000.
Meiktila Town. — Head- quarters of the Division and District of
the same name in Upper Burma, situated in 200 53' N. and 950 52' E.,
on the Myingyan branch of the Burma Railway, 320 miles from Ran-
goon and 57 from Myingyan. It stands on the margin of a large arti-
ficial lake, with an irregular indented margin. The lake is practically
divided into two bodies of water, the north and the south lake. Over
the strip of water uniting the twro run the railway bridge and a narrow
wooden bridge which connects the town on the east with the civil
station on the west. The population of Meiktila was 4,155 in 1S91
and 7,203 in 1901, including over 2,000 persons of Indian origin.
The town is built on irregular broken ground. On the highest point
east of the southern lake lie the cantonments, from which a road runs
along the embankment of the lake, passing through the town, near
the railway station, and crossing the bridge to the civil lines, whence
it is continued round the margin of the southern lake to the barracks
again, thus forming a circular road of 7 miles in length. The town is
not picturesque, and the number of flat-topped brick houses give it an
Eastern, but quite tin-Burmese, appearance. Only the pongyi kyaungs
2S8 MEIKTILA TOWN
and pagodas remain unchanged. There are trees in Meiktila itself;
but the general impression on first arriving by train from Thazi is of
bare, broken, stony ground, with scrubby jungle growing in patches,
and the lake, with its diversified shores, comes as a pleasant surprise.
The north lake has few buildings on its banks. West of it lies a small
suburb called Kanna ; and on its eastern shore are the military police
lines, the American Baptist Mission, the bazar, and the Musalman
mosque. All these are divided by the railway line from the town proper.
There are no manufactures, but a fair trade in hides and other com-
modities is done with the surrounding villages. Cattle-breeding is
carried on to some extent. Butter manufactured here is exported to
Rangoon and Mandalay. Nearly all the pongyi kyaungs contain saw-
pits, and new houses are constantly being built. Leases have lately
been issued in the town, and the consequent security of land tenure
encourages the growth of good wooden and brick buildings. There
is a large bazar, where a market is held every fifth day, resorted to
by all the country-side.
Most of the public buildings have been constructed within the last
ten years. The main Government vaccine depot for Burma is located
at Meiktila. It was started in 1902, and new buildings are to be
erected in connexion with it. The expenses of the depot in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 8,500, provided out of Provincial funds. The circuit-
house is unusually large ; and the club, built in one of the best positions
on the shore of the lake, is a convenient and capacious building. The
station contains two churches, for the Roman Catholic and Anglican
communities, a jail, and a hospital. The usual strength of the garrison
is one wing of British infantry and a regiment of Native infantry. Meik-
tila is also the head-quarters of a company of the Upper Burma Volun-
teer Rifles. The income of the cantonment funds in 1903-4 was
Rs. 5,700, and the expenditure Rs. 5,600.
The lake is reserved for drinking and household purposes, and is
carefully protected from possible pollution. The reputation of Meiktila
as a healthy station is supposed to be largely due to its good supply of
drinking-water. The depth of water in the lake varies very much, and
the under-currents are strong. During the hot season it is occasionally
swept by violent gusts of wind, which have caused several fatal
boating accidents. The town has not yet been constituted a munici-
pality ; but a conservancy scheme for the urban area is now working
well, and should increase the healthiness of this thriving and growing
centre.
Meja. — South-eastern tahsil of Allahabad District, United Provinces,
conterminous with the pargana of Khairagarh, lying between 240 47'
and 250 19' N. and 8i° 45' and 820 19' E., with an area of 650 square
miles. Population fell from 195,221 in 1891 to 167,014 in 1901, the
MELGHAT 289
rate of decrease being the highest in the District. There are 579 vil-
lages and two towns, including Sirsa (population, 4,159). The demand
for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 2,86,000, and for cesses Rs. 48,000 ;
but the land revenue has since been reduced to Rs. 2,13,000. The
density of population in the whole ta&sil is only 257 persons per square
mile, but in the northern Doab portion it rises to 469. The southern
part of the tahsil is a precarious tract, which has recently been brought
under a system of fluctuating assessments. North of a low range of
hills, which crosses the tahsil from east to west at a distance of 5 to
10 miles south of the Ganges, conditions resemble those of the Doab.
A great plain of mar or black soil like that of Bundelkhand, and with
low detached hills here and there, stretches south to the Belan. Be-
yond the Belan there is a tract of mar on the east, and on the west a
small fertile valley of much better quality. In the extreme south rises
the northern scarp of the Kaimurs.
Meja. — Chief place in an estate of the same name in the State of
Udaipur, Rajputana, situated in 250 25' N. and 740 n' E., about
80 miles north-east of Udaipur city, and 6 miles south-west of Mandal
station on the Rajputana-Malwa Railway. Population (1901), 1,027.
The estate is of recent creation and consists of 16 villages, held by
a noble who has the title of Rawat and belongs to the Chondawat
family of the Sesodia Rajputs. The income is about Rs. 25,600,
and a tribute of Rs. 2,500 is paid to the Darbar.
Mekong. — One of the main rivers of Indo-China, rising in Tibet
and flowing with a general south-easterly course into the China Sea
in French Cochin-China. The greater portion of its channel lies in
China, Siam, and the French possessions in Indo-China. For 50 or
100 miles between about 200 30' and 210 30' N. the river, however,
borders on the Shan State of Kengtung, separating that State from
French territory ; and it may therefore be said to form a portion of the
river systems of Burma. Its channel is impeded by rapids, and for
navigation it is of no more value than the Salween. Its main tribu-
taries in British territory are the Nam Lwi and the Nam Hkok.
Mekran.— Division of Kalat State, Baluchistan. See Makran.
Melghat. — Northernmost taluk of Berar, formerly part of Ellichpur
District, but since August, 1905, incorporated in Amraoti District,
lying between 210 io' and 210 47' N. and 760 38' and 770 40' E., with
an area of 1,631 square miles. The population fell from 46,849 in
1891 to 36,670 in 1901, the decrease being due to the famine of
1899-1900, which led very many of the Korkils to emigrate north-
wards. The density of the population, 22 persons per square mile, is
lower than in any other taluk of Berar. Villages, many of which are
small collections of Korku dwellings, number 330, and the taluk con-
tains no town. Its head-quarters are at the sanitarium of Chikalda.
2 9o MEL GHAT
The inhabitants are principally Korkus ; and the tahtk, a very large
proportion of which is state forest, lies entirely in the Gawilgarh hills,
a branch of the Satpura range. The land assessment is based, not
on acreage, but on ox-gangs, or the area which can be ploughed by
a pair of bullocks. The demand for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4
was Rs. 44,000.
Melukote. — Sacred town in the Seringapatam taluk of Mysore
District, Mysore, situated in 120 41/ N. and 760 39' E., on the Yadugiri
hills, 16 miles north of French Rocks railway station. Population
(1901), 3,129. It is the seat of the Srlvaishnava Yatiraja maf/i, founded
by the reformer Ramanuja, who, fleeing from persecution by the Chola
king, took up his residence here for twelve years at the beginning
of the twelfth century. He converted the Hoysala king, Bitti Deva
of Mysore, from the Jain faith, and received from him a grant of all
the country north and south of the Cauvery, afterwards known as
Ashtagrama. In the fourteenth century Melukote suffered at the
hands of the Musalmans on their destruction of Dorasamudra, the
Hoysala capital. The king retired to Tondanur, now Tonnur, at
the southern foot of the Yadugiri hills. The place was rebuilt about
1460 by the chief of Nagamangala, but in 177 1 was sacked by the
Marathas after their defeat of Haidar at Chinkurali. The principal
temple, a large square building and very plain, is that of Cheluva-
pillerava or Krishna. More striking is that of Narasimha, placed on
the very summit of the rock. From the early part of the seventeenth
century Melukote was under the special patronage of the Rajas of
Mysore. The inhabitants are mostly Brahmans, of whom 400 are
attached to the great temple, some of them being men of learning.
There are also numerous temple servants of Sudra extraction, musicians,
dancing-girls, and Satanis. Some weavers and shopkeepers are the
only persons who live by industry. Two classes of Holeyas or out-
castes, called Tirukula and Jambavakula, have the privilege of entering
the temple once a year to pay their devotions, in return for their
people having helped Ramanuja to recover the image of Krishna when
it was carried off to Delhi by the Muhammadans. Cloths of good
quality are made here, and fragrant fans of khas-khas grass. A fine
white clay, said to have been discovered by Emberumanar or Rama-
nuja, is used for making the nama or sect-mark on the forehead, and
is exported to distant places for that purpose, even to Benares. The
municipality dates from 1881. The receipts and expenditure during
the ten years ending 1901 averaged Rs. 1,400 and Rs. r,6oo. In
1903-4 they were Rs. 1,600 and Rs. 1,400.
Melur Taluk. — Taluk and subdivision in the east of Madura
District, Madras, lying between 90 52' and io° 30' N. and 7 8° 8' and
780 29' E., with an area of 485 square miles. The population in
MERCARA TALUK 291
1901 was 154,381, compared with 148,656 in 1891. It contains one
town, Melur (population, 10,100), the head-quarters; and 98 villages.
The demand for land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to
Rs. 4,60,000. In the north are the irregular masses of the Alagar,
Nattam, and Karandamalai hills. The more northern villages, known
as the Arumaganam, which are situated among these hills, are difficult
of access owing to the lack of roads. The soil is chiefly red sand.
One-half of the taluk is supplied with water from the Periyar Project,
and some of the best varieties of rice produced in the Presidency are
grown in this part. The remaining portion is irrigated by the Palar,
the Tirumanimuttar, and the Uppar streams, which, however, are not
perennial, and by numerous small tanks which these rivers supply
or which are rain-fed. The taluk has been greatly transformed and
enriched by the Periyar water.
Melur Town. — Head-quarters of the taluk of the same name in
Madura District, Madras, situated in io° 2' N. and 780 20' E., on the main
road between Madura and Trichinopoly. It is a Union with a popula-
tion (1901) of 10,100; and since the extension of irrigation in the
neighbourhood by means of the Periyar Project, the place has risen
in wealth and importance as an agricultural centre. The American
Mission has a station here.
Memadpura. — Petty State in Mahi Kantha, Bombay.
Memari. — Village in the head-quarters subdivision of Burdwan
District, Bengal, situated in 230 io' N. and 88° 7' E. Population
(1901), 1,674. Memari is a station on the East Indian Railway
and an important trade centre. Silk saris and dhotis are manu-
factured.
Mengni. — Petty State in Kathiawar, Bombay.
Mercara Taluk. — Central taluk of Coorg, Southern India, lying
between n°56/and i2°36' N. and 750 36' and 750 57' E., with an area of
216 square miles. The population in 1901 was 28,620, compared with
34,088 in 1 89 1, the decline being due to the falling off in the coffee
industry and consequent depression in trade. The taluk contains one
town, Mercara (population, 6,732), the head-quarters; and 56 villages.
The Mercara table-land, whose elevation is 3,809 feet above the sea at
the fort, occupies the west centre. From it the Ghat ranges extend
westwards towards Bengunad and the Sampajl valley, northwards lies
a range which includes Kotebetta (5,375 feet), on the east a range
runs towards Fraserpet, and south-east a range which culminates in
Nurokkalbetta. The Cauvery runs along the southern boundary,
receiving from this taluk the Muttarmudi and the Chikkahole. The
north is drained by the Hatti or Harangi, which for some distance
forms the boundary. Within the taluk are thus comprised all the
essential features of Coorg. The north and west are occupied by
2Q 2 MERCARA TALUK
valuable and extensive coffee plantations, and the soil generally is
fertile and productive for both ' wet ' and ' dry crops.'
Mercara Town (properly Madikeri, 'clean town'). — Chief town
of Coorg, Southern India, situated in 120 25' N. and 750 44' E.,
on an elevated plateau, points on which are 3,961 feet above the sea
in the south, 4,155 in the west, 4,267 in the north-east, and 4,345
in the south-east. It consists of the native town of Mahadevapet and
the fort, which is 3,809 feet above the sea. Population (1901), 6,732
(4,496 Hindus, 1,635 Muhammadans, 559 Christians, and 42 others).
For the reasons given in the article on the taluk, the numbers have
fallen from 8,383 in 1891. An efficient water-supply has been provided,
chiefly from private contributions. In 1903-4 the municipal income
was Rs. 18,000, including taxes on houses and lands (Rs. 6,200),
professions and trades (Rs. 2,300), and grants and loans (Rs. 4,500).
The expenditure amounted to Rs. 20,000, the chief items being
hospitals and dispensaries (Rs. 5,300), conservancy (Rs. 3,000), and
education (Rs. 1,700).
Mercara was selected by Muddu Raja on account of its central and
inaccessible position as the site of his fort and capital, and thither
in 1 68 1 he moved the royal residence from Haleri, a few miles to
the north. The present fort, which is of stone, was built by Tipu
Sultan, and named by him Jafarabad. On the approach of the British
force marching against Seringapatam under Abercromby in 1790, the
fort was evacuated by Tipu's troops, and delivered over with all its
guns and ammunition to the Raja of Coorg. It surrendered to the
British without opposition in 1834, and is still in pretty good preserva-
tion, but of little strategical value, being commanded by hills all round
within short range of cannon. It consists of a rampart 8 feet thick,
and from 15 to 20 feet high outside, with battlements 2 feet thick and
5 feet high. The fortress is an irregular hexagon, and nearly conforms
to the shape of the hill-top, leaving enough space for a ditch all round,
and on the north side for a glacis. There are bastions at the six
angles, and the whole is built of strong masonry. The circuitous en-
trance is on the east, and guarded by three successive gates. Within
the fort is the palace, erected of brick in 1812 by Linga Raja. The
ground plan is that of a Coorg house, with a superstructure in
European fashion. It forms a large square of 200 feet, with an open
space in the centre, and is two storeys high. In the fort also are the
Commissioner's residence and the public offices. In the inner fort,
to the southern front of the palace, is the English church, built on
the site of a Ylrabhadra temple removed in 1855. In the opposite
corner of the courtyard is (or was) the figure of an elephant, in
masonry, life size. It is said that the Raja used to stand on the
balcony of the palace with a rifle and cause prisoners to run across
MERGUI DISTRICT 293
the yard while he fired at them, with the promise of their lives if they
escaped to the elephant, which however seldom occurred.
The native town of Mahadevapet, so named after Vira Rajendra's
second Rani, runs along a ridge which stretches northwards from the
fort, being separated from it by a narrow rice valley. It consists of
three streets, two of which are nearly parallel. At the farther end
of the town, on a rising ground, are the picturesque tombs of the
Coorg Rajas. A market is held in the petta every Friday. In a hollow
to the east of the fort is the Omkaresvara temple, around which are
the residences of the principal native officials. But the Coorgs in
Mercara seldom have their families with them ; these remain on the
farms. More to the north are the central school-buildings, erected
on the site of the ruins of the palace built by Linga Raja for the
reception of European visitors. To the south of the fort are the
parade ground and promenade, at the farther end of which is the
Raja's Seat, a public garden from which a fine panorama is obtained
of Coorg scenery.
Mergui Archipelago. — A collection of islands in the Bay of Bengal,
stretching along the coast of the Tenasserim Division of Lower Burma
between, roughly, 90 and 130 N. The Archipelago numbers in all about
800 islands, which are almost uninhabited except by the Salons or
sea-gipsies, who wander from fishery ground to fisher}' ground in their
boats. The largest is King Island, one of the few that possess regular
villages. The large island of Kisseraing (Kitthayi), though now a waste
of jungle, contains traces of an old Siamese town, mentioned in the
archives of Tenasserim. Others are Tavoy Island, off the south-west
corner, on which are the most important of the bird's-nest caves ; Ross
and Elphinstone, the nearest pearling-ground to Mergui ; Sellore, pro-
tecting the fisheries of Auckland Bay ; Domel, between which and
Kisseraing is the difficult channel of Celerity Passage ; Bentinck,
farther out, and the Great Western Torres, farther still to sea in
970 30' E. ; Malcolm and Owen, off which are the richest pearling-
grounds ; Sullivan's, little known except to the Salons ; and St. Luke's
and St. Matthew's, forming, with Hastings Island, a fine natural
harbour, and also frequented by Salons. Of the islands at the mouth
of the Pakchan river and southwards, the outer ones generally are
British and those near the coast Siamese.
Mergui District.— Southernmost District of Burma and of the
Tenasserim Division, extending on the mainland from Myinmoletkat
mountain (130 28' N.) on the border of Tavoy District in the north
to the mouth of the Pakchan river (90 58' N.) and the Isthmus of Kra
in the south, and including the islands of the Mergui Archipelago from
Tavoy Island to the Aladdin Isles in 90 38' N. On the east it is con-
terminous with Siam, and at one point, in 990 40' E., the Gulf of Siam
294 MERGUI DISTRICT
is only 10 miles distant. On the west the islands streteh out as far
as 970 30' E. The total area is 9,798 square miles.
North of Mergui town the valley of the Great Tenasserim river is
separated from the sea by a mountain range, culminating in Myin-
moletkat, 6,800 feet high, on the northern border.
ysica Between this range and the coast is a fertile plain,
aspects. ° . l
intersected by small streams running east and west,
and to a great extent cultivated. The rest of the District is of a very
different character. There are no mountain ranges of any importance,
and such level lands as exist are mostly covered by the sea at high tide
or, if inland, flooded during the rains. With the exception of the
valleys of the two Tenasserim rivers and the Upper Pakchan, this
part of the District is generally a network of low hills fringed with
mangrove swamps.
The principal rivers are the Great Tenasserim, rising far to the north,
in Tavoy, and entering the District about 140 miles above Tenasserim
village, where it doubles back on itself and flows into the sea, forming
a delta round Mergui town ; its tributary, the Little Tenasserim, which
joins it at Tenasserim village after a northerly course from the Siam
border; the Lenya, to the south-west of the Little Tenasserim, and
nearly parallel with it, but flowing direct into the sea south of Mergui
after a bend to the north-west ; and the Pakchan, rising in the same
neighbourhood as the Lenya, but flowing south to Victoria Point.
The District is thus, with the exception of the Palaw township, where
a few streams run from east to west, a system of rivers flowing from
north to south or south to north, except where a bend is needed to
enable them to reach the sea. The Mergui Archipelago, which
stretches down the entire length of the coast, numbers 804 islands
of every size, from King Island, with an area of 1 70 square miles, to
mere rocks rising abruptly from the sea. Nearly all are forest-clad, and
most are hilly, often fringed with mangrove swamps, but occasionally
displaying a yellow beach of sand or pebble. With the exception of
King Island, which is partly cultivated by Burmans and Karens, and
some fishing villages, more or less deserted during the monsoon, on
the shores of Kisseraing and Sellore, the islands are almost unin-
habited, but for the Salons or sea-gipsies who wander among them.
A remarkable feature of the coast scenery is the presence of limestone
cliffs, towering sheer out of the water for several hundred feet, and
forming caves which recall the interior of a Gothic cathedral, while
others enclose lakes accessible only at low tide through a tunnel in
the rock. They are the home of the tiny swift that builds the edible
bird's-nest of commerce.
Coal, tin, gold, and other minerals are found in the District. They
are referred to in detail in a later paragraph. The coals of Theindaw
PHYSICAL ASPECTS 295
and Kawmapyin on the Great Tenasserim are found in association with
shales, sandstones, and conglomerates, which form a Tertiary basin.
The Moulmein group of beds constitute the greater portion of the
sedimentary rocks. Under these is the Mergui group, a series of
essentially pseudomorphic sedimentary beds, with imbedded fragments
of felspar which have so far been noticed only near Mergui. Rocks of
the gneissic series with granite, &c, also occur. It is from the disin-
tegration of this granitic rock that the tin ores are derived.
The flora resembles generally that of the adjoining District of
Tavoy. There is a good deal of swamp vegetation. Canes are abun-
dant. The thin reed grows in the valley of the Little Tenasserim.
The principal timber trees are referred to under the head of Forests
below.
The District swarms with monkeys, especially the fisher-monkey
(Macacus cynomolgus), which may be seen in great numbers on the
banks of the Palaw river cracking cockle-shells by means of stones ;
and the white-handed gibbon (Hylobates lar), usually black but some-
times light brown, with whose cries the forests everywhere resound at
sunrise. Elephants, tigers, sambar, barking-deer, and hog are plentiful,
and rhinoceros and bison are also found. The Malay tapir, which is
hardly known north of the Tavoy river, has been seen in Tenasserim.
Game-birds are less plentiful than in the delta Districts. The Archi-
pelago abounds with fish, prawns, and shrimps, especially in the muddy
waters between Mergui and the mouth of the Lenya river. The clearer
waters yield the pearl mollusc and other shell-fish of economic value.
Whales are frequently seen among the islands, and have given its name
to Whale Bay in the middle of the Archipelago.
The District is unusually healthy for a tropical country. Malaria is
little known, even in the lowlands at the foot of hills, where its most
deadly form is usually looked for. Situated on a peninsula between
two great seas, with no high mountain range to keep off the winds from
the Gulf of Siam, its climate is always mild and moist. The mean
maximum temperature at Mergui town is highest in April (93°) and
lowest in August (850), and the mean minimum ranges from 68° in
December to 750 in April and May.
The rainfall at Mergui town during the five years ending 1901
averaged 103 inches, and at Victoria Point about the same. A strip
of the District, about 10 miles wide, from Bokpyin to Ross and Elphin-
stone Islands, was devastated on May 4, 1902, by a cyclone, which
denuded the hills of forest and utterly destroyed any village that lay
in its path. Fortunately the tract is thinly populated; but many
fishing-boats were lost, and a part of the pearling fleet anchored near
Ross Island was destroyed.
Mergui has for most of its known history been a Siamese province.
296 MERGUI DISTRICT
with its capital at Tenasserim. The latter may possibly be identical
with Tun Sun, mentioned in the Chinese annals of the Liang dynasty
(a.d. 502-56) as the terminus of a trade route on the
western side of the Malay Peninsula. It is certain
that for hundreds of years Tenasserim was the gateway of the most
direct route to the Far East, commodities being brought to it by sea
from India and the Persian Gulf to meet those carried overland from
Siam and China. From early in the fifteenth century, when the port
was visited by Nicolb de' Conti the Venetian, till the massacre of 1687
described below, the place is constantly mentioned by travellers and
merchants as a great port. Abdur Razzak of Samarkand includes the
inhabitants of Tenasserim among the people to be seen at Ormuz
in 1442. Early in the sixteenth century it is described in the voyages
of Tristan d'Acunha as the first mart for spices in India, and Duarte
Barbosa says its ships were to be seen at Cape Guardafui. Large
vessels were then apparently able to reach Tenasserim, though it is
44 miles up the river ; and goods were carried thence overland to
Ayuthia and the Siamese Gulf. Mergui, however, seems always to
have been its seaport, for it is mentioned by Cesare de' Federici
in 1568.
Mergui has ever been a battle-ground of the rival kingdoms of Burma
and Siam. Cesare said in 1568, 'it of right belongeth to the kingdom
of Sion,' but whenever there was a strong Burmese king it became
a Burmese province. The earliest record is an inscription recently
found near the Shinkodaw pagoda, about 10 miles from Mergui. It is
dated 631 b. e. (a.d. 1269), and records a gift to the pagoda by Nga
Pon, the Royal Usurer of Tayokpyemin (' the king who fled from the
Chinese'), who reigned at Pagan from 1248 to 1285.
Siam was repeatedly invaded by the Burmans under Bayin Naung,
first as general and then as king, between 1548 and 1569, and in the
last year the capital, Ayuthia, was sacked. It is during this period that
Cesare de' Federici refers to Tenasserim as being in the kingdom of
Pegu. In 1587 Bayin Naung's son, the Yuva Raja, attempted to
imitate the exploits of his father ; but his army was destroyed, and
another expedition ended in disaster in 1593. Soon after this the
Burmese kingdom was broken up, and Siam enjoyed peace, so far as
the Burmans were concerned, for 150 years, until the rise of Alaung-
paya. In 1683 the king of Siam appointed Richard Burneby, an
ex-servant of the East India Company, as governor of Mergui, with
Samuel White as Shahbandar, or Port Officer, of Mergui and Tenas-
serim. A number of English traders were attracted to the place, and
there were also French, Dutch, and Portuguese settlements. But the
East India Company at that time claimed the monopoly of all trade by
Englishmen with the East, and the Council at Madras determined to
HISTORY
297
eject the interlopers. At the same time King James II was growing
anxious at the establishment of French influence at the Siamese capital;
and in 1687 the Curtana arrived outside Mergui with letters declaring
war on Siam pending payment of compensation for injuries done to the
Company's trade, and requiring Burneby and White to send all the
English in Mergui on board the frigate. A truce of sixty days was at
the same time allowed. During the truce the Siamese, under White's
direction, strengthened their defences and staked the river. An attempt
by the commander of the Curtana to remove the stakes resulted in
a general massacre of the Englishmen in Mergui, only three escaping
out of sixty. After this the French became supreme, and fortified
themselves in the town : but in 1688, as the result of a palace revolu-
tion, they were attacked and driven out. For the next seventy years
Siam was torn by incessant civil war, and a further blow was inflicted
on the trade of Mergui by the presence of pirates of all nationalities.
By 1757 Alaungpaya had become all-powerful in Burma, and had
founded the city of Rangoon. The usual invasion of Siam followed
at the end of 1759 by way of Mergui and Tenasserim, which were
occupied without resistance. Ayuthia was reached, but the siege was
abandoned owing to the illness of Alaungpaya, who died on the march
back to Burma. In 1775, however, another army was sent by his son
Sinbyushin under the Burmese general Maha Thihathura, and after
a siege of fifteen months the city was utterly destroyed. The Siamese
founded a new capital at Bangkok, and Tavoy and Mergui remained in
possession of the Burmans.
In 1 786 Siam was invaded by Bodawpaya, but without success, and
in 1792 the people of Tavoy rebelled and delivered up the town to the
Siamese. It Avas soon retaken, and Mergui, which had been success-
fully held by the Burmese governor, was relieved. Another rebellion
was crushed in 1808. Soon after this, friction arose between the British
and Burmese Governments. War was declared in 1824, which resulted
in the annexation of the Arakan and Tenasserim provinces in 1826.
In October, 1824, the East India Company's cruiser Mercury, with
Lieutenant-Colonel Miles and 370 men of the 89th Regiment, appeared
before Mergui, and the fort was carried with a loss of six men killed
and two officers and twenty-two men wounded. In 1825 a Siamese
force ravaged the country about Tenasserim, but was driven off; and
the present Mergui subdivision, almost depopulated by incessant wars
and rebellions, at last enjoyed a long period of tranquillity.
The principal pagodas are the Legyunsimi at Mergui, built in 17S5
over a smaller one erected soon after Alaungpaya's invasion ; and
the Zedawun pagoda, said to date from 1208, situated on a hill
10 miles up the Tenasserim river and commanding a fine view of
the valley.
298
MERGUI DISTRICT
The population of Mergui District has increased steadily from 47,192
_ , x. in 1872 to 56,559 in 1881, 71,748 in 1891, and
Population. 00 •
88,744 in 1901.
The principal statistics of area and population in 1901 are given
below : —
Township.
V
u
a
ST 8
e~
-B
V
U
<
Number of
c
0
"3
c
0
U
g'i
* 3
Oh
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
GO
B
0
H
en
U
Mergui .
Falaw .
Tenasserim .
Bokpyin
Maliwun
District total
1,879
785
4,033
2,103
989
9,789
I
152
"5
114
63
41
43,0-0
22,442
10,712
7,255
5,265
23
29
3
3
5
+ 33
+ 15
+ 28
+ 26
-32
10,890
2,728
1,405
1,856
854
I
485
88,744
9
+ 20
!7,733
There is little immigration, and the mining coolies brought from
China do not as a rule settle in the country. A large proportion of the
population in the extreme south is made up, however, of temporary
immigrants, and the fluctuations in this source of supply account for
the diminution that took place in the sparsely populated Maliwun
township between 1891 and 1901. Except along the coast, the inhabi-
tants are very scattered. Burmese is almost universally spoken in the
Mergui township, where even the people who admit, in other parts of
the District, kinship with pure Siamese call themselves Burmans. They
speak a dialect understood with difficulty by an ordinary Burman, with
some Siamese words and idioms, the most remarkable of the latter
being the inversion of the parts of compound verbs. The hard con-
sonants are retained as in Arakanese, but the r and h and final conso-
nants practically disappear. In Palaw an even less intelligible dialect of
Burmese is spoken by two-thirds of the population, the other third speak-
ing Karen. In Tenasserim, out of every roo persons 43 talk Burmese,
40 Siamese, and 16 Karen. Farther south Burmese tends to disappear
entirely, Siamese, Malay, and Chinese being the languages most heard.
According to religion, about 87 per cent, of the people are Buddhists.
There are a few Animists and Hindus, but most of the non-Buddhist
population are Musalmans, who numbered about 7,000 in 1901.
There were nearly 57,000 Burmans in 1901, about 2,000 Chinese,
and nearly 9,000 Siamese. A considerable proportion of the population
in the town and the mines is Baba or half-Chinese, the men retaining
the pigtail, but talking Burmese or Siamese, and the women wearing
the dress of their mothers. Of the Musalmans, between 2,000 and
3,000 are Malays and the rest nearly all Zairbadis.
Living in boats among the islands is a wild people of obscure origin
AGRICULTURE
299
called by the Burmese Salons, by the Malays Orang basin, by the
Siamese Chaunam (' waterfolk '), and by themselves Mawken ('drowned
in the sea '). The Salons are expert divers and swimmers, and the
supply of green snails and beche-de-mer is obtained entirely through
them. Their language has hitherto generally been regarded as akin to
Malay, but according to a recent view it is an entirely independent
form of speech, most nearly related to the Cham of Cambodia.
Two-thirds of the total population of the District are agricultural.
Outside Mergui the Burmans are husbandmen or fishermen, the
Siamese mostly agriculturists with a few miners, the Chinese usually
miners, and the Karens all agriculturists.
The Christian population in 1901 numbered 2,215. Of these, 2,135
were natives, mostly Karens in the Palaw and Mergui townships, where
the American Baptist Union started work in 1837.
There is little of special interest to note in connexion with the agri-
cultural methods obtaining in the District. The use of the plough is
practically unknown. In some parts a harrow with
a single tooth is used ; but the Siamese of the
Pakchan and other parts do nothing but tread out the soil with buffa-
loes, and this practice is followed by the Burmans on low-lying lands.
Fruit trees are planted in pits filled with burnt earth, which is also, with
cattle-dung, used as manure after the young tree has been planted out.
The area permanently cultivated is small. About one-third of it lies
in the Palaw township, rather more than a half in the basin of the
Tenasserim river, and the rest in the valley of the Pakchan.
The following table shows the main agricultural statistics for 1903-4,
in square miles : —
Township.
Mergui
Palaw
Tenasserim
Bokpyin
Maliwun
Total
Total
area.
1,879
4>°33
2,103
989
9.789
Cultivated.
64
37
22
9
7
Forests.
5,600
139
3,600
In the area under rice, which comprises about three-fourths of the
whole, the soil is generally rich, except in the Tenasserim township,
where it is inclined to be sandy. About 7 per cent, of the cultivated
area is planted with the dani palm {Nipd), which is at its best in this
District. It is grown on mud-banks in tidal creeks, which are covered
with water, more or less salt, at high tide. The leaves of this palm are
used for the roofs and walls of houses, and its juice for making toddy
and jaggery sugar. About 18 per cent, of the cropped land consists
vol. xvii. u
3oo MERGUI DISTRICT
of fruit orchards, usually on undulating land or the lower slopes of hills.
The soil is particularly well suited for areca palms and durians. There
are 12,640 rice holdings and 14,200 assessed orchards, but to the latter
must be added a very large number of gardens of less than a quarter
of an acre, which are not assessed. Of the area under rice, nearly half
is in the Mergui township and one-fourth in Palaw. More than 6,000
acres, of which 4,800 are in the Mergui township, are under the dani
palm. Nearly 2,000 acres in Palaw, and about the same area in Mergui,
are planted with areca palms. Durians cover a similar area in the
Mergui township, and coco-nuts 1,600 acres in the District as a whole.
Very little is done to improve the methods of husbandry, but con-
siderable progress has been made in bringing fresh land under culti-
vation. The cultivated area was 62 square miles in 1881, 81 in 1891,
134 in 1 90 1, and 139 in 1903-4. The area under rice has more than
doubled, and that of orchards nearly trebled, during the past twenty
years. The increase has been most marked in Palaw.
Buffaloes are practically the only cattle known outside Mergui town.
They are bred locally and are of a good quality.
The number of persons engaged in or dependent upon fishing is
between 10,000 and 11,000, or about one-eighth of the population. All
. , . the fisheries are in the sea. The principal implements
are the sanda (the hauling net) and the gawa. The
first is a lofty rectangular structure of wooden piles, often supporting
a small house in one corner, and provided with long wings of saplings,
which sometimes extend for half a mile. An immense net is lowered
from it by means of pulleys, and into this fish or prawns are swept by
the tide. The larger fish are dried on bamboo platforms ; the prawns
are boiled and similarly dried, after which the shells are removed by
being beaten in a bag, and go to feed the pigs or to manure the land of
the Chinese in the Straits. Long rows of sandas stand in the fair
season across the vast shallows of Whale and Auckland Bays, and as
many as 120 may be seen at once. The gaiv a is a triangular net form-
ing a kind of scoop, which a man pushes before him in shallow water,
towing a canoe at the same time. It is used only for collecting shrimps,
which are made into a paste and exported largely to Rangoon, where
this paste is regarded as the finest kind of ngapi.
Next to sea-fishing proper, the principal maritime industry is pearling.
Before 1893 a certain number of pearls were obtained by the Salons,
who are capable of diving to a depth of 5 fathoms or more without
apparatus. The richness of the beds was little suspected, however,
until a Singapore company obtained a lease in that year of part of the
Archipelago, and started operations with diving gear and Filipino,
Malay, and Japanese divers. This attracted a number of pearlers from
the Australian fisheries, to whom they sublet their rights. Meantime
FISHERIES 30 r
Chinese pump-owners began work in other parts of the Archipelago,
and in 1898 a Chinese syndicate obtained a lease of the entire area.
The white pearlers continued work for a time under this syndicate ;
but the supply of shell, on which, rather than the pearls, they depended
for their profits, had greatly diminished, and by 1900 all had left.
Their place was taken by Chinese, Zairbadis, and Burmans of Mergui,
who were attracted by the gambling nature of the industry, were
content with smaller average profits, and above all were better able to
check their divers. It is impossible for the pump-owner to prevent
peculation unless he, or some one he can trust, travels in each diving-
boat. Ostensibly the shells are opened only in the owner's presence,
but it is a very easy matter for the diver to test one for pearls and
reclose it.
Since 1900 licences have been issued at a fixed fee of Rs. 400 per
pump, the licensee working where he pleases ; and this system has
proved more satisfactory than the old one of auctioned leases. The
exports of shell declined from 414 tons in the year ending March,
1895, to 71 tons in 1905 ; but the price of both shell and pearls had
meanwhile risen, and in 1905 there were 77 pumps at work. The
finest pearl yet found in the beds, so far as is known, is a drop pearl
weighing 34 carats and sold at Singapore for $16,000 in 1902, but
a smaller pearl fetched Rs. 30,500 at Mergui in 1904. The shell is
usually found in waters from 18 to 23 fathoms deep. The best grounds
are in the neighbourhood of Owen and Malcolm Islands, about 100
miles south of Mergui ; but diving is also carried on near Ross and
Elphinstone, 30 miles west of the town. Mr. Jardine, an Australian
pearler, in a report prepared for Government in 1894, pronounced the
shells to be very fine specimens of the true mother-of-pearl shell of
commerce {Meleagrina margaritifera), weighing on the average 600 to
the ton. In the month ending January 16, 1894, eighteen boats
brought up 20,000 shells weighing 34^ tons, and containing pearls of
an estimated value of £2,600.
Other maritime products of the District are green snails {Turbo
marmoratus), the shells of which are exported for conversion into
imitation mother-of-pearl ; trochus, a conical shell of smaller size : and
sea-slugs or beche-de-mer, which, with the contents of the snail-shells,
are exported to the Straits for the delectation of the Chinese palate.
Among maritime products, since they are found in caves far out to
sea, may be included edible birds'-nests, of which 20 viss (73 lb.) of
the finest quality, valued in Penang at Rs. 4,000, were collected in
a single day in April, 1903, from one of the rocky islets near Tavoy
Island. The nests, which are milk-white and shaped like the half of
a diminutive basin glued to the rock, are, it is believed, made with the
saliva of a small species of swift {Collocalia francica), which sleeps in
u 2
302 MERGUI DISTRICT
the caves hut spends the day, when not actually at work, high up
in the sky. The nests are to be found only in the most inaccessible
corners of the caves, at a height sometimes of several hundred feet.
Three collections are made during the fair season, lasting respectively
four, seven, and three days. The birds rebuild their nests in the
intervals, and only the last made are available for rearing their young.
The best quality is obtained from the second collection.
Practically the whole District, with the exception of 139 square
miles of cultivation and perhaps a similar extent of old taungya
clearings, is under dense forests ; and of this a large
Forests. , • > -i •
part, approaching perhaps 1,000 square miles, is
mangrove. The area treated as forest by the department is about
5,600 square miles in extent, but only 330 square miles of this total
are 'reserved.' The forests are not generally valuable, and teak is
unknown ; but the lofty kanyin-tree {Dipterocarpus laevis) yields an oil
largely used in the manufacture of torches ; the wood of the thingan
(Uopea odorata) is, owing to its elasticity, unequalled for boats ; and
kyathnan or pink-on (Carapa moluccensis), anan (Fagraea fragrans),
hmanthin {Curcuma Roscoeana), kanazo (Bassia longi folia), and kokko
(Albizzia lebbek) are all useful timbers. Fyingado (Xyiia dolabriformis)
is plentiful in the extreme north. Kalamet (Santalum sp.), found on
a branch of the Little Tenasserim on the border of Siam, is prized for
its fragrance. The precious scented wood-aloes, or eagle-wood, the
diseased heart-wood of the akyaw tree {Aquilaria Aga/iocha), is still an
article of commerce, though not so plentiful as formerly ; and sappan
wood, once the most famous product of the District, exists in the
Tenasserim township, but is not now worked. Pzvenyet, the resinous
nest of the Trigona laeviceps, or dammer bee, makes valuable caulking
for boats when mixed with earth-oil. Rubber exists in a wild state
in some parts of the District ; and the Hevea brazi/iensis, introduced
by the Government from Kew Gardens in 1878, is yielding good
results in an experimental plantation near Mergui. The outside of the
stem of the Phrynium dichotomum, called by the Burmese thin, is
exported in large quantities to Danubyu to be made into the mats for
which that place is famous. The vast mangrove forests are being
utilized, their bark yielding a kind of tannin which is known in
Europe as cutch, though inferior to the genuine article, the produce
of the Acacia Catechu.
The existence of tin in Mergui District came to the notice of the
Government of India soon after the annexation of Tenasserim.
Favourable reports were made in 184 1-3 by Colonel
Tremenheere, and in 1855 by Dr. Oldham, but
without practical results. In 1873 the mining rights in the Maliwun
township were leased to a Rangoon firm, who introduced European
MINERALS 303
machinery, but retired in 1877 after incurring heavy loss. This is
explained partly by the want of good expert advice and partly by the
employment of Indian coolies, who were unable to stand the hard
work and exposure. Various officers have since then been deputed
to examine and report on the mines. The backward condition of
Maliwun, so far as Chinese immigration is concerned, is perhaps due
to the unsuitability of our laws, which the Government is reluctant to
suspend in so comparatively small an area for the sake of an industry
which has as yet attained no great importance. In 1895 the Jelebu
Mining Company started operations, but used only Chinese methods
for the extraction of the tin, and retired in 1898. In 1901 a concession
of 4 square miles was granted, but cancelled in 1903, as the con-
cessionaires had not found sufficient capital to work the lode.
Tin ore may be found: (1) in the original lode; (2) in the masses
of decomposed rock on the sides of hills ; (3) deposited beneath
a layer of silt on low-lying lands, to which it has been carried by the
action of water ; and (4) in the beds of streams. Of these four classes,
the first can be worked only with the aid of explosives and expensive
machinery, which are now being introduced by a European firm. The
second class may be worked on a large scale, by sluicing away the side
of a hill with water forced through pipes. The Chinese are described
as picking out the eyes of the hills with picks and crowbars, thus
obtaining a rich out-turn with comparatively little labour, but spoiling
the ground for those who come after them. Their usual method,
however, is lampan working, in which a small stream is diverted to the
piece of land to be worked, and the overburden or overlying earth is
removed by the force of the water assisted by cross channels cut in
the shape of a gridiron. In the third class the overburden has to be
removed by manual labour before the ore can be extracted. Here
again the ground is apt to be spoilt by the practice of fossicking, in
which, instead of the overburden being removed continuously, pits
about 6 feet wide are dug in it and allowed to fall in after the wash
dirt, or tin-bearing mass, has been removed from the bottom. No
objection can be urged against the practice of panning, or washing in
the beds of streams, the last of the four classes. This has been com-
pared to gleaning, and is carried on chiefly by Mala)- and Siamese
women, who are said to earn sometimes a dollar a day in this fashion.
The ore, after being cleaned by the action of running water, is
smelted at or near the mines in clay furnaces, and exported to Penang
or Rangoon in blocks weighing about a hundredweight. The labour
is mainly Chinese, but some of the small outlying mines are worked
by Siamese. The monthly wage for unattached Chinese coolies is
Rs. 20, with board and lodging ; but the large mines are worked by
labour imported under contract, the usual rate being 100 Straits dollars
304 MERGUI DISTRICT
a year, all found. The importation is done through the Chinese
Protectorate at Penang, the coolies being bound by written contract
to work for periods extending from one to three years. The annual
out-turn of tin for some years past has been about 60 tons, paying a
royalty of rather over Rs. 3,500.
The District yields about 500 tons of salt yearly, produced at Palaw
in the Palaw township. More than fifty families are employed in the
brine-boiling business. The water of a tidal creek is diverted into
fields of impervious clay, in which it is confined by means of small
ridges. The fields are of different heights, and the water remains a
day or two in each till the evaporation caused by the heat of the sun
has converted it into brine. It is then run into a tank, from which it is
eventually ladled into an iron pan, 4 feet square, placed over a furnace.
The salt is scraped from the bottom of the pan. Duty is levied at
8 annas a maund of 82 lb. The industry was first introduced in 1896.
On the Great Tenasserim river, between 120 20' and 120 30' N., is
a bed of coal estimated to contain not less than a million tons. It has
been calculated that the outside cost of placing the coal at Mergui
would be Rs. 7-1 2 a ton. The coal is said to be superior in quality to
most Indian coals ; but no serious attempt has yet been made to work
the field, though two prospecting licences have recently been issued.
Gold exists in many places, but not, so far as is known, in paying
quantities. A practically inexhaustible supply of iron, though not of
very good quality, is reported on the island of Kalagyun, about 8 miles
west of Mergui by sea. On Maingy Island Mr. Mark Fryar in 1872
discovered the existence of a valuable lode of lead (galena) containing
11 oz. of silver per ton, but most of it below the sea. An outcrop
inland, however, has recently been found, and some of the ore has
been sent to England for examination. Graphite exists on the almost
unexplored island of Kisseraing, and manganese at places on the
Great Tenasserim. The Marble Isles, between Kisseraing and Domel,
are composed of marble of a coarse quality, suitable for building.
The richness of Mergui in natural products and the sparseness of
its population account for the almost total absence of arts or manu-
factures of any kind. A notable instance of the
a. a"r lack of manufacturing enterprise is the fact that thin.
communications. . ° * '
the fine reed of which the famous mats of Danubyu
are made, is largely exported to Central Burma, and comes back into
the District in the form of mats.
The trade of the District is carried on entirely by sea. Nearly all
of it passes through the port of Mergui. Other ports are Palaw and
Victoria Point, but their trade is insignificant.
The British India Steam Navigation Company runs a weekly steamer
from Rangoon, calling at the mouth of the Tavoy river, and a fort-
ADMINISTRATION 305
nightly coasting steamer from Moulmein. The trade with Penang and
intervening ports to the south is very inadequately served by a single
boat of 194 tons, belonging to a Chinese firm in Penang. This
steamer is the sole means of communication with Victoria Point,
the head-quarters of the southern subdivision. A weekly service with
Tenasserim is kept up by means of small native boats, and with Palaw
by the police boat and the Moulmein coasting steamer, which also
runs on to Bokpyin. Road communications hardly exist, mainly owing
to the abundance of waterways. Roads from Mergui to Palaw, and
from Bokpyin to the newly opened mines at Yanngwa, are in course of
construction ; and a survey has been made from Victoria Point to the
Maliwun tin mines, which have already 4 miles of metalled road.
The District has two subdivisions, one of which, Mergui, is divided
into the townships of Mergui, Palaw, Tenasserim, and Bokpyin,
each under a township officer. The other subdivision,
called Victoria Point, consists of a single township,
Maliwun, which has no separate township officer. Below the town-
ship officers are 128 village headmen. These are taking the place of
the old circle thugyis, of whom, however, five still remain. The District
forms a portion of the Amherst Public Works division (head-quarters,
Moulmein) and of the South Tenasserim Forest division (head-quarters,
Tavoy). The Deputy-Commissioner, in addition to his judicial and
revenue duties, discharges those of Collector of Customs and Port
Officer.
For judicial purposes the District forms part of the Tenasserim civil
and sessions division. The Deputy-Commissioner is District Magistrate
and District Judge. The Mergui township court is presided over by
a judge, who sits for fifteen days in the month at Tavoy and for fifteen
at Mergui, but the subdivisional and the other township courts are
presided over by the executive officers. Outside Mergui there is not
much litigation and but little crime ; but assaults of a serious nature
are common, and theft is prevalent in the town, where there is a large
and turbulent population of Zairbadis. Opium smuggling on a large
scale was carried on in former years by junks from Penang, but has
been almost entirely suppressed by the excise staff appointed in 1902.
Cattle-theft is practically unknown. The Deputy-Commissioner is
Political Officer for Renong and other Siamese States ; and, owing
to the cordial co-operation of the Siamese authorities, the gangs of
border robbers who infested the Pakchan river have long since dis-
appeared.
When the British annexed the District the revenue was very small,
as might be expected in a country where the original population had
been, to a great extent, exterminated within the previous sixty years.
In 1854-5, the earliest year for which there are reliable data, the land
3°6
MERGUI DISTRICT
revenue was Rs. 26,000. The following table shows, in thousands
of rupees, the growth under the main heads of revenue since
1S80-1 :—
1 880- 1.
1890-1.
1900-1.
1903^4.
Land revenue .
Fisheries
Total revenue .
83
12
2,01
98
22
2,77
1,58
70
5.28
1.66
90
5.16
The District has not been settled. A cadastral survey of 577 square
miles was made between 1891 and 1894, but there are still about
10,000 acres of permanent cultivation not regularly surveyed. A topo-
graphical survey of 3,211 square miles, on the scale of one inch to
the mile, embracing most of the tin-mining areas, was carried out
between 1889 and 1893. Orchards in the Mergui township pay
Rs. 3 per acre; rice land, Rs. 2 or Rs. r-12; and vegetables, tobacco,
&c, R. 1. In the thinly populated tracts the rates are less by about
half.
The District cess fund had an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 18,700,
which is devoted to education and the maintenance of village headmen,
roads, and bungalows. Mergui Town is the only municipality.
The civil police force consists of 3 inspectors, 6 head constables,
19 sergeants, and 180 men, under the District Superintendent. Siamese
are usually employed in Bokpyin and Maliwun. There are also
100 military police, employed in guarding treasure and escort duty.
A police station has been established at every township head-quarters,
with additional posts at Palauk, Lenya, and Marang. Besides the
training depot at Mergui town, a police school has been established
at Victoria Point for Siamese constables. Mergui town has a jail, with
accommodation for 74 prisoners. The average number of inmates is
about 40. Long-term prisoners are removed to other jails to serve
out their sentences.
The standard of education is comparatively low for Burma. In
1 90 1 only 20 per cent. (33-3 males and 5-4 females) were returned as
able to read and write. In 1904 there were 7 secondary, 45 primary,
and 59 elementary (private) schools, with 3,775 pupils (including
542 girls) on their rolls. The number of pupils has risen to this
figure from 1,985 in 1891 and 2,379 in 1901. The total expenditure
on education in 1903-4 was Rs. 13,800, of which Provincial funds
provided Rs. 4,200 ; municipal fund, Rs. 3,600 ; fees, Rs. 3,600 ;
and the District cess fund, Rs. 2,400.
The District contains 2 hospitals, with accommodation for 34 in-
patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 12,846, of whom
512 were in-patients, and 383 operations were performed. The total
cost was Rs. 6,000, chiefly met from Local funds.
MERGUI TOWN 307
Vaccination is compulsory only in Mergui town. In 1903-4 the
number of persons successfully vaccinated was 4,388, representing
49 per 1,000 of population.
[Captain J. Butler, Mergui District Gazetteer (1884).]
Mergui Subdivision. — Subdivision of Mergui District, Lower
Burma, consisting of the Mergui, Palaw, Tenasserim, and Bokpyin
townships.
Mergui Township. — Township of Mergui District, Lower Burma,
comprising the most important islands of the Archipelago and a small
piece of the mainland in the neighbourhood of Mergui. It extends
from ii° 25' to 120 47" N. and from 970 30' to 98°58/ E., with an area
of 1,879 square miles. The eastern islands, lying at the mouths of the
Tenasserim and Lenya rivers, are in muddy waters teeming with fish.
They support a large fishing population, but only King Island is culti-
vated. The population was 32,448 in 1891, and 43,070 in 1901, when
the township contained 152 villages and hamlets, besides Mergui
Town (population, 11,987), the head-quarters. Outside the town
90 per cent, of the people speak Burmese, the rest being Karens,
Chinese, or Salons. Of the Burmans, nearly half are fishermen. The
cultivated area in 1903-4 was 64 square miles, of which about 41 square
miles were under rice, and the rest orchards and palm groves. The
land revenue in the same year amounted to Rs. 94,400.
Mergui Town. — Head-quarters of the District of the same name in
Lower Burma, situated in 120 26' N. and 980 36' E., on the Tenasserim
coast, just outside the principal mouth of the Tenasserim river, and
protected by the little hill-island of Pataw, which helps to form a good
natural harbour, and farther out by a ring of islands to the south and
west, including King Island, the largest of the Mergui Archipelago.
The principal Government buildings are on a ridge parallel to the
coast, rising abruptly from the sea, and affording a view of the harbour
backed by the pagoda-crowned hills of Pataw and Patet on the islands
opposite, and the distant heights of King Island beyond. The inner
town is densely packed, the houses being huddled together without
much regard for sanitation, especially on the foreshore, where they are
built over the mud. In the suburbs the buildings are scattered among
orchards, but roads are lacking everywhere.
The population of the town fell from 9,737 in 1S72 to 8,633 m 1S81,
but rose again to 10,137 m l%9* anQl IT>987 in 1901. The Census,
however, is taken at a time when the fishermen and their families, who
number several thousands, are living in the islands. During the mon-
soon they move into the town. The population is very mixed. To
a European resident most families seem to have either Chinese or
Indian blood in them ; but the census figures show only 1,400 Muham-
madans and 700 Hindus in the town, while the total number of persons
3oS MERGUI TOWN
in the entire District, including the miners, returning themselves as
Chinese, is only 2,100. No doubt most of these are in the town, many
Chinese miners being imported for the monsoon only. Practically
no persons called themselves Siamese or Karens, but there must be a
very large admixture of these races in the population. No Malays
reside in the town.
The Burmese name of Mergui is written Mrit, but pronounced Beik.
The Siamese write and pronounce the name Marit. The origin of the
name used by Europeans (and also by Malays and natives of India)
is quite unknown. It is by no means certain that it is connected with
the Siamese name, for no plausible explanation of the second syllable
has ever been given.
Mergui was formed into a municipality in 1887. The receipts during
the ten years ending 1901 averaged Rs. 27,600. In 1903-4 the income
was Rs. 34,700, of which Rs. 14,700 was derived from a tax on houses
and lands, Rs. 9,200 from market dues, and Rs. 6,800 from lighting
and conservancy rates. The chief items of expenditure were con-
servancy (Rs. 5,800), lighting (Rs. 4,300), hospital (Rs. 3,900), roads
(Rs. 3,700), markets (Rs. 3,000), and education (Rs. 3,000). There are
two bazars, one of brick on the shore, and the other of wood and
thatch, behind the ridge which runs along the centre of the town.
The hospital, school, and municipal office are situated on this ridge,
near the courthouse and police station.
The Port fund has an income of Rs. 3,500 a year. Passengers and
cargo from foreign ports are landed at the main wharf, which was built
of stone in 1900, at a cost of Rs. 38,000. Cargo from Rangoon and
coast ports usually goes to a smaller wharf in the south of the town,
and there are in addition numerous private jetties. The total value of
the exports in 1903-4 was 16 lakhs, of which n lakhs went to Indian
ports and 5 lakhs to the Straits and England. The imports were valued
at 14 lakhs, of which \\\ lakhs came from Indian ports.
The principal exports are fish-paste and salted fish, sent mostly to
Rangoon and Moulmein, and mother-of-pearl shell, sent to the United
Kingdom ; cotton piece-goods and husked rice are the two principal
imports, coming mainly from Rangoon.
Merkara. — Taluk and town in Coorg. See Mercara.
Merta. — Head-quarters of a district of the same name in the State
of Jodhpur, Rajputana, situated in 260 39' N. and 740 2' E., about
9 miles south-east of Merta Road station on the Jodhpur-Bikaner Rail-
way. Population (1901), 4,361. The town was founded by Duda, the
fourth son of Rao Jodha, about 1488, and was added to by Rao
Maldeo, who about 1540 built the wall (now somewhat dilapidated)
and the fort called after him Malkot. In 1562 Akbar took the place
after an obstinate and sanguinary defence, but about twenty years later
MER WAR A 309
he restored it to the Jodhpur chief, Raja Udai Singh. Merta was
at one time a great trade centre, and there are still many fine carved
stone houses ; it possesses a post office, an Anglo-vernacular school,
a hospital with accommodation for six in-patients, and a handsome
mosque built by Akbar. The principal manufactures are khas-khas
fans and screens, ivory work, country soap, and earthenware toys-
The country around Merta has been the scene of many a hard-fought
battle, and is covered with stone pillars erected to the memory of the
dead. Here in 1790 the Marathas under De Boigne inflicted a severe
defeat on the Rathors ; and on the dam of a tank called Dangolai is
the tomb of a French captain of infantry, who fell on that occasion.
Mertiparvat (or Mertigudda). — Mountain peak, 5,451 feet high, in
the south-west of Kadur District, Mysore, situated in 130 18' N. and
750 23' E. To the north it presents a majestic conical aspect. To-
wards the south-west it is connected with two lower heights, and is so
surrounded on all sides with high hills that its true elevation does not
appear except at a distance. The top is bare, but the sides are clothed
with fine forests, and where the ground admits, terraced for paddy-
fields. It is also called the Kalasa hill, being near to that place.
Merwara. — British District in Rajputana, lying between 250 24'
and 260 n' N. and 730 45" and 740 29' E., with an area of 641 square
miles and a population (1901) of 109,459. The local name of the
District is Magra, which signifies 'hills.'
Beyond the fact that between 1725 and 1816 several unsuccessful
attempts were made by Rajputs and Marathas to subdue the country,
the history of Merwara is a blank up to 18 18, when the British appeared
on the scene. Captain Broughton, who accompanied the Maharaja
Sindhia in his march from Agra to Ajmer, 1809-10, describes it in his
Letters from a Ma/iratta Camp as
' the district of Mugruolee, celebrated for its hilly fastnesses and im-
penetrable jungles. It forms the boundary between the countries of
Marwar or Jodhpur and Mewar or Udaipur ; but the daring race of
robbers who inhabit it acknowledge the authority of neither. They
subsist by levying contributions on the inhabitants of the plains around,
when they are not checked by the presence of a still greater evil than
themselves, a large army of Marathas.'
The District was then an impenetrable jungle, inhabited by outlaws
and fugitives from surrounding States. The population, known under
the general name of Mers, originally comprised a very heterogeneous
mixture of castes : Chandela Gujars, Bhati Rajputs, Brahmans, and
Minas. It is said that Visaldev, the Chauhan king of Ajmer, subdued
the inhabitants, and made them drawers of water in the streets of
Ajmer. Mr. "Wilder, the first British Superintendent of Ajmer. entered
into agreements with certain villages binding their inhabitants to abstain
3io MERWARA
from plunder. These pledges were disregarded ; and in 1819 a force
was dispatched from Nasirabad which destroyed the offending villages,
and established police posts at Shamgarh, Liilwa, and Jhak. In
November, 1820, the police officers were murdered, and the country
had to be thoroughly subjugated. An expedition started again from
Nasirabad, and accomplished its purpose by the end of January, 1821,
the campaign having lasted three months. It now became necessary
to make arrangements for the administration of this turbulent tract,
which was made up of three portions : British Merwara, Mewar-
Merwara, and Marwar-Merwara. Captain Tod, the author of Raja-
sthan, undertook the administration of the portion belonging to Mewar.
The Marwar portion was handed over to the Thakurs of adjoining
villages, and the British portion to the Thakurs of Masuda and Kharwa,
who were held responsible for its management, under the general
superintendence of Mr. Wilder. This arrangement was a complete
failure. The District was infested with murderous gangs, criminals
from one portion were sheltered in another, and the condition of
Merwara became worse than it had been prior to 1818. In 1823
and 1824 the British authorities entered into engagements with Udaipur
and Jodhpur, and took over the management of the whole tract. From
time to time these treaties were renewed, and the whole District is
now, to all intents and purposes, British territory. The first officer
appointed to hold charge of the newly acquired tract was Captain Hall,
who in 1836 was succeeded by Colonel Dixon. In 1842 Colonel Dixon
became Superintendent of Ajmer also, and since then the two Districts
have been administratively conjoined. To Hall and Dixon belongs the
credit of reclaiming the inhabitants of Merwara from predatory habits
to a life of honest industry. Colonel Dixon died at Beawar in 1857,
having lived in Ajmer-Merwara for thirty-seven years. A system of
government, which may well be called paternal, was established by
these officers in Merwara, and was eminently suited to the needs of
the people. Civil and criminal administration was carried on by
a patichayat or assembly of the elders of the village. If two-thirds
of the assembly were agreed, the question was settled. Prior to 1851,
when a regular settlement was effected by Colonel Dixon, the revenue
was settled by an estimate of the crop, one-third of the produce being
the share of the Government, except in special cases. Police and
revenue duties were combined. The people themselves were made
responsible for protecting travellers and trade ; and to this day certain
villages provide men to guard some of the passes leading out of
Merwara, receiving in return a small remuneration from travellers.
In 1822 a corps, designated the Merwara Local Battalion, was raised,
which transformed a number of wild mountaineers into brave and
disciplined soldiers, and exercised a beneficial effect on the pacification
ME WAR 31 r
of the country. In 1858 a second battalion, known us the Mhair
Regiment, was raised for service in the Mutiny. In t86i the two
battalions were amalgamated into one, 1,000 strong, called the Mhair
Military Police Battalion. This corps was in 187 1 re transferred, with
a strength of 712 men, to the regular military establishment. It served
in the Afghan War of 1878-80, and is now the 44th Merwara Infantry,
with head-quarters at Ajmer. Colonel Dixon's administration was
remarkable for the building of a large number of irrigation tanks.
The good effect of these works was enormous. Cultivation increased,
and the old villages, which had been perched on inaccessible peaks,
were deserted for places in the valleys where agricultural operations
could be carried on. It thus came about that the inhabitants of
Merwara, who had proclivities very similar to those of the Highland
caterans, and who lived by plundering in Mewar, Marwar, Kishangarh,
and Ajmer, were led into the paths of civilization. As the area under
cultivation and the produce of the lands increased, it became apparent
that something must be done to attract mahajans (traders) to Merwara,
to enable the people to reap the benefits of their industry. Colonel
Dixon, therefore, founded in 1835 the town of Nayanagar, better known
as Beawar, which is the commercial and administrative capital of the
District. By these measures a great social change was wrought in
Merwara, and Colonal Dixon had the satisfaction of seeing round him
a people whose wants had been supplied, whose grievances had been
redressed, and who are described as being ' most prosperous and highly
favoured.' The people of Merwara have not forgotten their benefactor.
They erected a monument to his memory in the town which he built.
For further information see Ajmer-Merwara.
Mesana. — Taluka and town in Kadi prant, Baroda State. See
Mehsana.
Mettancheri.— Town in Cochin State, Madras. See Mattan-
CHERI.
Mettupalaiyam. — Village in the District and taluk of Coimbatore,
Madras, situated in u° 19/ N. and 760 58' E., on the banks of the
Bhavani at the foot of the Nilgiri Hills. Population (1901), 10,223.
Being the terminus of the Nilgiri branch of the Madras Railway and
the starting-point of the ghat road and rack railway which lead up
those hills, it is a place of some importance and a deputy-ta/tst/Jdr
is stationed here. Owing to its situation, it is notoriously hot and
unhealthy. A tannery owned by a native firm employs 60 hands, and
turns out annually nearly 85 tons of leather, valued at over Rs. 50,000.
There are more than a hundred dolmens in the fields round the place.
Mevali. — Petty State in Rewa Kantha, Bombay.
Mevasa.— Petty State in Kathiawar, Bombay.
Mewar. — Another name for the Udaipur State in Rajputana.
312
ME WAR
The word Mewar is a corrupted form of the Sanskrit Med Pat, mean-
ing the country of the Meds or Meos, a tribe now numerous in Alwar,
Bharatpur, Gurgaon, &c. See Mewat.
Mewar (or Udaipur) Residency. — One of the eight Political
Charges into which Rajputana is divided. Situated in the south of the
Agency, it consists ] of the four States of Udaipur, Banswara, Dungar-
pur, and Partabgarh, and lies between 230 3' and 250 58' N. and 73° i'
and 750 49' E. It is bounded on the north by the British District of
Ajmer-Merwara and the Shahpura chiefship ; on the north-east by
Jaipur and Bundi ; on the east it touches Kotah and an outlying
district of Tonk, but the greater part of this boundary is formed by
Central India States ; to the south are several States belonging to
either Central India or the Bombay Presidency ; while on the west the
Aravalli Hills separate it from Sirohi and Jodhpur. The head-quarters
of the Resident are at Udaipur and those of his Assistant ordinarily at
Dungarpur. The population at the three enumerations was : (1881)
1,879,214, (1891) 2,310,024, and (1901) 1,336,283. The figures for
the two earlier years are, however, unreliable, as, except in Partabgarh,
the Bhils who form the majority of the population in the south were
not counted, a rough guess only being made of their numbers. But,
though the census figures for 1881 and 1891 may have been too high,
the loss of population during the last decade was certainly very great,
due to the famine of 1 899-1900 and the severe epidemic of fever
which immediately followed it. In regard to area and population, the
Residency stands third among the eight political divisions of Raj-
putana, while the density is nearly 79 persons per square mile, as
compared with 76 for the whole Agency. Of the total population in
1901, Hindus formed nearly 69 per cent., Animists (mostly Bhils) 21,
and Jains about 6 per cent. The following table gives details re-
garding the four States making up the Residency : —
State.
Area in square
miles.
Population,
1 901.
Normal land
revenue (k/ia/sa),
in thousands
of rupees.
Udaipur .
Banswara .
Dungarpur
Partabgarh
Total
12,691
1,946
1,447
886
1,018,805
165,350
100,103
52,025
13,60
85
1,00
1,00
16,970
I>336,283
16,45
There are altogether 8,359 villages and 17 towns. Of the latter,
only two have more than 10,000 inhabitants: namely, Udaipur City
(45,976) and BhIlwara (10,346).
1 It has recently been decided to establish a new Agency, comprising the States of
Banswara, Dungarpur, and Partabgarh.
ME WAT 313
Mewat. — An ill-defined tract lying south of Delhi, and including
part of the British Districts of Muttra and Gurgaon, and most of
Alwar and a little of Bharatpur State. It takes its name from the
Meos, who appear to have been originally the same as the Mlnas of
Rajputana, but say that they have not intermarried with these since
the time of Akbar. The origin of the name Meo is disputed, some
deriving it from Mewat, which is said to be the Sanskrit mlna-vati,
' rich in fish,' while the Meos themselves derive it from maheo, a word
used in driving cattle. Mlna is said to come from Amlna Meo or
' pure ' Meo, a term applied to those who did not become Musalmans.
The Hindu Meos and Mlnas claim to be Rajputs, but are not so
regarded by other Hindus, and it is certain that outsiders have often
been admitted in the past. Their tribal constitution varies in different
places. The Muhammadan Meos call themselves Mewatls. In 1901
there were 10,546 Meos and Mlnas in the United Provinces, chiefly in
the Districts of Meerut (916), Bulandshahr (4,745), Agra (906), Bijnor
(1,263), Budaun (884), and Moradabad (1,070); and 51,028 Mewatls,
chiefly in the Meerut (22,576), Agra (7,316), and Rohilkhand (16,129)
Divisions. The large number in Rohilkhand, which was never part of
Mewat, is explained by a migration owing to famine in Mewat in
1761-2. The Meos of Rajputana numbered 168,596, or nearly 2 per
cent, of the total population. Practically all are Muhammadans, and
they are found in thirteen out of eighteen States. In Alwar there were
113,142, or over 13 per cent, of the population; and in Bharatpur
51,546, or 8 per cent. The Khanzada subdivision is represented by 9,31 7
members, most of whom are in Alwar. The Mewatls have preserved
many Hindu customs, such as exogamous rules and Hindu festivals.
According to tradition, the Meos first crossed the Jumna in the
period of anarchy which succeeded the invasion by Mahmud of Ghazni
in 1 01 8-9. The great Rajput clans of Bulandshahr and Etawah state
that they dispossessed the Meos at the order of Prithwl Raj of Delhi
towards the end of the twelfth century. Throughout the period of
Muhammadan rule the Meos were the Ishmaelites of their own country
and of the Upper Doab, though harried again and again by the kings
of Delhi, from Nasir-ud-dln Mahmud (1259) to Babar (1527). During
the troubled times of Timur's invasion (1398) Bahadur Nahar, who
founded the subdivision of Mewatls called Khanzadas, members of
which were, for many years, rulers of Mewat, was one of the most
powerful chiefs in this part of India. Under Akbar the tract was
divided between the sarkars of Alwar and Tijara in the Subah of
Delhi. The rule of the Mewatls was subsequently challenged by the
Jats, who had already risen to importance before the death of Aurang-
zeb in 1707, and consolidated their power in Southern Mewat in the
first half of the eighteenth century ; and from this time the history of
3i4 ME WAT
Mewat merges in that of Alwar and Bharatpur. The Meos and
Mewatls, however, retained their character for turbulence ; and towards
the end of the eighteenth century travelling in the Upper and Central
Doab was unsafe owing to armed bands of MewatI horsemen. They
gave much trouble to Lord Lake's forces in the Maratha War of 1803,
while in the Mutiny they and the Giijars were conspicuous for their
readiness to take advantage of disorder.
[W. Crooke, Tribes and Castes of the North- Western Provinces and
Oi/dh, vol. iii, p. 485 et seq., where full authorities are quoted.]
Mhasvad. — Town in the Man taluka of Satara District, Bombay,
situated in 1 70 38' N. and 740 48' E., 5 1 miles east of Satara town, on
the road to Pandharpur. Population (1901), 7,014. Six miles south-
east of the town, at Rajewadi in Aundh State, is the great Mhasvad
irrigation lake, covering an area of 6 square miles. An ancient temple
of Nath stands near the western entrance of the town. Its courtyard,
in which Puranas are read daily by a Brahman, contains an inscription
and a black stone elephant, which is greatly venerated. A large fair
is held in December, at which cattle and blankets are sold. The
municipality, constituted in 1857, had an income during the decade
ending 1901 averaging Rs. 4,700. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 5,300.
The town contains a dispensary.
Mhow {Man). — British cantonment in the Indore State, Central
India, situated in 220 ^^ N. and 750 46" E., on the southern boundary
of the Malwa plateau, and on the Ajmer-Khandwa branch of the
Rajputana-Malwa. Railway. Population (1901), 36,039. It stands
on a somewhat narrow ridge of trap rock, with an average elevation of
about 1,800 feet, the highest point near the barracks of the British
infantry being 1,919 feet above sea-level. The ridge falls away abruptly
on the south and east, but slopes away gradually on the west, forming
a broad plain used as a brigade parade ground. Mhow was founded by
Sir John Malcolm in 1818, in accordance with the conditions laid down
in the seventh article of the Treaty of Mandasor (see Indore State),
and remained his head-quarters till 1821 while he held general political
and military charge in Central India. In 1857 the garrison at Mhow
consisted of a regiment of native infantry, the wing of a regiment of
native cavalry, and a battery of field artillery, manned by British
gunners but driven by natives. An outbreak took place on the
evening of July 1, but order was rapidly restored, and only a few lives
were lost, the Europeans taking refuge within the fort. The canton-
ment is now the head-quarters of the Mhow division in the Western
Command. The garrison consists of one regiment of British cavalry,
two batteries of horse artillery, one regiment of British infantry, one
ammunition column, and two regiments of Native infantry.
The population in 1872 was 17,640; in i88r it was 15,896, the
MI A. XI 315
decrease being due to the withdrawal. of the labourers employed in con-
structing the Rajputana-Malwa Railway in 1875; in 1891, 28,773; ancl
in 1901, 28,457. Mhow has no export trade properly speaking, but the
imports are considerable. The total receipts of the cantonment fund
in 1903-4 amounted to 1-4 lakhs, including receipts from octroi
(Rs. 50,000), chaukldari tax (Rs. 22,000), grants-in-aid (Rs. 31,000),
and excise (Rs. 18,000). The chief heads of expenditure were medical
and conservancy (Rs. 31,000 each), police (Rs. 19,000), public works
(Rs. 17,000), general administration and collection of revenue
(Rs. 10,000), water-supply (Rs. 3,000), and education (Rs. 1,400).
The sanitary condition of the cantonment has been much improved of
late years, a regular water-supply having been completed in 1888. The
( lantonment Magistrate exercises powers as a District Judge and Judge
of the Small Cause Court, his Assistant being a magistrate of the second
class and a judge of the Small Cause Court for petty suits. Appeals
from the Cantonment Magistrate lie to the First Assistant Agent to the
Governor-General, who is Sessions Judge and first Civil Appellate
Court, the Agent to the Governor-General being the High Court. The
police, who belong to the Central India Agency force, number 107 men
under a European Inspector. Three schools in the cantonment — the
Pars! school with 400 boys and 60 girls, the railway school, and the
convent school — receive grants-in-aid from cantonment funds. Besides
the military hospitals, a civil hospital is maintained by local charity
and a grant from cantonment funds.
Miani (1). — Port in Las Bela State, Baluchistan. See Sox. miani.
Miani ('Fishing village') (2). — Village in the Hyderabad taluka of
Hyderabad District, Sind, Bombay, 6 miles north of Hyderabad city.
Population (1901), 962. It was here that Sir Charles Napier, on
February 17, 1843, with a force of 2,800 men and 12 guns, en-
countered a Baloch army numbering 22,000, strongly posted on
the banks of the Fuleli. The enemy were totally routed, 5,000 men
being killed and wounded, and the whole of their ammunition, stan-
dards, and camp taken, with considerable stores and some treasure.
A monument marks the scene of the battle, and on the eastern side of
the pillar are inscribed the names of the officers, and the number of
rank and file, who fell. The village contains three schools, one of which
is for girls.
Miani (3). — Town in the Dasuya tahsil of Hoshiarpur District, Pun-
jab, situated in 310 43' N. and 750 34' E., on the Beas river. Population
(1901), 6,118. It is of no commercial importance. The municipality
was created in 1874. The income during the ten years ending 1902-3
averaged Rs. 1,700, and the expenditure Rs. 1,600. In 1903-4 the
income was Rs. 1,800, chiefly derived from octroi ; and the expenditure
was Rs. 2,300. It maintains a Government dispensary.
VOL. XVII. x
J
1 6 MI AN I
Miani (4). — Town in the Bhera tahsll of Shahpur District, Punjab,
situated in 320 34' N. and 730 5' E., on the left bank of the Jhelum,
opposite Pind Dadan Khan. Population (1901), 7,220. It was formerly
the depot to which all the salt from the Khewra mines was brought for
dispatch down country, but its trade has been ruined by the extension
of the North-Western Railway across the Jhelum to Khewra. The
original town, called Shamsabad, having been swept away by a flood,
Asaf Khan, father-in-law of Shah Jahan, founded the present one. It
was plundered by Nur-ud-din, general of Ahmad Shah, in 1754, taken
in 1783 and restored in 1787 by Mahan Singh, father of Ranjlt Singh,
wrho reopened the salt mart. The municipality was created in 1867.
The income during the ten years ending 1902-3 averaged Rs. 8,000,
and the expenditure Rs. 7,600. In 1903-4 the income amounted to
Rs. 10,000, chiefly from octroi ; and the expenditure was Rs. 8,400.
The town possesses an Anglo-vernacular high school, maintained by
the municipality, and a Government dispensary.
Mian Mir. — Former name of Lahore Cantonment, Punjab.
Mianwali District. — North-westernmost District of the Multan
Division, Punjab, lying between 300 36'' and ^ I4/ N. and 700 46'
and 720 o' E., with an area of 7,816 square miles. Of this vast area
about three-fourths are east of the river Indus, comprising the tahsils
of Mianwali, Bhakkar, and Leiah, which lie in that order from north to
south along the river. On the east, the District is bounded by the
Districts of Attock, Shahpur, and Jhang, while on the south it adjoins
Muzaffargarh. The cis-Indus portion of the District is bounded on
the west, for the greater part of its length, by the Indus, which divides
it from Dera Ghazi Khan and the North-West Frontier District of Dera
Ismail Khan. To the west of that river lies its remaining portion, the
tahsll of Isa Khel, bounded to the west and north by the Bannu and
Kohat Districts of the North-West Frontier Province. This consists
mainly of a semicircle of level plain enclosed between the Chichali and
Maidani hills and the Indus. North of Kalabagh, and between the
termination of the Khattak hills and the Indus, lies the outlying
tract of Bhangi Khel, a rugged area broken up by rough lines of hills,
irregular but with a main direction from north to south. Vishorgun
(4,001 feet above sea-level) is the highest point. The Isa Khel
tahsll is the only tract with a Pathan population which the Punjab
has retained west of the Indus.
The cis-Indus territory has a maximum length from north to south
of 180 miles, and attains a width of 70 miles in Bhakkar, its cen-
tral tahsll, which stretches eastwards almost to the
Physical jhelum river. Thus the three cis-Indus tahsils of
aspects. ■*
Mianwali comprise the greater part of the Sind-
Sagar Doab, the country which lies between the Indus and the
MIANWALI DISTRICT
3i7
o
Jhelum. It includes two distinct tracts. Along the Indus lies a
strip of riverain land, locally called the Kachhi, which is flooded by
that river, and is of great fertility, though the action of the floods is
often capricious, fields and hamlets being sometimes swept away in a
few hours. About half the area is cultivated, the rest being covered
with tall Saccharum grass and tamarisk scrub. The other tract is the
vast barren upland known as the Thal, a desolate waste of shifting
sandhills on a level surface of hard clay. On this upland brushwood
grows sparsely, and the only cultivation is that round the scattered wells
sunk amid the sandhills. A great part of this tract will be commanded
by the projected Indus Canal. The monotony is unbroken by hills or
rivers ; but its north-eastern corner runs up into the western flank of
the Salt Range and the south-western slopes of the Sakesar hill, on
which stand the summer head-quarters of the officials.
The Indus issues from the hills at Kalabagh in a narrow channel,
but rapidly spreads till above Isa Khel its width from bank to bank is
nearly 13 miles. The whole of the Kachhi is intersected with straggling
branches of the Indus, chief of which is the Puzal.
The District is of considerable geological interest, for it includes
both cis-Indus and trans-Indus portions of the Salt Range. The
chief points of interest in the series as exposed here are the disappear-
ance of the older palaeozoic beds, and the development of Jurassic
and Cretaceous rocks. The salt marl and rock-salt still form the lowest
member of the series ; but as a rule all overlying formations, found in
the eastern part of the range between the salt marl and the boulder-bed,
are absent. The Jurassic beds are well seen in the Chichali pass, where
they contain ammonites and belemnites, and are overlain by rocks with
Lower Cretaceous fossils. Coal of fair quality occurs in the Lower
Tertiary beds in the Isa Khel tahsll, and salt is quarried at Kalabagh \
The flora is in part that of the Western Punjab, but there is a strong
admixture of West Asian and even Mediterranean forms. Trees are
scarce, except where planted ; but the tali {Dalbergia Sissod) is frequent
along the Indus, and the Mesopotamia!! aspen {Pofi/lits euphraticd) is
reported from the south of the District. The Salt Range at Kalabagh
has a flora of its own, corresponding to that of like situations on the
ranges east of the Indus. The Thai sandhills are an extension of
the Great Indian Desert, and their flora is largely that of North-western
Rajputana.
An occasional leopard on the Salt Range and a few wolves are the
only representatives of the fiercer beasts. Urial are to be found on
1 Set Manual of Geology of India, passim; Wynne, ' Geology of the Salt Range,'
Memoirs, Geological Survey of India, vol. xiv, and ' Trans-Indus Extensions of the
Salt Range,' ibid., vol. xvii, pt. ii ; C. S. Middleniiss, 'Geology of the Salt Range,
Reeords, Geologieal Siui'ey of India, vol. xxi, v, pt. i.
X 2
3i 8 MIANWALI DISTRICT
the Salt Range and in the Bhangi Khel hills, where markhor are also
sometimes seen. 'Ravine deer' (Indian gazelle) are found in numbers
in the Thai and along the foot of the hills. Wild hog are met with in
a few islands in the south.
The greater part of the District is situated in the Thai, and has a
fiercely torrid and long hot season, with extreme cold in the winter
months. At Sakesar in the Salt Range the elevation is sufficient to
make punkahs a luxury only, but the heat is considerable until the rains
break. The District is on the whole healthy, but the neighbourhood
of the Indus is malarious. Goitre is not uncommon near Kalabagh,
and guinea-worm is prevalent in the Mianwali and Isa Khel tahslls.
The annual rainfall is slight, varying from \\\ inches at Mianwali town
to 7 at Leiah.
Nothing is known of the early history. The remains at Kafirkot
in Dera Ismail Khan and Mari in this District appear to testify to the
existence in the north of a Hindu civilization pos-
sessed of considerable resources and architectural
skill. The only other archaeological remains of any antiquity are some
statues of Grecian type excavated at Rokhri, two erections near Nam-
mal in shape like sentry-boxes and supposed to be dolmens, and several
massive tombs of dressed stone in the Salt Range. There are no
remains in the Thai earlier than the fourteenth century, and there is
every reason to suppose that this area was previously an uninhabited
desert. The country appears to have been colonized in the beginning
of the fifteenth century by an immigration of Jats from the south,
followed by the Baloch, who came in large bands under recognized
leaders and took possession of the country as a military caste and over-
lords of the Jat cultivators, founding the towns of Karor, Bhakkar,
and Leiah. At the beginning of the seventeenth century we find the
Jaskani Baloch ruling from the Indus to the Chenab, and from Bhak-
kar to Leiah, with their capital at Mankera. In the north the earliest
inhabitants were the Awans, who were driven back to the Salt Range
by the Niazai immigration in the sixteenth century. The Gakhars
seem to have exercised an overlordship in the Mianwali tahsll as feuda-
tories of the Mughal empire until 1748, when they were expelled by a
Durrani army. The rest of the District was incorporated in the Durrani
kingdom in 1756, and towards the end of the century became the
province ruled over by Nawab Muhammad Khan Sadozai, whose suc-
cessor annexed Isa Khel in 181 8. The cis-lndus portion was seized by
the Sikhs in 1822, after the fall of Mankera, and Isa Khel in 1836.
On the outbreak of the second Sikh War a force of local levies was
raised by Sir H. Edwardes at Leiah, which took part in the siege of
Multan. The territories now comprised in Mianwali were annexed in
1849. The cis-lndus portion of the present District, together with the
POPULATION
3*9
SanaAvan (or Kot Adu) tahsll of Muzaffargarh, formed the Leiah Dis-
trict, and Isa Khel formed part of Dera Ismail Khan. Sanawan was
transferred to Muzaffargarh in 1859; and in 1861 Leiah District was
abolished, the Bhakkar and Leiah tahslls going to Dera Ismail Khan,
and Mianwali and Isa Khel forming part of the new District of Bannu.
In 1901 the present District of Mianwali was constituted, being the
original Leiah District without Sanawan and with Isa Khel. During
the Mutiny the District was generally quiet ; a detachment of irregular
cavalry mutinied at Mianwali, but the rising was quickly suppressed.
The population of the area now included in the District at the last
three enumerations was: (1881) 365,621, (1891) 400,477, and (1901)
424,588, dwelling in 5 towns and 426 villages. It
has increased by 61 per cent, during the last decade, Population,
the increase being greatest in the Leiah tahsll, and least in Isa Khel.
The District is divided into the four tahslls of Mianwali, Isa Khel,
Bhakkar, and Leiah, the head-quarters of each being at the place
from which it is named. The towns are the municipalities of Isa
Khel, Kalabagh, Bhakkar, Leiah, Karor, and Mianwali l.
The following table gives the chief statistics of population in 1901 : —
Tahsil.
V
u
-a
V
<
Number of
c
"3
0
0-,
5 a
'3 a
3 3
CO*
0 <rt
Ph
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and IQOI.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
CO
c
0
H
2
I
2
5
1)
be
J3
>
Mianwali
Isa Khel
Bhakkar
Leiah .
District total
',478
678
3,212
2,433
69
43
196
118
111,883
64,224
125,803
122.678
75-7
94-7
39-2
5°-4
54-3
+ 7-7
+ 0.5
+ 5-5
* 8.1
3,564
2,227
5-5S9
4,345
7,816
426
424,588
+ 6.1
i?,725
NOTE.— The figures for the areas of tahstts are taken from revenue returns,
total District area is that given in the Census Report.
The
Muhammadans number 371,674, or over 87 per cent, of the total :
Hindus, 50,202 ; and Sikhs, 2,633. Pashtu is spoken by some of the
Pathan inhabitants of the Isa Khel tahsil. Elsewhere various dialects
of Western Punjabi are used.
The most numerous tribe is that of the agricultural Jats, who number
138,000, or 32 per cent, of the total population. Next to the Jats
come the Pathans (47,000), Baloch (27,000), Awans (23,000), and
Rajputs (6,000). But one commercial money-lending caste, the Aroras
(42,000), is of numerical importance, the number of Khattris being
only 2,000. Saiyids number 10,000. Of the artisan classes, the Julahas
(weavers, 13,000), Mochis (shoemakers and leather-workers, io,coo),
Tarkhans (carpenters, 10,000), and Kumhars (potters, 7,000) are the
1 .Mianwali has been created a municipality since the Census ul 19c 1.
320
MIANWAL1 DISTRICT
most important : and of the menials, the Machhis (fishermen, bakers,
and water-carriers, 8,000), Chhimbas and Dhobis (washermen, 8,000),
Chuhras and Kutanas (sweepers, 7,000), and Nais (barbers, 7,000).
Kaneras, a caste which is found only in two other Districts, but is
strongest here, number 2,000. Their original occupation was plaiting
mats from grass and leaves, making string, and generally working in
grass and reeds : but they have now taken to weaving generally, and
even cultivate land. Of the total population, 57 per cent, are sup-
ported directly by agriculture. The District contained only 16 native
Christians in 1901.
The semicircle of plain on the west bank of the Indus enclosed
between the river and the hills is level and open, has a good soil,
and where irrigated by hill streams produces excel-
lent crops. In the stony hills of the Bhangi Khel
tract, on the other hand, a crop of the coarsest grain can be raised
only in favourable seasons. Cultivation in the Kachhi depends entirely
on inundation from the Indus, and the westerly trend of the river
necessitates increased artificial irrigation by means of water-cuts and
dams. The soil of the Thai is light and sandy, and cultivation is
impossible without the aid of well-irrigation.
The area for which details are available from the revenue records
of 1903-4 is 7,707 square miles, as shown below : —
Agriculture.
Tahsil.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
Mianwali
Isa Khel
Bhakkar
I.eiah .
Total
1,478
67S
3,134
2,4'7
432
170
301
259
5
30
47
132
C14
182
2,705
2,000
7,7°7
I,l62
214
5:501
The chief crop of the spring harvest is wheat, which occupied
341 square miles in 1903-4. Barley and gram occupied 45 and 119
square miles respectively. Spiked millet {bajra) is the principal staple
of the autumn harvest (203 square miles). Pulses occupied 87 square
miles, and great millet (jowar) and oilseeds 45 square miles each. Little
cotton, no rice, and practically no sugar-cane are grown.
The area cultivated has increased by 47 per cent, since the settle-
ment of 1878, and tends to rise, owing to the extension of irrigation
from wells and cuts from the hill streams or the Indus. Nothing
has been done to improve the quality of the crops grown. Advances
for the construction of wells and dams are readily taken from Govern-
ment, about Rs. 29,000 having been advanced during the three years
ending 1903-4.
The population of the Thai is largel) pastoral: and cattle, sheep,
MIXER ALS 321
and goats are bred in large and increasing numbers. The local breed
of cattle is, however, not of large size, and for the severe work of well-
irrigation bullocks are generally imported from the south. Sheep-breed-
ing is the principal means of livelihood of the inhabitants of the
southern Thai ; the sheep are of the ordinary thin-tailed breed. Camels
are also bred in the Thai in large numbers. Buffaloes are found in
all villages of the Kachhi. The people possess a good many horses,
and the District board maintains one pony and three donkey stallions.
A small cattle market is held weekly at Isa Khel.
Of the total cultivated area in 1903-4, 214 square miles, or 18 per
cent., were classed as irrigated. Of this area, 185 square miles were
irrigated from wells, and 29 from canals, and in addition 444 square
miles, or 40 per cent., are subject to inundation from the Indus. The
District possesses 7,31c masonry wells, besides 993 unbricked wells,
water-lifts, and lever wells. Nearly the whole of the Kachhi is inter-
sected by branches of the Indus ; and in the higher portions dams
are thrown across these streams and a few small canals excavated,
but for the most part the people trust to inundation and percola-
tion. The Kot Sultan Canal, which belongs to the Muzaffargarh
Inundation Canals, takes off from the Indus in the extreme south
of the District : but with this exception the channels irrigating from
the Indus are all private. Canal-irrigation in the Isa Khel tahsll
consists of cuts from the hill streams, one channel being under the
management of the Deputy-Commissioner. Well-irrigation is the great
feature of agriculture in the Thai. In the north-east the spring-
level is so deep that wells are used only for watering cattle, but in
the west and south they supply a good deal of cultivation. In certain
parts level strips are found free from sandhills, and these are full of
wells. In the two southern tahslls the Kachhi is dependent on the
overflow from the Indus, and considerable improvements in the man-
agement of its irrigation have been made in recent years, the westerly
trend of the river necessitating more and more attention to this
subject. It has been proposed to irrigate the greater part of the Thai
by a perennial canal taking off from the Indus at Kalabagh.
The forest lands comprise 1,235 square miles of ' unclassed ' forest
and Government waste under the control of the Deputy-Commissioner.
In the Mianwali and Isa Khel tahsils these consist chiefly of groves of
shisham (Dalbergia S/ssoo), while in the Thai they are patches of waste
land leased for grazing. The forest revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 28,000.
Rock-salt occurs at many places in the Salt Range and in the
Maidani range across the Indus. It is, however, worked only along
the right bank of the river near Kalabagh, where
the salt stands out in the form of solid cliffs and
is quarried on the surface. Alum, which is abundant throughout
32 2 MIANWALI DISTRICT
the whole Salt Range, was formerly manufactured at Kalabagh and
Kotki (at the mouth of the Chichali pass), the process being almost
identical with that in Europe ; but the industry has almost died out,
owing to competition with other sources of cheaper supply. The
shale from which alum was extracted was dug from shafts in the hill-
side, sometimes of considerable depth. Coal or lignite of the oolitic
period occurs at Jaba (cis-Indus), at Kalabagh, Chopri, Chasmian,
and Sultan Khel (trans-Indus), and crops out in many other parts
of the Salt Range. The largest outcrop is in the hills between
Kalabagh and the Chichali pass in Isa Khel. It is found in lumps
of various sizes among dark bituminous shales, not in beds, but in
detached masses, which appear to be compressed and fossilized trunks
of trees. The occurrence of these masses is altogether uncertain
and irregular, so that nothing like a systematic working or shaft-
cutting would be remunerative. The coal itself is hard and light,
very black, but marked with brown streaks, and often encloses nests of
half-decomposed wood resembling peat. It is not so easily inflam-
mable as good coal ; it burns quickly, without coking, to a light-
coloured ash, and emits a large amount of smoky yellow flame with
but little heat. A seam of coal of some value was discovered in
1903 near Malla Khel.
Rock oil or petroleum is found at Jaba in Masan (cis-Indus), near
Kundal in the Khisor range, and in lesser quantities elsewhere in
the hills of Isa Khel and Mianwali. The Jaba reservoir was tapped
scientifically about twenty years ago, and the oil drawn up sent to
Rawalpindi for lighting purposes ; but the experiment was not re-
munerative. It is used for treating itch on camels and sheep, and
also to light the Kalabagh mines when men are at work in the tunnels
excavating shale for the alum manufactory. The hill at the foot of
which the springs lie is said to contain sulphur. Gold is found in
minute quantities, mixed with the sand of the Indus, and is extracted
by a laborious process of washing ; but the yield is very small. Salt-
petre is made from the earth of old village sites, and limestone and
building stone are found.
Iron vessels and instruments are manufactured at Kalabagh, and
striped cotton cloth {susl) is made there in considerable quantities.
A particularly excellent form of cotton check (khes)
iradeand. -g ma(je at Leiah. The weaving of baskets and
communications. . ° .
other articles from the dwarf-palm employs a fair
number of workers. Water-mills for grinding corn are worked in
large numbers on the hill streams of Isa Khel.
The chief exports are salt, alum, iron vessels, sftsi, coal, articles made
from the dwarf-palm, wheat and other grain, oilseeds, wool, and hides.
The principal imports are iron, cotton piece-goods and thread, silk,
A DMINISTRA TIOX 323
sugar, rice, potatoes, and timber. Exports go chiefly by rail and river
to Multan and Karachi. The chief centres of trade are Mianwali,
Kalabagh, Isa Khel, Bhakkar, Leiah, and Karor.
The line of the North-Western Railway running from Multan to
Rawalpindi passes through the District, with a short branch to Mari
opposite Kalabagh, and is joined at Kundian by the Sind-Sagar branch
from Lala-Musa. There are 2 miles of metalled road under the Public
Works department, and 200 miles of unmetalled roads maintained by
the District board. The principal road runs parallel to the railway
through Mianwali, Bhakkar, and Leiah. There is no wheeled traffic,
camels, mules, and donkeys being the means of conveyance. A great
deal of traffic is carried on the Indus to Multan and Sukkur. The
Indus is crossed opposite Dera Ismail Khan by a bridge of boats
in the cold season, replaced by a steam ferry in the hot season, and
by thirteen ordinary ferries. Inflated skins are largely used by the
natives for crossing the river.
The District has never suffered seriously from famine. The Kachhi
and a large proportion of Isa Khel are rendered secure by irrigation
or floods, while the scattered cultivation in the _
,„, , • • , i ,i • • • T Famine.
I hal is entirely dependent on well-irrigation. In
the famine year of 1899- 1900 the area of crops matured exceeded
70 per cent, of the normal area.
The District is divided for purposes of administration into the four
tahsl/s of Mianwali, Isa Khel, Bhakkar, and Leiah, each under
a tahslldar and a naib-tahslldar. The two last form A ^ .
_., , , . .. . . , , , c Administration,
the Bhakkar subdivision, under the charge of an
Assistant Commissioner. The Deputy-Commissioner is aided by three
Assistant or Extra-Assistant Commissioners, one of whom is in charge
of the District treasury. For the prevention of the illicit extraction
of salt, a preventive establishment supervised by a European officer
is located at selected points among the hills, from which all exposed
salt can be seen.
The Deputy-Commissioner as District Magistrate is responsible for
criminal justice. The District Judge is in charge of civil judicial work.
and both officers are under the supervision of the Divisional and
Sessions Judge of the Shahpur Civil Division. There are three
Munsifs : one sits at head-quarters, one at Bhakkar, and one at Karor.
The Frontier Crimes Regulation is in force throughout the District.
The Isa Khel tahsil is subject to inroads from trans-border outlaws
and their confederates in Kohat and Bannu. Cattle-stealing is the
principal crime. Besides the facilities which the great Thai desert
affords for transporting cattle into other Districts, the high jungle
along the bank of the Indus makes a most effective hiding-place,
especially in the flood season. Crime in the Thai also is very hard
324 MI AN \V All DISTRICT
to detect, owing to the great distances between police stations. Pro-
fessional trackers are largely employed, and occasionally accomplish
marvellous feats of long-distance tracking.
The fiscal conditions which obtain in the north are very different
from those of the southern tahsils, and even the two northern tahsils
have widely different histories. Mianwali appears to have paid the
large sum of i^ lakhs under Sikh rule. Lump assessments were made
on annexation and in 1850, until in 1853 the Deputy-Commissioner
of Leiah made a summary settlement of all the country west and south
of the Salt Range, including the modern tahsils of Mianwali, Leiah,
and Bhakkar. Leiah and Bhakkar had been summarily settled once
before, and a careful measurement of all the cultivation was made.
The demand for the three tahsils was more than 3^ lakhs. Various
other summary settlements were made in these tahsils, but the Leiah
District was broken up in 1861.
Isa Khel became subject to the Durranis on the downfall of the
Mughal empire, and paid revenue to them, sometimes without, but
more often after, coercion. In 1836 the Sikhs established themselves
here. The annual amount they realized is not known, but after
annexation a quarter of the estimated value of the crops was collected
for four years. In 1853 John Nicholson made a summary settlement,
based on these collections, imposing a severe assessment which lasted
for five years. In 1857 another and more lenient summary assess-
ment was made, which remained in force for eighteen years.
The regular settlement of Bannu District, made in 187 1-9, treated
the tahsils of Mianwali and Isa Khel very lightly. A fluctuating
assessment was generally levied in the riverain tracts, Rs. 1-4 per acre
being charged on all land sown in any year, except land newly broken
up, which paid 12 annas. These tahsils came under revision of
settlement in 1903, and an increase of Rs. 72,000, or 39 per cent.,
on the old revenue of 1-9 lakhs is expected.
The regular settlement of Dera Ismail Khan District was carried
out from 1872 to 1879. The Thai tract of the Bhakkar and Leiah
tahsils was assessed at a fixed revenue, but the assessment broke down,
and since 1887 a semi-fluctuating system has been in force. The
Indus valley portion of these two tahsils was originally assessed at
a fluctuating acreage rate. At the latest settlement, 1 898-1 904, the
same system of semi-fluctuating assessment, somewhat modified in
its details, has been continued in the Thai of both tahsils. The
principle is that, when a share equal to from one-fourth to three-fourths
of the area irrigated by a well falls out of cultivation, a corresponding
fraction of the assessment will be remitted. The revenue on the 'dry'
cultivation and the grazing revenue are fixed. In the Indus valley
a system of fluctuating crop-rates has been introduced, and the whole
ADMINISTRA TION
325
revenue varies. The demand, including cesses, for the whole District in
1903-4 amounted to nearly 5-7 lakhs. The average size of a proprietary
holding is 57 acres, but some very large holdings raise the average.
The collections of land revenue alone and of total revenue are
shown below, in thousands of rupees : —
1 900- 1.
1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue .
4»27
6,oS
4,06
6,07
The District contains six municipalities : Mianwali, Isa Khel,
Kalabagh, Bhakkar, Leiah, and Karor. Outside these, local affairs
are managed by a District board, whose income in 1903-4 was
Rs. 40,000, mainly derived from a local rate. The expenditure in
the same year was Rs. 45,000, the largest item being Rs. 1 7,000
spent on education.
The police force numbers 492 of all ranks, including 81 municipal
and 8 ferry police, under a Superintendent, who usually has 3 inspectors
under him. There are 15 police stations and 5 police posts. The
District jail at head-quarters has accommodation for 317 prisoners
of all classes.
The District stands sixteenth among the twenty-eight Districts of
the Province in respect of the literacy of its population. In 190 1 the
proportion of literate persons was 3*7 per cent. (6-7 males, 0-3 females).
The number of pupils under instruction was 7,589 in 1 900-1, and
8,290 in 1903-4. In the latter year there were 4 secondary, 72 primary,
and 3 special (public) schools, 13 advanced and 208 elementary (private)
schools, with 412 girls in the public and 967 in the private schools.
The principal school is the high school at Mianwali town. Industrial
schools for girls are maintained at Isa Khel and Mankera. The total
expenditure on education in 1903-4 was Rs. 27,000, of which Local
funds contributed Rs. 15,000, municipal funds Rs. 2,600, and fees
Rs. 4,000.
Besides the Mianwali civil hospital, the District has five out-lying
dispensaries. These institutions in 1904 treated a total of 98,407 out-
patients and 2,349 in-patients, and 4,962 operations were performed.
The expenditure was Rs. 15,000, District and municipal funds con-
tributing Rs. 5,000 each, and Government Rs. 5,000.
The. number of successful vaccinations in 1903-4 was 10,464,
representing 24-7 per 1,000 of the population. The Vaccination Act
has been extended to the towns of Mianwali, Isa Khel, and Leiah.
[D. C. J. Ibbetson, District Gazetteers of Bannu and Dera Ismail
Khan (1883-4) ; S. S. Thorburn, Settlement Report of Bannu (1S79) ;
H. St. G. Tucker, Settlement Report of Dera Ismail Khan (1879).]
326 MIANWALI TAHSIL
Mianwali Tahsil. — Head-quarters tahsil of Mianwali District,
Punjab, lying between 320 11/ and 330 2'N. and 710 16' and 7i°s8'E.,
with an area of 1,478 square miles. The population in 1901 was
111,883, compared with 103,909 in 1891. It contains the town of
Mianwali1 (population, 3,591), the head-quarters; and 69 villages.
The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 72,000.
The northern part of the tahsil is enclosed between the western slopes
of the Salt Range on the east and the Indus on the west, forming
a picturesque corner, which contrasts with the monotonous level of
the remainder of the cis-Indus territory of the District, in which its
southern part lies.
Mianwali Town1. — Head-quarters of the District and tahsil of
Mianwali, Punjab, situated in 320 35' N. and 710 31' E., on the high
left bank of the Indus, 655 feet above sea-level. It is the residence
of a notable Saiyid family, the Mians of Mianwali, descended from
a local Muhammadan saint, and themselves possessing a great reputa-
tion for sanctity. Population (1901), 3,591. Mianwali was long the
head-quarters of the Mianwali subdivision of Bannu District, and was
made the head-quarters of the new Mianwali District in 1901. The
civil lines are situated about half a mile from Mianwali, which is
little more than a village, and has no commercial importance. It was
made a municipality in 1903-4, and contains a hospital and a model
Government high school.
Michni. — Fort in the District and tahsil of Peshawar, North- West
Frontier Province, situated in 340 n' N. and 710 27' E., on the left
bank of the Kabul river, close to where it issues from the hills, and
15 miles north of Peshawar city. The fort, which commands an
important ferry over the Kabul river, was constructed in 1851-2 on
account of the numerous raids by Mohmands from beyond the frontier.
Lieutenant Boulnois, in command of the party constructing the fort,
was murdered here by Mohmands in 1852 ; and in 1873 Major
MacDonald, the commandant of the post, was murdered in its vicinity.
There is no village of Michni ; but the Tarakzai Mohmands have settle-
ments all round, those on the south side of the river being in British
territory. Fort Michni was formerly under the command of a field
officer, subordinate to the Brigadier-General at Peshawar ; but in
1885 it was handed over to the border military police, who now hold
it with a garrison of twenty men.
Midagesidurga. — Fortified hill, 3,376 feet high, in the north-east
of Tumkur District, Mysore, situated in 130 50' N. and 770 12' E.
It is said to be named after a princess who was burned here with the
corpse of her husband. Ranis of the same family held it till it was
1 Created a municipality since the last Census, and hence not shown as a town in
the table on p. 319.
MIDNAPORE DISTRICT 327
taken about 1670 by the Maddagiri chiefs, in whose hands it remained
till captured by Haidar All in 1761. The Marathas took it in 1767,
but it was recovered by Tipu Sultan in 1774.
Midnapore District (Medtnipur). — Southernmost District in the
Burdwan Division of Bengal, lying between 210 36' and 220 57' N. and
86° $$' and 88° 1 1' E., with an area of 5,186 square miles. Midnapore
is the largest and most populous of the Bengal Regulation Districts ;
and it is proposed to subdivide it into two Districts in order to ensure
greater efficiency of administration. Its western boundary marches
with Balasore District and the Mayurbhanj Tributary State of Orissa
and with the Singhbhum and Manbhiim Districts of Chota Xagpur,
while its southern boundary is the coast-line of the Bay of Bengal-
To the east the Hooghlv river and its tributary the Rupnarayan
separate it from the Twenty-four Parganas, Howrah, and Hooghly
Districts, while on the north it is bounded by Bankura.
This extensive District comprises three tracts of well-marked charac-
teristics : the north and west are of laterite formation, the east is
deltaic, and the south is seaboard. The Contai
and Tamluk subdivisions, on the sea-coast and the Physical
aspects.
estuary of the Hooghly, contain the mouths of the
Rasulpur and Haldl rivers. They are comparatively free from malaria
and produce very rich crops of rice. The Ghatal subdivision, farther
north, slopes back from the bank of the Rupnarayan ; the soil is a rich
alluvium, but much of its area is liable to floods, and, though excellent
crops are reaped, the inhabitants suffer greatly from malaria. The
head-quarters subdivision consists in the north and west of thinly
wooded and rocky uplands forming part of the fringe of the Chota
Nagpur plateau ; here the climate is good, though the laterite soil is
dry and infertile. Towards the east and south the level dips, and
a swampy hollow is formed between the elevated country to the west
and the comparatively high ground along the coast. The conditions
in this tract are very similar to those in the Ghatal subdivision which
it adjoins. In the north-west corner there are several hills over 1,000
feet in height, but the rest of the District is nearly level. The scenery
is varied in the north and west, where there are extensive sal forests
and the country is undulating and picturesque.
The chief rivers are the Hooghlv and its three tidal tributaries, the
Rupnarayan, the Haldl, and the Rasulpur. The Rupnarayan joins
the Hooghly opposite Hooghly Point : its chief tributary is the Silai,
flowing in a tortuous course through the north of the District and
navigable as far as Ghatal. The Haldl falls into the Hooghly opposite
the northern point of Sagar Island. Its principal tributaries are
the Kaliaghai and the Kasai, neither of which is navigable ; the latter
rises in Manbhiim District and flows past Midnapore town. The
328 MID NA PORE DISTRICT
Rasulpur rises in the south of the District, and joins the Hooghly a
little below Kedgeree and the Cowcolly lighthouse. The Subarna-
rekha enters the District from Singhbhum, and passes through the
jungle tract of Western Midnapore into Balasore District; it is not
navigable.
In the extreme north-west corner of the District there is a low ridge,
formed of grey and bluish grey micacean schists with bands of a more
igneous character. The plains are covered in the north and west by
lateritic rocks, which gradually give way in the south and east to the
ordinary alluvium of the Gangetic delta. At the surface the laterite
invariably contains small rounded fragments of other rocks, and in
places these become conglomeratic, pebbles of quartz coated with oxide
of iron and rounded fragments of other rocks being frequently formed.
Close to Midnapore town, where a section is exposed, more than
50 feet of solid laterite are seen superposed in large tabular masses
upon a soft soapy greyish white and reddish clay, resembling the kaolin
clays which result from the decomposition of felspathic rocks.
In land under rice cultivation are found the usual marsh weeds of
the Gangetic plain and many sedges, while the surface of ponds,
ditches, and still streams is covered with aquatic plants. The home-
steads are embedded in shrubberies of semi-spontaneous growth.
Some species of figs, notably the plpal and the banyan, make up, along
with the red cotton-tree (Bombax malabaricum), Mangifera, Moringa,
and Odina JVodier, the arborescent part of these thickets, in which
numbers of Phoenix dactylifera and palmyra palms (Borassus flabelli-
fer) are often present. Hedges and waste places are covered with
climbing creepers and various milkweeds.
Bears and deer are still plentiful in the west, and leopards and
hyenas are not uncommon. There are a few wild elephants and
wolves, and a tiger is occasionally seen. Wild buffaloes were formerly
common in the south, but these have disappeared with the extension
of cultivation. Small game is plentiful, including wild geese, ducks,
snipe, ortolans, teal, and hares ; but, excepting the migratory birds, all
game is decreasing. Snakes are numerous.
The climate of the arid tract in the north and west is very different
from that of the swamps in the east and south. The average mean
temperature for the whole District is about 8o°. The coast-line is
wetter and cooler than the higher portion. In the north and west,
where the surface is of red laterite and the hot westerly winds from
Central India penetrate, exceptionally high day temperatures are a
feature of the hot months, and the mean maximum temperature rises
to 1020 in April and May. The monthly rainfall averages less than an
inch for November, December, January, and February, and between
1 and i| inches in March and April, after which there is a rapid
HISTORY 329
increase. The rainfall in June averages 9»So inches, in July 12-42, in
August 13-18, in September 9-04, and in October 4-43 inches. The
annual total averages 59 inches.
The great cyclone of 1864 caused serious loss of life and property
in the south-east ; no less than 53,000 deaths were reported, and the
returns were far from complete. The immediate losses were equalled,
if not exceeded, by the mortality caused by the scarcity and pestilence
that resulted from the destruction of the crops and the pollution of the
drinking-water supply. Heavy storms, all causing more or less damage
to life and property, have occurred on twelve other occasions during
the last seventy years. In the alluvial tract the rivers frequently over-
flow their banks and cause widespread havoc to the crops ; owing to
silt the mouth of the rivers are obstructed, and large tracts of country
remain submerged for weeks after a flood. In 1889 the Bengal
Government found it necessary to appoint a Commission to investigate
the causes of the frequent occurrence of these floods, and as a result
the cross-damming of tidal channels for agricultural purposes has been
restricted.
The eastern portion of Midnapore originally formed part of the
kingdom of Suhma or Tarnralipta, the ancient name of Tamluk, which
is now the head-quarters of a subdivision on the
Rupnarayan river. It derives its name from tamra
(' copper '), which was once an important article of export. The
earliest traditional kings of Tamluk were Kshattriyas of the Peacock
dynasty, who were succeeded by Kaibarttas. The whole District, with
Kalinga or Orissa, came under Buddhist influence in the fifth century
b. c. Early in the fifth century a.d. the Chinese pilgrim Fa Hian spent
two years at Tamluk and thence took ship for Ceylon. Another
Chinese pilgrim, Hiuen Tsiang, wrote of Tamluk in the seventh
century as still an important harbour, with 10 Buddhist monasteries
containing 1,000 monks and a pillar of king Asoka. Midnapore
District nearly coincides with the Muhammadan division known as
sarkdr Jaleswar, which had for its capital the town of that name now
situated in Balasore District, and was included in Orissa at the time
of Todar Mai's settlement in 1582. This sarkdr paid to the Mughal
emperor a revenue of i2| lakhs, but during the last half-century of
Muhammadan rule the Marathas collected revenue from the southern
portions of the District.
It was at Hi j ill, at the mouth of the Rasulpur river, that Job
Charnock with a small force defended himself successfully in 1687
against an overwhelming army of Mughals, and it was from this place
that he sailed to found Calcutta. The British occupation of the
District dates from the year 1760, when Mir Kasim, who had been
made Subahdar of Bengal by the British, assigned to the East India
330 MIDXAPORE DISTRICT
Company the three Districts of Burdwan, Midnapore, and Chittagong
to meet its military expenses. By a subsequent treaty, dated July 10,
1763, Mir Jafar, who had been reinstated in place of Mir Kasim,
confirmed the cession of these Districts, which were then estimated to
furnish nearly a third of the whole revenue of Bengal. As a result of
the decisive battle of Buxar, the Diwani of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa
was conferred in perpetuity on the East India Company in 1765. The
Orissa therein referred to included only the District of Midnapore
and a part of Hooghly ; Orissa proper was not conquered from the
Marathas until 1803. The principal officer of the Company in this
province was the Chief or Resident at Midnapore.
In the early years of British administration much trouble was given
by the chiefs of the hilly country within as well as without the boun-
dary, and frequent expeditions had to be made against them. The
southern portion of the District, now the Tamluk and Contai sub-
divisions, was at first administered by a Salt Agent and Collector at
HijilT. Tamluk was transferred to Midnapore in 1789; but Hijili
remained a separate Collectorate up to 1836, when a quarter of it was
amalgamated with Midnapore and the rest with Balasore. Dhalbhum
originally formed part of Midnapore, but it was transferred in 1833 to
Manbhum and subsequently to Singhbhum ; in 1876, however, forty-
five outlying villages were again included in Midnapore. In 1872 the
parganas of Chandrakona and Barda were transferred from Hooghly
District.
The principal object of archaeological interest is the temple at
Tamluk, which is of Buddhist origin, but is now dedicated to the
goddess Barga-Bhima, or Kali. In the high lands there are various
old garhs or forts of the petty jungle Rajas, of which little is left but
the sites. Many of the large tanks are of great age, and some of the
embankments constructed to restrain the rivers are anterior to the
British occupation.
The population fell from 2,542,920 in 1872 to 2,515,565 in 1881,
but rose again to 2,631,466 in 1891 and to 2,789,114 in 1901. The
decrease in 1881 was due to the prevalence of an
epidemic of malaria known as the ' Burdwan fever,'
but since that year there has been a steady increase. During the last
decade there was an advance of about 6 per cent. Midnapore is
now fairly healthy, with the exception of the low tracts of the Ghatal
subdivision and the centre of the I )istrict, where malaria is prevalent.
Hepatitis is not uncommon, and elephantiasis exists in the swampy
parts of the alluvial portion of the District. Cholera has diminished
since the opening of the railway, as the pilgrims to and from Purl no
longer throng the roads spreading the disease in their train. The
principal statistics of the Census of 1901 are shown below : —
POPULA TIOX
33i
Subdivision.
Area in square
miles.
Xumber of
Population.
1 "
39 1
S74
893
710
5 = i-
6 = = & 3
" '5 *; q -
? •-■= u"2
- g ^"- S
Pi a
Number of
persons ablctO
read and
write.
X
a
H
I
5
1
7
V
>
Midnapore
Ghatal .
Tamluk .
Contai .
District total
3.271
372
653
849
3-7S2
I.042
'•57s
2.062
1,277.749
324.991
583,238
603,156
+ 4-5
— 0-9
+ 90
+ io-6
95.59*
38,100
92,139
69, 2 2 ~
5,186*
8,464
2.789,114
538
+ 6-o
295,064
* Includes 41 square miles returned as uninhabited river-beds.
Five of the towns— Ghatal, Chaxdrakoxa, Kharar, Ra.mjI-
banpur, and Khirpai — are situated in the north-east of the District,
which suffered from the ' Burdwan fever ' epidemic, and they have
scarcely yet regained the population they then lost. The remaining
towns are Midnapore, the headquarters station, and Tamluk. The
pressure of population is greatest along the banks of the Rupnarayan
and the estuary of the Hooghly, the maximum density being found
in the Tamluk thdna, where there are 1,156 persons per square mile.
Farther inland the climate is bad and the density gradually de-
creases. In the west the cultivable area is small, and the density
steadily diminishes until, on the confines of Singhbhum and Mayur-
bhanj, it drops to 259 per square mile. The Contai subdivision is the
most progressive part of the District, the increase being greatest in the
Contai thdna, which in the course of ten years has added nearly a sixth
to its population, and in the other three coast thdnas. On the other
hand, the Ghatal subdivision and the Debra, Sabang, and Narayangarh
thdnas in the head-quarters subdivision are decadent. This is due, not
only to the prevalence of fever, but also to a movement of the popula-
tion from the densely crowded and waterlogged tracts in the north-east
and centre of the District to the newly reclaimed lands along the coast
and tidal rivers in the Contai and Tamluk subdivisions. There is
a small loss by emigration. The railway has attracted coolies and
employes, but it has also facilitated temporary migration to Calcutta
and Hooghly. Of every 100 persons, 80 speak Bengali, 10 Oriya,
3 Hindi, and the remainder other languages. Oriya is spoken in the
Contai subdivision and also in the western thdnas of the head-quarters
subdivision. Hindus number 2,467,047, or 88 per cent, of the total ;
Muhammadans, 184,958, or 7 per cent. ; and Animists, 135,050, or
5 per cent. The Hindus and Muhammadans have increased slightly
at the expense of the Animists, who are found only in the north and
west of the District.
The Kaibarttas are the great race or caste, numbering no less than
883,000, or nearly a third of the whole population. The Bagdis
VOL. XVII. Y
33*
MIDXAPORE DISTRICT
(142,000), another aboriginal caste, who gave their name to the ancient
Bagri (South Bengal), are also strongly represented ; and so are the
S:idgops (131,000), a cultivating branch of the Goalas. The Santals
(148,000) are numerous in the north-west of the District. Of the
higher castes, Brahmans (1 14,000) are more numerous than elsewhere
in Bengal proper, and the Kayasths with the Karans, the indigenous
writer caste of Orissa, number 91,000. The Baishnabs (93,000) have
considerably increased during the last decade, but the Tantis or
weavers have lost ground. Of the Muhammadans, 121,000 are Shaikhs
and 22,000 are Pathans. Agriculture supports 77 per cent, of the
population, industry 10 per cent., and the professions 3 per cent. The
population is more distinctively agricultural than in any other part of
"West or Central Bengal.
The Christian population is increasing, and in 1901 numbered 1,974,
of whom 1,545 were natives. The American Free Baptist Mission
works among both the Bengalis and the Santals ; there is a small
Roman Catholic mission to the Santals ; and Church of England
missions are established at Midnapore town and Kharakpur.
The new alluvium in the east and south produces abundant rice
crops. In the west and north rice is grown in the depressions between
successive ridges by terracing the slopes, and maize,
millets, oilseeds, and pulses are grown on the uplands;
but the crests of the ridges are very infertile. Along the sea-board and
on the banks of tidal rivers and creeks, dikes are necessary to keep out
the salt water, and similar embankments are erected to protect the
lowlands in the interior from inundation by floods. The non-tidal
rivers are dammed for irrigation purposes, so that the alluvial tract
is covered with a network of embankments and cross-dams, which
seriously impede the drainage, and in years of heavy rainfall large
areas are waterlogged. The chief agricultural statistics for 1903-4
are shown below, in square miles : —
Agriculture.
Subdivision.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated
from canals.
Cultivable
waste.
Midnapore
Ghatal
Tamliik
Contai
Uninhabited river-bet's
Total
3,2/1
372
f>53
849
4'
1,876
242
376
633
130
15
243
47
171
89
5,» 86
3,127
'45
55°
The uncultivable area extends over no less than 1,509 square miles, in
the rocky western uplands and on the sea-shore and in the big rivers.
The staple product is rice, which occupies nearly three-fourths of
the cultivated area. The winter crop, comprising 93 per cent, of the
AGRICULTURE 333
total area under rice, is sown in the early part of the rainy season and
reaped in November, December, and January. In the most highly
cultivated parts the seed is first sown in nurseries, but in the low-lying
lands it is sown broadcast. The autumn crop is sown broadcast on
dry land in the months of April, May, and June, and reaped in August
and September. The spring crop is sown broadcast after the rains, and
is cut in March and April ; it usually requires irrigation. The other
crops are wheat, barley, peas, linseed, mustard, sesamum, sugar-cane,
pan {Piper Betle), mulberry, jute, cotton, and indigo. Tobacco,
turmeric, and market-garden produce are grown in small quantities on
the homestead lands.
Land on which winter rice is grown seldom yields a second crop, but
wheat, barley, peas, and linseed are often grown on land from which an
early rice crop has been taken. Only 3-6 per cent, of the cultivated
area was twice cropped in 1903-4. On some of the uplands a crop is
raised only once every two or three years ; this is usually sesamum or
some other variety of oilseed. The cultivation of indigo, which was
grown on high lands or the banks of rivers, has almost entirely died
out, as the price of the dye has fallen so low that it no longer pays
to manufacture it here. The silk industry has greatly decayed, owing
largely to diseases amongst the worms.
Little space exists for further extension of cultivation in the alluvial
tract ; but much good land remains to be brought under cultivation
in the west, and here the work of reclamation is now in progress. The
out-turn in many parts might be much increased by substituting trans-
planted for broadcast rice. Fields are often manured with cow-dung
and ashes ; but the canal-irrigated and flooded tracts do not require
manure, as the silt brought down by the water fertilizes the soil.
Government loans are not popular, and during the ten years ending
1904 only about Rs. i,ood a year was taken under the Land Im-
provement Loans Act and nothing under the Agriculturists' Loans Act.
The cattle are of the degenerate species met with in the plains of
Bengal, and it is to be feared that they are still further deteriorating
owing to the encroachment of tillage on the pasture lands. Attempts
have been made at Midnapore town with some success to improve the
breed of cattle by importing cows from Bihar and bulls from Hissar.
Buffaloes are common in the south and are mostly kept for milk.
No less than forty-three fairs are held, but they are generally of a
religious or semi-religious nature, and few cattle are sold at them.
The main source of irrigation is the Midnapore High-level Canal,
which takes off from an anicut across the Kasai river just below Midna-
pore town, and runs to Ulubaria on the Hooghly, 16 miles below
Calcutta. It was completed in 1873 at a cost of 80 lakhs, and has
a navigable length of 72 miles, including the portions of the Kasai,
Y 2
334 MIDNAPORE DISTRICT
Rupnarayan, and Damodar rivers into which it flows : regular steamer
services, however, have ceased to ply since the opening of the Bengal-
Nagpur Railway to Calcutta. It has several distributaries, one of
which is navigable, and in 1901 it supplied water to 80,000 acres of
rice, or one-twentieth of the crop. Irrigation from tanks and embanked
depressions is conducted in the upland tracts, but many of these tanks
have been allowed by the landlords to fall into decay. In a year of
good rainfall the average yield per acre of rice and straw from irrigated
lands is 22 and 38 maunds, compared with 16 and 29 maunds respec-
tively from unirrigated lands.
No 'reserved' or protected forests exist, but the western uplands
are clothed with small sal (Shorea robusta), mahui (Bass/a latifolia),
tamarind, and palas (Biitea frondosa). The jungle products are lac,
tasar silk, wax, wood dye, bark fabrics, resin, firewood, and charcoal.
The m a hit a flower and various jungle roots are used as food.
The District contains no mines, but laterite and limestone are
quarried. The former is of the kind known as rock laterite, and is
(.lose grained, hard, and durable ; it is generally met with at a depth
varying from 2 to 4 feet below the surface. Magnesian potstones are
also found. Alluvial gold occurs in small quantities, and also iron and
soapstone.
Excellent mats are manufactured at Raghunathbari, Kasijora, and
Narajol, whence the)- are exported to Calcutta. Pottery is made in the
neighbourhood of Ghatal for use in the metropolis,
radeana anfj \^rSLSii an(j COpper utensils are manufactured in
communications. l r ,
Midnapore town for local sale. Bell-metal ware is
extensively manufactured in Kharar, and exported to Calcutta and
elsewhere. Tasar silk is manufactured in the north, but the processes
are old-fashioned and the manufacturers are poor. Weavers are to
be found in Chandrakona and other places, but the industry is being
killed by competition with machine-made imported fabrics. A Lyons
firm owns a silk factory at Guruli in the Ghatal subdivision. Salt was
formerly manufactured by Government on an extensive scale along the
coast, but the manufacture has now ceased.
Large quantities of rice are sent to Calcutta. Among the other
exports are sugar and molasses, jute, linseed, gram, pulses, charcoal,
brass and bell-metal ware, timber, hides, mats, silk and cotton cloth,
tasar silk, pottery, and vegetables. The chief imports are cotton
goods, coal and coke, kerosene oil, gunny, salt, tobacco, potatoes,
enamelled ware, nails, &c. The principal trading marts are Midnapore,
Ghatal, Tamluk, Kukrahati, Panskura, Chandrakona, Balighai, Kasiari,
Garhbeta, and Nawada. Much trade is also done at the fairs held
at Tulslchura, Gophballabhpur, Mahishadal, and Egra. Many parts of
the District enjoy special facilities for trade. The tidal rivers Hooghly,
FAMINE 335
Rupnarayan, Haldl, and Rasulpur afford an easy means of communica-
tion with Calcutta, and the canals carry much of the rice exported.
The main line of the Bengal-Nagpur Railway from Calcutta to
Bombay traverses the District from east to west ; and at Kharakpur
the East Coast section branches to the south, and the line through
Bankura and the Jherria coal-fields to the north. These lines have
all been opened since 1899.
The Orissa trunk road from Kola, on the Rupnarayan, through
Midnapore to Dantan on the frontier of Orissa and the pilgrim road
from Midnapore to Ranlganj are in charge of the Public Works depart-
ment. They are metalled and, except where they cross the Silai and
Kasai, fully bridged, and have an aggregate length of 112 miles. The
District board maintains 364 miles of metalled and 376 miles of
unmetalled roads, and there are 754 miles of village tracks. The
principal roads are bridged except where they cross big rivers. They
lead from Midnapore to Chichra on the Singhbhum border, from
Ghatal to Sijua on the Manbhum border, from Panskura to Tamluk,
from Contai Road railway station to Contai, from Pirakata to Garhbeta,
from Midnapore to the Burdwan border, from Garhbeta to Chandra-
kona, and from Tamluk to Contai. Notwithstanding the numerous
excellent roads, much of the traffic in the interior is still carried by
pack-bullocks.
The Coast Canal runs from Geonkhali at the junction of the
Rupnarayan and Hooghly rivers to the Haldl river, and thence to
the Rasulpur river and through the canalized Sarpai river to Contai.
About 8 miles above Contai it is continued into Balasore District.
It is a tidal canal with locks, and is used solely for drainage and
navigation ; but the traffic has much decreased since the opening of
the railway along the East Coast, and the regular service of steamers
has ceased. The first two reaches of this canal from Geonkhali to
the Rasulpur river, called the Hijili Tidal Canal, were opened in 1S73,
and the remainder, called the Orissa Coast Canal, in 1885. The
Midnapore High-level Canal, from opposite Midnapore on the Kasai
river to Dainan on the Rupnarayan, was opened in 1873; it is used
for navigation as well as irrigation.
Daily steamer services run from Calcutta via Geonkhali to Tamluk
and Kola. Country boats ply in the Bay of Bengal, and on the
Hooghly and the other tidal rivers of the District ; these are made
near Contai, are partly decked, and will stand a moderate sea.
The District is not specially liable to drought, but the years 1766,
1770, 1792, 1 85 1, 1866, and 1S97 were years of famine or scarcity.
Of the first three little is known, but in 1851 it was
estimated that nearly five-eighths of the rice harvest
was destroyed. In 1866 the District was involved in the great Orissa
336 MIDNAPORE DISTRICT
famine. After a year of exceptional floods, a severe and protracted
drought in 1865 resulted in a loss of half the winter rice crop, and
the distress reached its height in August and September, 1866. Relief
was afforded much too late and was meagre in the extreme ; and
although no accurate statistics of the mortality were obtained, it was
estimated at 50,000, or no less than one-tenth of the total population
of the famine tract. In 1897 a portion of the Binpur thatia, about
100 square miles in area, with a population of 25,000, was affected
by scarcity.
Midnapore District is one of the heaviest charges in Bengal. For
the purposes of administration it is divided into four subdivisions, with
AJ . . . head-quarters at Miiixapore, Ghatal, Tamluk, and
Administration. „ „. „ ,. '
Contai. 1 he staff at Midnapore town subordinate to
the Magistrate-Collector, who is also ex-officio Assistant to the Superin-
tendent of the Tributary Mahals, Cuttack, and has the powers of
a Revenue Superintendent of Canals in Howrah District, consists
of a Joint-Magistrate, seven Deputy-Magistrate-Collectors, an Assistant
Magistrate-Collector, and a special Deputy-Collector for excise. Each
of the three outlying subdivisions is in charge of a Deputy-Magistrate-
Collector ; at Tamluk he is assisted by a Sub-Deputy, and at Contai
there is a second Deputy-Magistrate-Collector for the management of
khds mahals. The Executive Engineer of the Kasai division of the
Public Works department is stationed at Midnapore.
Civil justice is administered by a District Judge, with two Sub-
Judges and four Munsifs at Midnapore, four Munsifs at Contai, four
Munsifs at Tamluk, and one Munsif each at Ghatal, Dantan, and
Garhbeta. The criminal courts include those of the District Magistrate,
the District and Sessions Judge, the Joint, Assistant, Deputy, and Sub-
Deputy Magistrates. Midnapore is a heavy criminal District, and has
long been notorious for the number of dacoities committed within its
borders. These are largely the work of Tuntias, a Muhammadan caste,
whose traditional occupation is the cultivation of the mulberry -tree
(fiint) for feeding silkworms. This occupation having become un-
profitable, many of them have taken to criminal courses, and are
professional thieves and dacoits.
The current land revenue demand in 1903-4 was 24-49 lakhs, of
which 18-90 lakhs was payable by 2,733 permanently settled estates,
Rs. 89,000 by 200 temporarily settled estates, and the balance by
67 estates held by Government. The demand is larger than that of
any other District in Bengal except Burdwan, and is equivalent to
36 per cent, of the reported gross rental of the District, the incidence
on each cultivated acre being Rs. 1-2. The Permanent Settlement
never extended to the Pataspur f>argana, which adjoins Orissa and
was in the possession of the Marathas, along with that province, until
. / DMINIS 7'A>. 1 TIOX 337
1S03. Among the other estates which escaped the Permanent Settle-
ment are Jalamuta, Majnamuta, Kalyanpur, and Balarampur. The
proprietors of Jalamuta and Majnamuta refused to engage for them
at the time of the Permanent Settlement on any but temporary
conditions, on account of the liability of these estates to inundation.
Kalyanpur in the west of the District consists of taufir or ' excess '
lands, which by an oversight were left unsettled in 1793. The Bala-
rampur pargana, in the neighbourhood of Kharakpur, was purchased
by Government in 1838 at a sale for arrears of revenue. Pataspur was
surveyed and settled for fifteen years from 1897. The other temporarily
settled estates, with an area of nearly 500 square miles, are now under
resettlement.
The average rent per acre for occupancy ryots' lands in the Pataspur
estates is Rs. 3-4-1, but rates vary greatly in different parts. Land on
which winter rice is grown usually fetches about 50 per cent, more
than that used for early rice, and sugar-cane land is about twice as
valuable as the best rice land. In addition to the rent, a cash
premium of from Rs. 30 to Rs. 75 an acre is usually taken at the
commencement of a new lease.
The following table shows the collections of land revenue and of
total revenue (principal heads only), in thousands of rupees : —
1880-1.
1S90-1. 1900- 1. 1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
22,45
31.01
24,34 22,4° 24,13
34.95 37,3^ 39,75
Outside the municipalities of Midnapore, Tamluk, Ghatal,
Chandrakona, RamjIbanpur, Khirpai, and Kharar, local affairs
are managed by a District board, with four subdivisional local boards
and five Unions. The income of the District board in 1903-4 was
Rs. 3,38,000, of which Rs. 1,75,000 was derived from rates; and
the expenditure was Rs. 3,47,000, of which Rs. 2,16,000 was spent on
public works and Rs. 99,000 on education.
The system of railways and canals has already been described.
Embankments have been constructed on an extensive scale, some
with a view to protecting the coast-line from the invasion of the
sea and preventing an inrush of salt tidal water from the creeks, and
others to prevent the flooding of low lands by the overflow from the
rivers. In all, no less than 785 miles of embankments are maintained
by the Irrigation department, 543 miles at the public expense, and the
balance at the cost of the parties benefited. A sea dike nearly
42 miles in length, extending from the western boundary of the
District to the Rasulpur river, protects the coast from inundation by
storm-waves : it was constructed by Government in 1864-74 at a cost
333 MIDNAPORE DISTRICT
of 6 lakhs. The right bank of the Hooghly from the Rasulpur to the
Rupnarayan river is protected by an embankment, which is extended
along the west bank of the Rupnarayan as far north as Ghatal. Both
banks of the tidal rivers Haldi and Rasulpur and of several tidal khals
are also similarly embanked. The Kasai river is hemmed in on both
banks for a distance of 120 miles to prevent its waters from over-
flowing, and so is the Silai river for a distance of 25 miles ; the
Kaliaghai river is also embanked. Most of the embankments which
are now maintained at public expense were in existence before the
country came under British administration ; they were originally in
charge of the zamlndars, but they were greatly neglected, and it was
found necessary for Government to undertake their repair in order to
ensure the punctual collection of the revenue. Various measures have
been adopted to improve the drainage in the waterlogged areas in the
east and south of the District by cutting channels, deepening rivers
and k/id/Sy and providing sluices in embankments ; but there is much
scope for further work in this direction.
There is a lighthouse at Geonkhali on the right bank of the
Hooghly, opposite the northern point of Sagar island.
The District contains 26 thanas, 10 outposts, and 4 road-posts. In
addition to the District Superintendent and his Assistant, the force
includes 7 inspectors, 68 sub-inspectors, 68 head constables, 649 con-
stables, and 109 town chaukldars ; there is also a village police of
494 daffaddrs and 5,863 chaukldars. The regular force is small for
this large area, as there is only one policeman to 8-6 square miles and
to 4,832 persons. The majority of the village chaukldars are now
under Act VI (B.C.) of 1870, but many of them in the west of
the District are still remunerated by service lands. The latter are the
successors of the paiks, or foot-soldiers, who were retained by the
zamlndars of former times as a defence against the incursions of
Marathas and hill-robbers ; their service lands are being gradually
resumed, and they are being enlisted on regular pay under the Bengal
Chaukidari Act. A Central jail at Midnapore town has accommoda-
tion for 1,340 prisoners, and sub-jails in the outlying subdivisions
for 48.
At the Census of 1901 the proportion of literate persons was
io-6 per cent. (20-5 males and 0-7 females), a larger proportion than
in any other part of Bengal except Calcutta and Howrah. The total
number of pupils shown in the returns of the Educational department
increased from Sr,ooo in 1883 to 107,000 in 1892-3, and 118,000 in
1 900- 1. There was a slight fall in 1903-4, when 102,000 boys and
12,000 girls were at school, being respectively 48-8 and 5-7 per cent.
of the children of school-going age ; both proportions compare favour-
ably with the ratios for the whole of Bengal. The number of educa-
MIDNAPORE TOWN 339
tional institutions, public and private, in 1903-4 was 4,263, including
an Arts college, 118 secondary, 4,077 primary, and 66 special schools.
The expenditure on education was 4-63 lakhs, of which Rs. 35,000
was met from Provincial funds, Rs. 94,000 from District funds,
Rs. 6,000 from municipal funds, and 2-62 lakhs from fees. A training
school at Binpur for aboriginal tribes and depressed castes, under the
management of the American Baptist Mission, supplies teachers to
39 attached pathsdlas in the Jungle Mahals. A small technical school
at Midnapore town is aided from District funds, and a madrasa at
Pataspur is provided with a hostel from Provincial revenues. The
District also contains 58 Sanskrit tols, of which 53 have adopted the
standards prescribed by the Educational department.
In 1903 the District contained 14 dispensaries, of which 7 had
accommodation for 123 in-patients. The cases \o( 20,000 out-
patients and 1,500 in-patients were treated during the year, and 4,700
operations were performed. The expenditure was Rs. 29,000, of
which Rs. 4,000 was met from Government contributions, Rs. 5,000
from Local and Rs. 12,000 from municipal funds, and Rs. 7,000 from
subscriptions.
Vaccination is compulsory only in municipal areas. Elsewhere it is
very backward, and in 1903-4 only 68,770 persons, or 25-5 per 1,000
of the population, were successfully vaccinated.
[Sir W. W. Hunter, Statistical Account of Bengal, vol. iii (1876);
Reports of the Embankment Committee (Calcutta, 1839—40, reprinted
in 1901); J. Price, Early History of Midnapore (Calcutta, 1876);
Selections from the Records of the Government of Bengal on the Settlement
of Jaldmuta and Mdjnamutd Estates in Midnapore (Calcutta, 1882);
Embankment Committee's Report (Calcutta, 1888).]
Midnapore Subdivision. — Head-quarters subdivision of Midna-
pore District, Bengal, lying between 21° 46' and 22° 5 70 N. and 86c 33'
and 870 43' E., with an area of 3,271 square miles. The subdivision
consists in the north and west of thinly wooded and rocky uplands.
The climate is good, but the laterite soil is dry and infertile. Towards
the south and east the level dips, and a swampy hollow is formed
between the elevated country to the west and the comparatively high
ground along the coast. The population in 1901 was 1,277,749,
compared with 1,223,248 in 1891, the density being 391 persons per
square mile, which is much less than in any other subdivision. It
contains one town, Midnapore (population, 33,140), its head-quarters ;
and 3,782 villages. Kharakpur, 8 miles from Midnapore town, is an
important railway junction.
Midnapore Town {Medinipitr). — Head-quarters of Midnapore
District, Bengal, situated in 22° 25' X. and 870 19' E., on the north
bank of the Kasui river. Population (1901), 33,140, of~ whom Hindus
34° MIDNAPORE TOWN
numbered 26,094, Musalmans 6,575, and Christians 398. The town
was formally declared the head-quarters of the District in 1783, but
a factory and fort had been built here more than twenty years
previously. Midnapore has no great industry or trade, though brass-
ware, rice, and timber are exported on a small scale. The town shows
little tendency to grow. It has been recently connected with the
Bengai-Nagpur Railway system by a branch line to Kharakpur.
Midnapore was constituted a municipality in 1865. The income
during the decade ending 190 1-2 averaged Rs. 60,000, and the ex-
penditure Rs. 58,000. In 1903-4 the total income was Rs. 64,000,
of which Rs. 18,000 was derived from a tax on houses and lands,
Rs. 14,000 from a conservancy rate, Rs. 12,000 as fees from educational
institutions, and Rs. 6,000 from a tax on vehicles. The incidence of
taxation was Rs. 1-2-3 Per head of the population. In the same year
the expenditure of Rs. 63,600 included Rs. 2,000 spent on lighting,
and the same amount on drainage, Rs. 16,000 on conservancy,
Rs. 11,000 on medical relief, Rs. 4,000 on roads, and Rs. 20,000 on
education. The town contains the usual public buildings, and also
a church and a Central jail. The jail has accommodation for 1,340
prisoners, who are employed on cloth-weaving, cane- and basket-work,
mat-making, carpentry, and the manufacture of mustard oil. The
American Baptist Mission maintains a training school and printing
press. The educational institutions include an Arts college and
a small technical school.
Midnapore Canal. — A navigable and irrigation canal in the
Midnapore District of Bengal. Construction was begun by the East
India Irrigation and Canal Company in 1886; the works were taken
over by Government two years later, and irrigation commenced in
1 87 1. The canal originally formed part of the Orissa Canals scheme,
but was at an early stage separated and treated as a distinct project.
The water-supply is derived from the Kasai river at Midnapore, where
there is a regulating weir with head-works, and the canal extends to
Ulubaria on the Hooghly, crossing the Rupnarayan and Damodar
rivers.
The length of the main canal is 72 miles, and of its distributaries
267 miles, and the maximum discharge is 1,500 cubic feet per second.
The whole length of the main canal is navigable, and the estimated
value of cargo carried in 1902 3 was 63-8 lakhs, the tolls collected
amounting to Rs. 70,000. The capital outlay up to March 31, 1904,
was 84-8 lakhs, and the gross revenue for that year amounted to
2-2 lakhs, the net revenue being Rs. 70,000; the total area irrigated
was 146 square miles. Before the opening of the Bengal-Nagpur
Railway the canal formed part of the main route between Calcutta and
Midnapore; the railway has tapped tin- canal traffic and caused
MIL A A' 341
a falling off in the receipts from navigation, which has been accom-
panied, however, by a corresponding decrease in working expenses.
Mihrpur. — Subdivision and town in Nadia District, Bengal. See
Meherpur.
Mikir Hills. — A tract of hilly country in Nowgong and Sibsagar
Districts, Eastern Bengal and Assam, lying between the Assam Range
and the Brahmaputra, about 26° 30' N. and 930 30' E., but cut off
from the main mountain system by the valleys of the Dhansiri on the
east, and of the Kapili and its tributaries on the west. The northern
hills are composed of gneissic rocks, which towards the south are
overlain by sedimentary strata of Tertiary origin. These younger rocks
consist of soft yellow sandstones, finely laminated grey clay shales, and
nodular earthy limestone. Limestone is found near the Nambar,
Deopani, Hariajan, and Jamuna rivers, and iron ore is of widespread
occurrence, though the haematite is seldom sufficiently concentrated to
pay for working. Coal of inferior quality is found near the Langlei
hill and the Nambar river. The hills have steep slopes, and both they
and the intervening valleys are covered with dense jungle. They
extend over an area of about 2,000 square miles and average from
1,000 to 2,000 feet above the sea, though the loftiest summits attain
a height of nearly 4,500 feet. The Mikirs, the tribe inhabiting these
hills, speak a language which occupies an intermediate position between
Bodo or Kachari and the various forms of Naga speech. In character
and habits they differ entirely from the savage hillmen to the south,
and are quieter and more timid than any other tribe in Assam. Dalton
states ' that they were originally driven from the hills of North Caehar
to the Jaintia Hills, where they are still to be found in considerable
numbers ; but the majority of the tribe were displeased with the
treatment they received, and moved to the locality which has since
borne their name. Similar migrations were undertaken by the Lalungs,
a kindred neighbouring tribe, who according to their traditions went to
the Jaintia Hills to escape the necessity of providing the Kachari Raja
with a daily ration of six seers of human milk, and left because
they did not like the matriarchal theory of inheritance there in force.
The Mikirs are said to have been compelled to forswear the use of
arms by the Ahom government, and this is offered as an explanation
of their present peaceful disposition. They live in small hamlets near
the crops of rice, cotton, and chillies which they raise on the hill-side.
Their houses are large and strongly built, and are raised on platforms
above the ground. Rice is their staple food, but they eat fowls and
pork and consume large quantities of fermented liquor.
Milak. —South-eastern tahsil in the State of Rampur, United
Provinces, lying between 2S0 34' and 2S0 51' N. and 79° 5' and
1 Ethnology of Bengal, p. 54.
342 MILAK
790 18' E., with an area of 156 square miles. Population (1901), 94,046.
There are 201 villages and one town, Milak (population, 2,615),
the tahsil head-quarters. The demand for land revenue in 1903-4
was Rs. 3,83,000, and for cesses Rs. 46,000. The density of popu-
lation, 603 persons per square mile, is slightly above the State average.
The tahsil lies in the fertile central tract. In 1903-4 the area under
cultivation was 115 square miles, of which 24 were irrigated, chiefly
from canals.
Milam. — Village in the District and tahsil of Almora, United
Provinces, situated in 300 26' N. and 8o° 9' E. Population (1900),
1,733. Tne village is inhabited only in the summer, when it is the
residence of the Bhotia traders with Tibet. It lies at an altitude of
11,400 feet, 13 miles south of the Anta Dhura pass, to which access
is obtained by a difficult and trying ascent. Below the village, near
the Gorl stream, is a considerable stretch of alluvial land, which in
summer produces buckwheat and barley. The surrounding country
is bleak and desolate, but presents a scene of peculiar grandeur. Lofty
snow mountains shut in the valley, and waterfalls are numerous and
often of considerable beauty. The London Mission has a station
here, and there is a school with about 50 pupils.
Milur. — Subdivision, taluk, and town in Madura District, Madras.
See Melur.
Minbu Division. — South-western Division of Upper Burma, lying
entirely in the Irrawaddy basin, between 180 52' and 220 50' N. and
930 59' and 950 52' E. It is bounded on the north by the Upper
and Lower Chindwin Districts ; on the east by the Lower Chind-
win, Sagaing, Myingyan, Yamethin, and Toungoo Districts ; on the
south by Prome District ; and on the west by the Arakan Division
and the Chin Hills. It comprises four Districts : Thayetmyo in the
south, lying astride the Irrawaddy, mainly in Lower Burma; Minbu
and Magwe, north of Thayetmyo, the former between the Irrawaddy
and the Arakan Yoma, the latter between the Irrawaddy and the Pegu
Yoma ; and Pakokku, extending from the Irrawaddy and Chindwin
to the Chin Hills. The Commissioner of the Division also exercises
control over the Pakokku Chin Hills, which lie to the west of
Pakokku. With the exception of a comparatively narrow strip of hill
country in the west, practically the whole of the Division lies in, and
is typical of, what is known as the dry zone of Burma. The population
of the Division (excluding the Pakokku Chin Hills) was 997,269 in
iSgr, and 1,076,280 in 1901. Its distribution in 1901 is shown in the
table on the next page.
The population is distributed over 7 towns and 4,714 villages. The
head-quarters are at Minuu (population, 5,780), in river communica-
tion with all the other District head quarters. The other towns are
MINBU DISTRICT
*» A ->
Pakokku (19,456), Thayetmyo (15,824), Allanmyo in Thayetmyo
District ( 10,207 )> Salin in Minbu District, and Magwe and Taung-
dwingyi in Magwe District. Pakokku and Allanmyo are trade centres,
and both Thayetmyo and Salin are towns of some antiquity, but there
are no important historic sites in the Division. By far the greater
number of the people are Burmans, who aggregated 1,009,102 in 1901.
Chins (to the number of 43,810) inhabit the Arakan Voma and Chin
Hills along the western border, and, to a small extent, parts of the
Pegu Yoma also. In Pakokku District are a community known as
the Taungthas, numbering 5,701. Shans and Chinamen are few in
number, as are natives of India. The Census of 1901 showed totals
of only 4,768 Hindus and 4,696 Musalmans.
District.
Area in square
miles.
Population,
1901.
Land revenue
and lhatha-
meda, 1903-4,
in thousands
of rupees.
Thayetmyo
Pakokku .
Minbu
Magwe
Total
4,75°
6,2IO
3,299
2.913
239,706
356,489
233,377
246,70s
4,57*
8,53
6,62
5>°7
17.172 1.076,280
24,79
* Includes capitation tax in Thayetmyo.
Minbu District. — A dry zone District in the Minbu Division of
Upper Burma, lying along the western bank of the Irrawaddy, between
1 90 50' and 21° 2' N. and 940 2' and 950 2' E., with an area of 3,299
square miles. It is bounded on the north by Pakokku District ; on
the south by Thayetmyo ; on the east by the Irrawaddy, which
separates it from Magwe District ; and on the west by the Arakan
Yoma, which divides it from Kyaukpyu. Roughly speaking, the land
over the greater part of the District rises from east
to west away from the Irrawaddy valley. In the ex- asoects
treme east are sandy plains on the banks of the river,
which gradually become broken undulations, and then give place first
to rocky jungle-covered hills and finally to the steep and even majestic
range that severs the District from the Arakan coast-lands and the
sea. This configuration is modified by various small rivers which flow
into the Irrawaddy and drain the uplands. Cultivation is chiefly
confined to the strips of land extending east and west which these
rivers irrigate, and to the alluvial tract running north and south along
the course of the Irrawaddy. Between these irrigated tracts, and
covering almost the whole of the south of the District, is dry gravelly
country clothed with scrub jungle, ending in the extreme south in a
spur of hills which breaks off at right angles from the western range.
344 MINBU DISTRICT
The Arakan Yoma, which forms the barrier between Minbu and
Kyaukpyu, runs south-east and north-west, and rises in places to a
height of over 5,000 feet. Parallel to the main range on the east,
and between it and the river, are the Nwamadaung hills, a chain
running the entire length of the District, but far lower than the Yoma,
averaging in height only about 600 feet. Of the rivers of Minbu, the
Irrawaddy is the most important. It skirts the District for about
80 miles, and its width opposite Minbu town is nearly 3 miles, though
the expanse of waters is broken even in the rains by one or other of
the numerous shifting sandbanks which here make navigation difficult
at all seasons. In the course of the year the river level rises 40 feet,
the most constant rise being from June till the beginning of September,
and in flood-time the current flows at a rate of 5 or 6 miles an hour.
The other rivers of the District — the Salin, the Mon, and the Man —
are all tributaries of the Irrawaddy, which find their source in the hills
in the west. The Salin rises in the Pakokku Chin Hills, not far south
of Mount Victoria, and enters the District from the north, flowing in
a southerly direction from Pakokku District to about 35 miles from
the boundary, when it bends abruptly and takes a north-easterly course
to meet the Irrawaddy near Sinbyugyun. For the greater part of its
course in the District it is a broad, slow, shallow stream, with low
indefinite banks and a gravelly bed. Above Salin in the dry season
it holds but little water, and below that town it is quite dry. The
alluvial plain skirting it is well watered by an extensive system of
canals. The Mon rises in the mountains west and north of Mount
Victoria, and enters the District at its north-west corner. It runs first
in a south-easterly direction along a narrow valley between the Arakan
Yoma and the Xwamadaung. Below Sidoktaya it pierces the latter
range and emerges on the plain, flowing eastwards across it for about
34 miles in a wide channel before entering the Irrawaddy. Its waters
are perennial, and the rich valley it is capable of irrigating will in the
near future be a very valuable rice tract. The Man rises in the Arakan
Yoma in the south-west corner of the District, and flows in a north-
easterly direction through a break in the Nwamadaung hills into the
Irrawaddy, which it enters at Minbu. Like the Salin its waters
are diverted into irrigation canals, but the stream is of little size in
the dry season.
Two lakes are worth) of mention ; one at Paunglin, and one known
as the YVetthigan lake. The former is situated near the Irrawaddy,
10 miles south-east of Salin town, and is really a lagoon fed by the
overflow of the Irrawaddy. In the hot season the bed is practically
dry, and is sown with rice. When the Irrawaddy rises the water
rushes in through two creeks which are dammed up as soon as the
river begins to subside, and until the dry season comes round again
PHYSIC A/. ASPECTS 345
the sheet of water thus formed is worked as a fishery by the neighbour-
ing villages. It provides good duck-shooting in the cold season. The
Wetthigan lake, which is not fished, as it was held sacred under
Burmese rule, is formed by rain-water and the outflow from the Salin
canals. It has an area of 366 acres, and lies half a mile to the west of
Salin town.
North of Minbu town the country is overlaid with the alluvium
of the Mon and Inawaddy rivers. South and west of the town the
ground is undulating, and is occupied mainly by soft sandstones of
Upper Tertiary (pliocene) age, containing fossil wood and fragments
of mammalian bones. A small area of miocene rocks is brought up
near Minbu by an anticlinal fold consisting of blue and olive clays
with soft sandstones, belonging to the upper or Yenangyaung stage
of the Pegu series. Traces of oil are found along the crest of this
anticlinal, and on it, near Minbu, a number of mud volcanoes are
situated \ The miocene beds are also exposed in the western part
of the District, extending along the foot of the Arakan Yoma, followed
in the hills by Nummulitic shales and limestones (upper eocene).
West of these again is a band of purple schists, and green and purple
shales (Chin shales), traversed by numerous dikes of dolerite and dark-
green serpentine. Steatite occurs in association with the serpentine,
and is quarried near Pa-aing and Sinlan, west of the Nwamadaung.
The vegetation follows the three natural divisions adverted to in an
earlier paragraph, and may be divided into the flora of the alluvial
and irrigated tracts, that of the dry uplands, and that of the submontane
and Yoma zones. In the alluvial belt we find a stretch of savannah,
the chief constituent grasses being Imperata arundinacea and I. exal-
tata ; trees are sparse here, the more common ones being Bombax
malabaricum, Bit tea fro/tdosa, and Parkinsonia aculeata. Moist hollows
are frequent ; as a rule they are surrounded by a copse of shrubs and
trees, generally Xanthophyllum glaucum, and filled up with Polygonum
stagnium or Combretum trifoliatum. Round villages toddy-palms
(palmyras) and coco-nut palms are common, and banyans, p/pals,
mangoes, or jack-fruit trees are usually to be found. The banks of
the Irrawaddy are covered with a great variety of herbaceous plants.
The irrigated areas present much the same features as the alluvial,
though the coarse grasses of the latter are to a considerable extent
here replaced by Desmodium triflorum, Tephrosia purpurea, and similar
plants, while Calotropis is quite common. The dry upland vegetation
is peculiarly characteristic of the District. It forms a rolling wilderness
of prickly scrub, the principal shrubs in which are the so-called wild
plum (Zizyphus Jujuba), Randia dumetorum, special species of Capparis,
and the cactus-like Euphorbia antiquorum. True cactus is also found
1 F, Noetlin<j, Memoirs. Geological Survey of India, vol, xxvii, pt. ii. p 35.
346 MINBU DISTRICT
near villages. Trees are scarce, the only common kinds being Albizzia
Lebbek and Acacia leucophlaea, the latter providing welcome oases of
bright verdure in the burnt-up scenery of the hot season. In the
mountain tracts, the Nwamadaung hills are clad with deciduous forest,
and present a very bare appearance in the hot season owing to the
almost total absence of herbaceous undergrowth. The lower slopes
of the Yoma proper are clothed with deciduous forests of much the
same kind, while its upper crests are covered with evergreen forest.
From the sportman's point of view the District is as well provided
with wild animals as any in Burma. Tigers are common in places,
elephants, bison, the trine or hsaing (Bos so/idaicus), and the Tibetan
bear are plentiful, and leopards are dangerously numerous. The
Malayan bear and the rhinoceros are also found. Of the deer tribe, the
sambar (Cervus unicolor), the thiamin (Cervus e/di), and the hog deer
abound in places, while the barking-deer is a pest to cultivators.
Wild hog are not uncommon, and three kinds of wild dogs are to be
found : namely, the ordinary grey wild dog, the jackal, and a wolf.
Porcupines and otters occur, but very rarely. Among game-birds the
silver pheasant, Hume's pheasant, the bamboo partridge, and the
Chinese francolin deserve special mention ; while peafowl, jungle-fowl,
rain quail, button quail, snipe, teal, and most varieties of duck all find
a habitat in the District.
The climate of Minbu varies. In the hilly portion west of the
Nwamadaung it is, except during the first four months of the year,
deadly for Europeans, and even for Burmans, save those who actually
live in the hills, whereas in the east the conditions are much the same
as in other Districts in the dry zone of Upper Burma. The cold
season lasts from November till February, the hot season from March
till May, and the rains from June till November. The cold season is
delightful, but April and May are oppressively sultry, and Minbu has
the reputation of being one of the hottest Districts in Burma during
those two months. The following maxima and minima were recorded
in 1901 : December, 890 and 6o°; May, 1070 and 870 ; July, 950 and
770. In April and May the thermometer rises not infrequently to 1090.
The nights, however, are nearly always cool, even in the most sultry
weather.
The annual rainfall for the live years ending 1 900-1 averaged
26-6 inches. It should be noted, however, that the rainfall in the
hills in the west is often nearly double that in the eastern portion
of the District. In the east, which is a typical dry zone area, steady
downpours lasting for days are unknown. When it comes, the rain
descends in showers which seldom last more than four or five hours.
There are floods of some extent every year, and the rise of the river
corresponds roughly with the rainfall. It is estimated that an ordinary
HISTORY 347
high flood occurs every three years, and an unusually high flood one
year in five.
The early history of Minbu is pure legend, being concerned largely
with the doings of Alaungsithu, king of Pagan, who is credited with
having improved the early irrigation systems of the
District in the twelfth century. Under Burmese rule
the charge of what is now Minbu District was entrusted to three tvuns
living at Salin, Sagu, and Ngape, while Minbu itself was administered
by an official called a penin (' coxswain of a royal boat '). Each ivun
had under him a sifke (technically military officer), a na/ikan, and
a sayegyi or head clerk, while all important villages were under
a myothugyi. Of the towns, Salin was then the largest, containing in
1826 some 10,000 inhabitants. Minbu was first occupied by the
British in March, 1886, and became the head-quarters of a military
command in July. In the succeeding year the troops were gradually
withdrawn, and Myingyan became the military head-quarters. The
chief feature in the annexation of the District was the stubborn
resistance offered by two dacoit leaders, Xga Sue and Oktama,
the former operating chiefly south of the Man river, the latter north
of the Man as far as Salin. Nga Swe, who, as a border thugyi, had
frequently harried British territory, collected a large following and
captured Ngape, a police outpost, in May, 1886. After an unsuccessful
attempt to capture him, in which Mr. Phayre, the Deputy-Commissioner,
lost his life, he was driven out ; but he then laid siege to the village
of Thabyebin, which was only relieved after the British garrison had
been reduced to sore straits. The occupation of various outposts in
his country and vigorous pursuit by mounted infantry drove this
notorious outlaw eventually to Thayetmyo District, where he was
killed. Oktama was a pongyi who collected a band of insurgents,
and attacked and burnt Sagu in April, 18S6. He was driven out,
but reappeared in June of the same year with 3,000 men and laid
siege to Salin. The gang dispersed after this, but later gave much
trouble round Pyilongyaw ; and it was not till June, 1889, that Oktama
was betrayed into British hands and hanged after due trial.
The only archaeological remains of interest are a few pagodas.
Salin is a town of some antiquity, having been founded, according to
tradition, about a.d. 1200, by Narapadisithu, king of Pagan; and the
remains of the old city wall present a fine specimen of ancient Burmese
fortification. Of pagodas, the most important is the Shwezettaw
('the golden foot') in the Sagu township, not far from Minbu town. It
is said to derive its name from the fact that when Buddha came to
Burma he went to the site of the Shwezettaw pagoda and there left his
footprints, one by the bank of the Mon stream, and one on the top
of the hill which rises sheer on the opposite bank. Thither every year
vol. xvii. z
348
MINBU DISTRICT
at the time of the pagoda festival, which lasts from the middle of
February to the middle of March, come streams of gaily-dressed
pilgrims from every part of Burma. The pagoda at Kyaungdawya in
the Legaing township is reverenced as marking the place where
Buddha rested during the same visit. Other important pagodas are
the Koktheinnayon near Salin, and the Myatsepo and Shwebannyin,
both in the Legaing township. Towards the upkeep of three pagodas
and two natsins (' spirit shrines ') the Archaeological department makes
an annual grant.
The population was 215,959 in 1891 and 233,377 in 1901. Its
distribution in the latter year is shown in the follow-
Population.
ing table
V
s
Number of
c
0
on per
mile.
0 = j= ~ .
v'~ _ a* —
ac gee 0
er of
able to
and
te.
Township.
Area in
inil(
V)
0
H
1
be
>
Popula
u v
Percent
variat:
populat
tween
and 1
NumL
persons
read
wri
Sagu .
542
'97
57,699
106
+ 32
1 8,444
Legaing
533
146
36,397
68
+ I
8,874
Ngape .
362
M4
1 6,033
44
+ 22
3,867
Salin
741
I
464
IOO,737
136
+ 2
' 27,850
Sidoktaya
District total
1,121
2
20S
22,511
20
4,686 1
3,299
M59
233,377
71
+ 8
63,721
The only towns are the municipalities of Minbu and Salin. There
has been a distinct increase of population in all the townships except
Legaing, which will probably develop rapidly when the new canals are
completed, and the sparsely populated and hilly township of Sidoktaya
the west. The growth in the Salin township as a whole is
in
accompanied by a diminution in Salin town, the precise cause of which
is doubtful. There has been considerable immigration of recent years
from Magwe and Myingyan Districts. Along the Irrawaddy valley
villages are numerous and the density of population is high, but the
forest-clad areas on the slopes of the Yoma are very thinly populated.
There are no Christian missions and only 10 1 native Christians. The
Chins are nearly all ^^/-worshippers ; otherwise Buddhism reigns
supreme. Burmese is the vernacular of 93 per cent, of the people.
The majority of the population is Burman everywhere, except in the
western townships, where it is composed largely of Chins of the
Chinbok tribe ; and tradition has it that Salin was originally a Chin
colony. The Chins in all numbered 15,600 in 1901, forming one-fifth
of the population of the Ngape township, and half that of Sidoktaya.
The people of Sagu and parts of the Salin township are said to be
of Shan descent, and the weaving village of Xwetame, a suburb of
AGRICULTURE 349
Sinbyugyun, is reckoned a Shan colony ; but the Census returned only
1,000 Shans. In connexion with the population, mention should be
made of the large landed proprietors of Salin known as thugaungs, rich
families who have gradually come to form a separate class, inter-
marrying among themselves, and living in almost patriarchal fashion.
Their houses are as a rule surrounded by spacious compounds, in
which are lodged their tenants and retainers, and at least one com-
pound contains a school for the children of the thugaung's followers.
The thugaungs, it may be noted, freely recognize their Chin origin.
Natives of India numbered 1,850 in 1901, the total being equally
divided into Hindus and Musalmans. About one-third of them live
in the two municipalities. About 66 per cent, of the entire population
are directly dependent on agriculture for a livelihood. Of this total,
more than a third are dependent on taungya cultivation alone.
The District is an essentially agricultural one ; but the light rainfall,
the vicissitudes of the seasons, and the easy-going disposition of the
people make their agricultural income sadly pre- .
carious. Especially is this the case with those who,
living at a distance from rivers or canals, cultivate upland crops, such
as sesamum and Jozuar, which are particularly dependent on a proper
distribution of moisture. Of the capabilities of the soil on the whole
the cultivator has no reason to complain, for, apart from irrigated and
alluvial land, he can grow mogaung rice in the hollows of the undulating
uplands (indaing), and the crop only requires proper rain to be profit-
able. But agricultural practice is slovenly : no care is taken in the
selection of seed at harvest ; a large amount of land is tilled badly
instead of a small amount well, and no trouble is taken to manure
the fields.
Rice is usually transplanted, but it is also occasionally sown broad-
cast on lands flooded late by the Irrawaddy. Ploughing is done with
the ///// or harrow ; sometimes in river-flooded land even this process is
dispensed with, and the soil is merely stirred up by driving cattle to
and fro over it. On alluvial land the te or plough is used, a rude but
effective instrument ; and clods are crushed on rice and alluvial land
by an implement called the kyanbanng.
The area under cultivation varies very considerably from year to
year, owing to the irregularity of the rainfall. The table on the next
page exhibits the main agricultural statistics for 1903-4, in square
miles.
The area under rice is comparatively large for a District in the dry
zone. It is the staple crop, occupying more than 120 square miles in
1903-4, and is both lowland (/e) and hill {taungya). Next in importance
is sesamum, covering 116 square miles. About 49 square miles are
under pulses of various kinds ; but maize and jowar are grown to a very
z 2
35°
MINBU DISTRICT
much smaller extent than in the other dry zone Districts, occupying
together only about 70 square miles. Gram, hardly grown at all in
the adjoining District of Magwe, here covers 18 square miles, and is
increasing in popularity. The tobacco crop in 1903-4 (3,000 acres)
was small compared with that of the previous year. About 700 acres
are under cotton. The area devoted to garden cultivation (2,000 acres)
is small, but is larger than in many other dry zone Districts. Betel-
vines and plantains are cultivated in the Legaing township, and man-
goes, coco-nuts, and the like in the Salin township. The betel vineyards
at Pwinbyu on the Mon river are deserving of special mention.
Township.
Total area.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Forests.
SagU
Legaing .
Ngape .
Salin
Sidoktaya
Total
54^
533
362
"41
1,121
105
70
9
186
15
24
5
46
5
Y 1,561
I
3,299 385
94
1,561
Cultivation is on the increase, especially in the uplands ; and when
the Mon canal system is completed, there should be a large increase
in irrigated land also. The introduction of new varieties of seed is
a difficult task. An improved kind of plantain has, however, been
brought from Mandalay, and a dry variety of pea from the United
Provinces, while attempts are being made to get tobacco-growers to
experiment with Havana seed. After bad years cultivators are much
helped by the system of agricultural loans. The average amount
allowed for the District is Rs. 13,800 per annum, every rupee of which,
in hard times, is applied for, and very little has ever to be written off
subsequently as irrecoverable.
Cattle-breeding is carried on, but scientific breeding requires a care
and attention which the people are but little disposed to give to it.
Cows are extensively kept, but almost solely for breeding purposes ;
a cow that produces a good heifer at once rises in value. Trotting
bullocks are also in considerable demand. Ponies, too, are bred ; but
colts and foals are ridden far too young, and though good colts are
doubtless kept for breeding purposes, no care at all is taken over the
selection of mares. Something is at present being done to encourage
sound breeding by the institution of an annual agricultural show at
Sagu. Buffaloes are found chiefly in the villages along the Irrawaddy.
They are not used in the upland tracts, and only occasionally on
irrigated land. The average price for a pair of buffaloes is between
Rs. 120 and Rs. 150.
Ample provision for grazing grounds was made at the time when the
District was settled, but the system has not been found very successful
FOUESTS 351
in practice. Allotments of land for grazing purposes have frequently
to be revoked, because the land is required for cultivation, and very
often what is allotted is too far from the village to be of much use.
In the irrigated tracts no grazing grounds have been reserved at all,
and cultivators here send their cattle to upland villages when turning
them out to grass.
The total area of irrigated land in 1903-4 was 94 square miles,
dependent almost entirely on the Man and Salin Government irrigation
systems. Of this total, more than 90 square miles were under rice.
The Man system begins at Sedaw, a village situated on the Man river
where it leaves the hills, about 20 miles from its mouth, and serves
more than 40 square miles on its northern bank. The Salin system
begins at Theywa, a village on the Salin river 29 miles from the
Irrawaddy, and irrigates more than 50 square miles on both sides of
the Salin. It comprises eighteen canals, the most important of which
is the Myaungmadaw, which, leaving the Salin river at Linzin 12 miles
above Salin town, passes through the town, and ultimately reaches the
Paunglin lake. A very important scheme for utilizing the Mon river
for irrigation purposes has recently been sanctioned. A weir is under
construction in the Mon at Mezali, 34 miles from its mouth. By
taking out a canal on each side, the work has been designed to irrigate
both the northern and southern slopes of the valley down to the
Irrawaddy, and thus to serve a total area of 120 square miles of very
rich rice-growing soil. The cost of this scheme is estimated at
$3^ lakhs. A certain amount of land is irrigated by small private
canals and tanks. In 1903-4 about 17 square miles were watered
by the former method. The Paunglin lake supplies about 1,600 acres
of mayin rice.
The revenue obtained from leased fisheries amounted in 1903-4 to
Rs. 24,800. Paunglin lake, the most important of these areas, is split
up into five different sections ; four are leased as fisheries, and in the
other individual licences for catching fish are issued. Another fishery
worthy of mention is the Kekkaya tank, just outside Legaing village.
The total area of 'reserved' forest is 378 square miles, comprising
12 different tracts of hilly country, the most important of which are the
Mon West Reserve (covering 93 square miles) and
the Nwamadaung (covering 36 square miles). The
former extends over elevated and precipitous uplands in the Arakan
Yoma ; the Nwamadaung lies farther to the east, also on high ground.
An extension of the ' reserved ' areas will soon be imperatively needed,
for the forest tribes (practically all Chins) who live by taung\a-z\\\Xvs\g
have carried that practice to such a stage as to threaten seriously the
existence of valuable and climatically essential timber-grounds. The
area of ' unclassed ' forest is about 1,183 square miles, much of which is
35 2 MINBU DISTRICT
merely scrub. A tract with a more valuable growth, containing teak
and cutch, is drained by the Sin stream, and it has recently been
proposed to reserve 30 square miles of this. Good timber occurs on
the Podein branch of the Man and its tributaries, while in the higher
parts of the ' unclassed ' forest in the south-west of the District Fiats
elastica yields india-rubber in paying quantities.
The chief trees of economic value in the ' reserved ' forests are : sha
{Acacia Catechu), yielding some of the best cutch obtainable in Burma ;
kyun or teak {Tectona grandis), found in all the Reserves, though not
in great quantities ; padauk {Pterocarpus indicus), the wood of which is
in great request as material for cart-wheels : and bamboo, usually the
myinwa {Dendrocalamus slrictus). The wood of a large number of
trees is used for house-building, most important among which are
ingyin {Pentacme sia/neusis), thitya {Shorea obtusa), in {Dipterocarpus
tuberculatus\ and kusan (Hymenodictyon thyrsifiorum). Charcoal is
burnt in certain localities from the dahat { Tectona Hamiltoniand) and
than {Terminalia O/iveri), and wood varnish is extracted from the
thitsl-tree {Melanorrhoea usitata) and used for lacquer. Thitchabo,
the bark of Cinnamomum zeylanicum, is used medicinally for bruises
and the like, and also chewed with betel. The fibre of the shaw-tree
(Stercuiia) and gangaw (Mesua ferrea) are obtained high up in the
evergreen forest. Plantations of Acacia Catechu have been made with
a view to increasing the yield of cutch, and more than 800 acres have
been successfully planted. It is interesting to note that the pine
{Pinus Khasya) is found on exposed ridges in the Mon West and
Palaung Reserves, but that it is not worked either for its timber or
its rich supplies of resin. Fire protection is at present attempted in
the Mon West, the Tichaungywa, and the Pasu Reserves, and the
protected area is being extended. The gross forest receipts in 1903-4
amounted to about Rs. 43,000.
The District contains no mines of importance. There are two steatite
quarries, one of inferior quality near Ngape, the other near Pa-aing ; the
amount extracted in 1903 was 15 tons, valued at about Rs. 6,000.
The steatite is dug out in blocks, brought to Pa-aing on pack-bullocks,
and taken from there in carts to Sinbyugyun, where the blocks are
sawn into slabs, which, in their turn, are converted into pencils used
for writing on the black paper memorandum books known as parabaiks.
The borings are from 90 to 100 feet deep. Laterite, clay, gravel, and
sandstone are all worked to some extent. A thirty years' lease for
the working of oil-wells in the Sagu and Minbu circles was granted to
the Burma Oil Company in 1896, but the undertaking had eventually
to be abandoned. There are a few salt-wells in Sidoktaya and Ngape,
but the out-turn is insignificant. Talc, mica, and coal are all found
in the District, but arc not at present worked.
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS
JO J
Minbu being preeminently an agricultural District, it is not surprising
to find that arts and manufactures are few. One small oil refinery
employing about half a dozen men at Taukshabin
.„ , , r ■ i • Trade and
village, and a few aerated water factories employing communicatjonSt
about three men each, are the only approach to
special industries the District can boast of. A little weaving is carried
on in the town and villages for domestic consumption ; there are a
certain number of mat-weavers and potters, and a little cutch is boiled
at Sidoktaya. At Thayetkyin, a small village near Salin, the people
manufacture the rough black paper of which parabaiks are made ; but
even this industry is being driven out by the introduction of European
paper. The arts are even worse represented. Sinbyugyun, where
lacquer betel-boxes, brass bowls, and a little wood-carving are turned
out, is the only place worthy of mention in this regard.
The few large traders in the District are mostly either Chinamen or
natives of India. Minbu town in the south and Sinbyugyun in the
north are the two main commercial centres. The chief exports are
cutch, hides, sesamum seed and oil, gram, beans, and other kinds of
agricultural produce; and the main imports are piece-goods, yarn,
salted fish, ngapi, and, in years of scarcity, rice. The two principal
routes for external trade are the Irrawaddy on the east and the An
pass, which is reached by a track through Ngape, on the west. The
latter is freely used by the pack-bullocks that ply between Kyaukpyu
and the western portion of Minbu.
Internal traffic is mostly by road, and no railways have been
constructed. A stretch of good metalled roadway, 9 miles long,
connects Salin with the Irrawaddy, and a few short lengths of 2 or
3 miles each run out from Minbu town ; but not a single highway
has been metalled for any considerable length. The chief land
communications are the chain of roads running from south to north
from Thayetmyo to the Pakokku border, passing through Minbu,
Sagu, Legaing, and Salin, by way of Sinbyugyun and Zibyubin ; the
road from Minbu to Ngape, by way of Singaung : and the road from
Salin to Sun. A track from Salin to Sidoktaya is in course of con-
struction. These are maintained by the Public Works department,
but about n 8 miles of road are kept up from the District fund, less
than 4 miles being metalled. Merchandise is conveyed chiefly in
bullock-carts, but where the roads fail in the west of the District pack-
bullocks are used.
The chief waterways for internal traffic are the rivers Mon and Man.
The Mon is navigable in the rains by 2-ton dug-outs up to the point
where it enters the District. The Man is not navigable during the
dry season at all, but in the rains boats can go as high as Aingma.
The main waterway is, however, the Irrawaddy. Steamers ot the
354 MINBU DISTRICT
Irrawaddy Flotilla Company ply four tunes a week, carrying mails and
passengers, twice up from Rangoon and twice down from Mandalay.
The same company also runs a small steamer between Minbu and
Thayetmyo, and a large number of cargo-boats. A steam ferry plies
across the Irrawaddy between Minbu and Magwe, and there are other
local ferries.
Famine, in the worst sense of the word, is unknown in Minbu,
though years of scarcity are not uncommon. Accidents to irrigation
„ . works, deficiency of rain, and cattle-disease cause
Famine. ,. , ■ , , ,
distress ; but agricultural loans relieve the strain,
and emigration to Lower Burma acts as a safety-valve. In 1891-2
famine was declared, and relief works were started ; but with rain in
the latter part of the year and a flow of imported rice from Lower
Burma the distress quickly subsided, and later, when a new relief work
was opened, not a person volunteered for labour on it. A District
in which so many kinds of ' dry crops ' are grown is always to some
extent armed against drought; and it is estimated that, even in the
event of a serious famine, the maximum number of persons who would
require daily relief would not exceed 15,000.
For purposes of administration the District is divided into two
subdivisions : Minbu, comprising the townships of Sagu, Legaing,
, , . . ±. and Ngape : and Salin, comprising those of Salin
Administration. , „ .... , . , . ° . ,
and Sidoktaya. Minbu is the head-quarters of the
Commissioner of the Division1. The Public Works department is
represented by two Executive Engineers, one in charge of the Mon
canals and another in charge of the Salin irrigation subdivision. For
ordinary public works the District forms a subdivision of the
Thayetmyo Public Works division. There is a Deputy-Conservator of
forests at Minbu, who is also in charge of the Magwe forests. The
total number of village headmen is 458.
The District, subdivisional, and township courts are ordinarily
presided over by the respective executive officers. The head-quarters
magistrate at Minbu, however, acts as additional judge of the District
court, and there is an additional judge in the Salin township court.
The indigenous population are on the whole law-abiding, and not as
a rule litigious.
Before annexation, revenue in Upper Burma was raised by a fixed
lump assessment on every town (myo), and was collected in kind by
the town-headman (myo-ivun), who sold the produce thus collected,
and forwarded to the court officials the whole or so much of the
proceeds as he thought would content them. The thathameda tax,
the chief source of revenue, was introduced by king Mindon, and at
1 The transfer of the head-quarters to Magwe has been sanetioned, and will
probably take place shortly.
ADMINISTRATION 355
first stood at Rs. 3 per household. Subsequently it was raised until
it reached an average of about Rs. 10. Along the Mon valley the
tax seems to have been treated as a tax partly on households and
partly on land, the average rate being Rs. 10. Every household was
assessed, in the first instance, at only Rs. 5, the balance varying
according to the quantity and quality of the land worked by the
taxpayer. A direct land tax was also levied on certain kinds of state
land : namely, irrigated and mayin (hot-season) rice lands, some kyun
(island) and kaing (alluvial) lands, and certain lands devoted to the
upkeep of pagodas and other religious property. Irrigated state land
paid much the same proportion of out-turn in revenue as non-state
land paid in rent to the local landlords. In Salin the amount was
usually one-half or one-third, in Sagu and Legaing one-half to one-
fourth. Mayin rice lands paid sometimes one-fifth of their out-turn,
and sometimes Rs. 10 per ic saiks (about 2 acres). Kyun lands were
variously assessed : and alluvial lands, if of good quality, would pay
about one-fifth ; if poor, one-tenth of their produce.
After annexation the Burmese methods of assessment were at first
generally maintained; but in 1890 an ad interim system was intro-
duced under which Government dealt direct with the cultivators,
instead of through officials like the myo-ivuns, and the rate at which
rice was to be commuted was fixed annually by the Deputy-Com-
missioner according to market rates. Lump-sum assessments and acre
rates were abolished, the kan (roughly 75 square cubits) was taken as
the unit, and rates were raised all round. At the same time crop out-
turns were measured, and statistics collected as to the cost of culti-
vation, with the result that in the following year (189 1-2) the rates
were generally reduced. By 1893 the cadastral survey of most of the
District was completed, and in that year regular settlement operations
were started. They were finished by the end of 1897. but did not
include the townships of Ngape and Sidoktaya, which were summarily
settled in 1901. As a result the main rates, as finally sanctioned for
five years in 1899, were as follows: irrigated rice, Rs. 2 to Rs. 7 per
acre ; alluvial rice {laze), R. 1 to Rs. 4-8 ; hot-season rice, Rs. 4 ;
unirrigated rice, Rs. 1-8 or Rs. 2-8. Alluvial crops other than
rice pay from Rs. 2 to Rs. 7, and upland {ya) crops are assessed at
rates varying from 4 annas to Rs. 1-8 per acre. These figures all
refer to state land ; other land pays three-fourths of these rates. The
average size of a holding (including fallows) is — for irrigated rice,
7£ acres ; for taze rice, 5! acres ; for mayin rice, 2\ acres ; for mogaung
rice, 6 \ acres; for ya crops, 8| acres ; and for alluvial (kaing) crops,
5^ acres.
As the result of the summary settlement of the Ngape and Sidoktaya
townships in 1901, the rate for irrigated rice has been fixed at Rs. 4
35
6 MINBU DISTRICT
or Rs. 3, according to the quality of the soil, while unirrigated rice
pays Rs. 2, ya land from 8 annas to R. 1, and alluvial crops from
R. 1 to Rs. 5 per acre. The average size of a holding in the
summarily settled tract is — for rice land, 4 acres ; for gardens, t^ acres ;
and for ya land, 7 acres.
The following table shows the fluctuations in the revenue since
1 890-1, in thousands of rupees : —
1 890-1.
1 900- 1. 1903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
yo
4J3 4,04
7,70
The large increase in land revenue between 1 890-1 and 1 900-1 is
due to the settlement. Thathameda fell, on the introduction of acre
rates, from 4 lakhs in 1890-1 to Rs. 2,41,000 in 1900-1, but rose to
Rs. 2,58,000 in 1903-4.
The income of the District fund in 1903-4 was Rs. 27,000, half of
which was spent on public works. There are two municipalities in
the District, those of Minbu and Salin.
• For police purposes the District is in charge of a District Super-
intendent, and is divided into two subdivisions which are under an
Assistant Superintendent or an inspector. The strength of the force
is 3 inspectors, 13 head constables, 34 sergeants, and 429 constables;
and there are n police stations and 13 outposts. The contingent of
military police belongs to the Magwe battalion, and consists chiefly
of Sikhs and Punjabis with an admixture of Karens. The sanctioned
strength is 5 native officers and 180 rifles, of whom 3 native officers
and no rifles are stationed at Minbu, and the remainder at Salin and
Pwinbyu. Minbu no longer contains a jail, and convicts are sent
to Magwe.
The District, in spite of its large total of Chins, who are practically
all uneducated, had in 1901 the largest proportion of males able to
read and write in the Province, namely 53-3 per cent., a result which
is largely the outcome of the energy of the local monastic teachers.
For the population as a whole, male and female, the proportion was
27-3 per cent. The number of pupils in public and private schools
was 3,417 in 1891 and 7,793 in 1901, and the proportion to the total
population of school-going age in the last-named year was estimated
at 25 per cent. In 1904 there were 9 secondary, 167 primary, and
419 elementary (private) schools, with an attendance of 7,896 (including
349 girls). Of lay institutions, the most important is the Government
high school at Minbu. The total educational expenditure in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 21,000, of which Rs. 3,000 was derived from fees,
and the rest from Provincial funds.
MINEU TOWN 357
Minbu and Salin possess hospitals, and there is a small dispensary
at Sinbyugyun, at the mouth of the Salin river. The two hospitals
have accommodation for 50 in-patients, of whom 508 were treated in
1903, the total number of out-patients during the same year being
15,303, and that of operations 242. Towards their combined income
of Rs. 8,300 the two municipalities contributed Rs. 3,900, Provincial
funds Rs. 3,700, and private subscribers Rs. 600. The dispensary at
Sinbyugyun is maintained wholly from Provincial funds.
Vaccination is compulsory only within the two municipalities. In
1903-4 the number of persons successfully vaccinated was 5,496,
representing 24 per r,ooo of population.
[O. S. Parsons, Settlement Report (1900).]
Minbu Subdivision. — Southern subdivision of Minbu District,
Upper Burma, comprising the Sagu, Legaing, and Ngape townships.
Minbu Town. ■- Head-quarters of the Division and District of the
same name in Upper Burma, situated in 20° 10' N. and 94° 53' E.,
among typical dry zone surroundings on the right bank of the
Irrawaddy, almost immediately opposite the town of Magwe1. The
town has several prominent features. On the north is a large pagoda
known as the Red Pagoda; on the west a sharply defined conical
eminence, capped by a pagoda, stretches at right angles to a low range
of hills running north and south ; on the south another hill rises
abruptly from the river bank, similarly crowned with pagodas, and
topped by a lofty wooden spire erected over an impression of a foot.
It is known as Buddha's Foot Hill. The natural southern boundary
of Minbu is the Sabwet stream, a sandy nullah communicating with
the Irrawaddy about 200 yards south of the last-named shrine. The
town is divided into two parts by a small creek called the Dok.
The northern or native portion lies near the Irrawaddy, and is usually
flooded on the rise of the river. The J )eputy-Commissioner's court
lies to the south, between the Dok and the southern portion of the
town, which stands considerably higher and is not liable to flooding.
In this southern area is situated the civil station, with the club, several
of the Government offices and the residences of the local officers for
the most part standing up on high ground well above the river bank.
Minbu was a small fishing village previous to the annexation of Upper
Burma in 1885, but became an important base of operations in 1SS6,
and since then has always been the head-quarters of the District.
Its population was 7,270 in 1891, and 5,780 in 1901, having, like
Salin, Magwe, Yenangyaung, and other towns in the dry zone, de-
creased during the decade. The people are occupied mainly in river
business, trading, and fishing. A fair amount of trade passes through
1 The transfer of the Divisional head-quarters to Magwe has been sanctioned, and
will probably take place shortly.
03
3 MINBU TOWN
the town, and the steamers of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company give
regular communication with all ports on the Irrawaddy ; but, like
Myingyan, Minbu has suffered from the vagaries of the river, which
has shown a tendency of late years to form sandbanks in the channel
opposite the regular steamer ghat. In the rains the Irrawaddy Flotilla
steamers are able to come alongside the town, but during the dry
season they have to anchor at a village 2 miles to the south.
A municipal council was formed in 1887 and reconstituted in 1901.
The income and expenditure during the ten years ending 1901 averaged
nearly Rs. 17,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 21,000, bazar rents
contributing Rs. 9,000 ; and the expenditure was Rs. 19,000, the chief
items being conservancy and roads (Rs. 5,000 each). The town
hospital contains 28 beds, and 310 in-patients and 8,300 out-patients
were treated at it in 1903. The Government high school has a steadily
increasing attendance, and boys come to it from all parts of Minbu and
Magwe Districts.
Minbya Subdivision. — Subdivision of Akyab District, Lower
Burma, consisting of the Pauktaw and Minbya townships.
Minbya Township. — Eastern township of Akyab District, Lower
Burma, lying between 200 2' and 200 35' N. and 930 7' and 930 43' E.,
on the western edge of the Arakan Voma, with an area of 480 square
miles. The population was 35,505 in 1891, and 41,663 in 1901,
consisting largely of Chins. There are 295 villages. The head-
quarters are at Minbya (population, 1,322), on a branch of the Lemro
river. The area cultivated in 1903-4 was 104 square miles, paying
Rs. 1,33,000 land revenue.
Minchinabad Tahsil. — Head-quarters tahsll of the nizamat of the
same name, Bahawalpur State, Punjab, lying on the left bank of the
Sutlej, between 290 53' and 30° 25' N. and 730 2' and 730 58' E., with
an area of 603 square miles. The population in 1901 was 72,272,
compared with 68,070 in 1891. It contains the town of Minchinabad
(population, 2,558), the head-quarters ; and 235 villages. The tahsll
lies for the most part in the lowlands of the Sutlej valley. The land
revenue and cesses in 1905-6 amounted to 2-1 lakhs.
Minchinabad Town. — Head-quarters of the nizamat and tahsll of
the same name in Bahawalpur State, Punjab, situated in 300 io' N.
and 730 34' E., on the Southern Punjab Railway, in the north-eastern
corner of the State. Population (1901), 2,558. It was named after the
late Colonel Charles Minchin, Political Agent in Bahawalpur, 1866-76.
The town contains a dispensary, has a large manufacture of saltpetre,
and is a great centre of the export trade in grain. The municipality
had an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 6,100, chiefly from octroi.
Mindon. —Western township of Thayetmyo District, Burma, lying
between 19° 3' and iy° 30' X. and 94^ 30' and 94' 56' P., with an
.VIXHI.A TOWNSHIP
35<>
area of 70S square miles. The township, which is undulating in the
east and hilly in the Arakan Yoma country in the west, contains
251 villages. It had a population of 35.040 in 1891, and 30,350 in
1 90 1. Emigration to the more fertile lands of the delta accounts for
the falling off during the decade. The head-quarters are at Mindon,
a village of 803 inhabitants, picturesquely situated on the Maton river
within a few miles of the Arakan Hills. The total number of Chins
is about 4,000. They inhabit the Arakan Yoma, which covers the
western half of the township. About 35 square miles were cultivated
in 1903-4, paying Rs. 29,000 land revenue.
Mingin Subdivision. — South-eastern subdivision of the Upper
Chindwin District, Upper Burma, containing the Mingin and Kyabin
townships.
Mingin Township.- South-eastern township of the Upper Chind-
win District, Upper Burma, lying on either side of the Chindwin river,
between 220 36' and 230 12' N. and 940 22' and 940 55' E., with an
area of 1,311 square miles. It consists throughout of low hills. The
population, which is almost wholly Burman, was 21,015 in 1891, and
19,941 in 190 1, distributed in 141 villages. The head-quarters are at
Mingin (population, 1,815), on trie Chindwin river, about 80 miles below
Kindat. The villages lie on the Chindwin and its tributaries, the
Maukkadaw stream on the north and the Patolin on the south. The
area cultivated in 1903-4 was 37 square miles, and the land revenue
and thathameda amounted to Rs. 42,000.
Minhla Subdivision. — Subdivision of Thayetmyo District, Burma,
consisting of the Minhla and Sinbaungwe townships.
Minhla Township (1). — Northernmost township of Thayetmyo Dis-
trict, Burma, lying between 190 30' and 190 59' N. and 940 24" and
950 i2r E., and extending from the Irrawaddy to the Arakan Yoma
in the west, with an area of 490 square miles. It contains 290 villages,
the most important of which is Minhla (population, 2,553), the head-
quarters, on the right or west bank of the Irrawaddy close to the
border of Minbu District. The population was 33,416 in 1891, and
42,120 in 1901. It is the only township of the District which has
increased considerably in population during the past decade. There
are nearly 6,000 Chins, who inhabit the hilly country to the west.
East of the Yoma, towards the Irrawaddy valley, the country is cut
up by many low hills. The area under cultivation in 1903-4 was
41 square miles, paying Rs. 36,000 land revenue. In 1902-3
capitation tax took the place of thathameda as the main source of
revenue.
Minhla Township (2). — Central township of Tharrawaddy District,
Lower Burma, lying between 170 53" and iS° 20" N. and 950 37'
and 960 4' E., and stretching from the Pegu Yoma westward to the
360 MI XII LA TOWNSHIP
border of the Monyo township, with an area of 627 square miles,
for the most part flat and fertile. In 1891 the population was
75,068, and in 1901 86,939. Minhla (population, 3,537) is the
head-quarters, and the only town. The number of villages is 468.
The area cultivated in 1903-4 was 177 square miles, paying
Rs. 2,42,000 land revenue.
Minhla Town. — Head-quarters of the township of the same name
in Tharrawaddy District, Lower Burma, situated in 180 N. and
950 44' E., near the centre of the District on the Rangoon-Prome
railway, 91 miles from Rangoon. Population (1901), 3,537. The
town is administered by a town committee, which consists of five
members. In 1903-4 the income of the town fund was Rs. 15,400,
and the expenditure Rs. 14,700.
Minicoy. — An island attached to the District of Malabar in the
Madras Presidency, lying in the Arabian Sea, in 8° 18' N. and 730 E.
The lighthouse on the southern end was finished in 1885. Politically
Minicoy appertains to the Laccadive group, but ethnologically and
geographically it belongs to the Maldive Islands. It is 6 miles long
by half a mile in breadth, and contains an area of about if square
miles. Population (1901), 3,097. The physical characteristics of
Minicoy are similar to those of the other Laccadive Islands ; but
it contains no tottam, or garden cultivation, and the coco-nut trees
are smaller, and there is more jungle interspersed among the
plantations.
The people are probably of Singhalese extraction ; they are darker
and smaller than the other islanders ; their language is Mahl, and
they have a duodecimal numerical system. Though Muhammadans,
they are strictly monogamous, and the women take the lead in every-
thing except navigation. A girl's consent has to be obtained before
marriage, and she brings no dowry, but receives presents from the
bridegroom. There are three subdivisions among the people — the
Malikhans, the Malumis or Takkarus, and the Kohlus — which corre-
spond to the three found on the other islands ; but, unlike the other
islanders, the Minicoy people are all congregated in one village, which
is divided into ten quarters or wards, in each of which the male and
female populations are organized into separate clubs, each managed
by its own headman or headwoman and forming a unit for social
and political purposes. The fishing-boats are very well made, and
the men are expert navigators. The islanders' chief trouble is the
food-supply. All the rice has to be imported, and the trade is prac-
tically monopolized by the chief Malikhans. The revenue is raised
by a poll-tax and taxes on fishing-boats, &c, and not by a monopoly
as in the other islands. Minicoy came into the possession of the
Ali Raja of Cannanore later than the other islands, probably not
MIR A J TOWN 361
till the middle of the fifteenth century, as a gift from the Sultan
of the Maldives, and this accounts for the difference in its adminis-
tration '.
Miraj State (Senior Branch). — State under the Political Agent
of Kolhapur and the Southern Maratha Country, Bombay, with an
area of 339 square miles. It consists of three divisions : a group
of villages in the valley of the Kistna, a second group in the south
of Dharwar District, and a third in the midst of Sholapur District.
The State contains 5 towns, the chief being Miraj (population,
18,425), the head-quarters, and Lakshmeshwar (12,860); and 59
villages. The population in 1901 was 81,467, Hindus numbering
68,660, Muhammadans 8,778, and Jains 3,866. The portion of the
State which is watered by the Kistna is flat and rich ; the remaining
parts lie low and are surrounded by undulating lands and occasionally
intersected by ridges of hills. The prevailing soil is black. Irrigation
is carried on from rivulets, tanks, and wells. As in the rest of the
Deccan, the climate is always dry, and is oppressively hot from March
to May. The principal crops are millet, wheat, gram, sugar-cane, and
cotton. Coarse cotton cloth and musical instruments are the chief
manufactures.
Miraj was originally a portion of Sangli, from which it was detached
in 1808. In 1820 it was, with the sanction of the British Government,
divided into four shares, and the service of horsemen was proportioned
to each. Two of these shares lapsed in 1842 and 1845 from failure
of male issue ; the two others remain. The whole area of the State
has been surveyed and settled. The chief ranks as a first-class Sardar
in the Southern Maratha Country. He has power to try his own
subjects for capital offences. The revenue in 1903-4 was 3^ lakhs,
of which 2-7 lakhs was from land. Tribute of Rs. 12,558 is payable
to the British Government. The family holds a sanad authorizing
adoption, and follows the rule of primogeniture in matters of suc-
cession. Of the five municipalities in the State, Miraj and Laksh-
meshwar have incomes of Rs. 15,500 and Rs. 7,000 respectively.
There are 25 schools with 1,237 pupils. The police force numbers
235 men, maintained in 1903-4 at a cost of Rs. 23,400. There are
three jails, with a daily average of 55 prisoners. The State contains
three dispensaries, which afforded relief to 35,371 persons in 1903-4.
In the same year 1,789 persons were vaccinated.
Miraj Town. — Capital of the State of Miraj (Senior Branch) in
the Southern Maratha Country, Bombay, situated in 160 49' N. and
740 41' E., near the Kistna river, a few miles south-east of Sangli.
Population (1901), 18,425. In 1761 the fort of Miraj with some
1 An interesting account of Minicoy .Marco Polo's ' Female Island'^ is to be found
in BlackwooJ's Magazine for February and March, 1889.
362 MIRAJ TOWN
thanas was assigned by the Peshwa Madhu Rao to Govind Rao
Patvardhan for the maintenance of troops. Miraj is a large trading
town, with two old dargdhs, built in 1491. It is administered as a
municipality, with an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 15,500. It contains
a high school and a dispensary.
Miraj State (Junior Branch). — State under the Political Agent
of Kolhapur and the Southern Maratha Country, Bombay, with an
area of 211 square miles. It consists of three divisions: a group
of villages adjoining the Bankapur tdhtka of Dharwar District ;
a second near the Tasgaon tdluka of Satara District ; a third near
the Pandharpur taluka of Sholapur District, which also includes four
///dm villages in Poona District. There are 3 towns, the largest
being Bhudgaon (population, 3,591), where the chief resides; and
31 villages. The population in 1901 was 35,806, Hindus numbering
32,484, Muhammadans 2,034, and Jains 1,288. The soil is generally
black. Indian millet, wheat, gram, and cotton are the chief crops ;
arid coarse cotton cloth is the principal manufacture. The history
of this branch of the family is the same as that of the Senior Branch,
given above. The chief ranks as a first-class Sardar in the Southern
Maratha Country, and has power to try his own subjects for capital
offences. The family holds a sa/iad authorizing adoption, and follows
the rule of primogeniture in matters of succession. The estimated
revenue is about 4 lakhs, and the expenditure nearly 3 lakhs. Tribute
of Rs. 6,412 is payable to the British Government. The police force
numbers 143. In 1903-4 there were three jails, with a daily average
of 23 prisoners. There are 30 schools in the State, attended by
991 pupils. Two dispensaries treat about 14,500 persons. In 1903 4
about 800 persons were vaccinated.
Miram Shah (Miran S//d//). — Head-quarters of the Northern
YVaziristan Agency, North-West Frontier Province, situated in 33°
57' N. and 700 7' E., in Daur (the Tochi valley), about 57 miles
west of Bannu. Its elevation is 3,050 feet above the sea, and it com-
prises three or four hamlets. It is now garrisoned by the Northern
Waziristan militia.
Miranpur. — Town in the Jansath tahsll of Muzaffarnagar District,
United Provinces, situated in 290 17' N. and 770 57' E., 20 miles from
Muzaffarnagar town. Population (1901), 7,209. It is the home of
a family of Saiyids, descended from a member of the Chhatraun
branch of the famous Barha Saiyids. Early in 1858 it was attacked
by the Bijnor rebels, but successfully held by British troops. Miran-
pur is administered under Act XX of 1856, with an income of about
Rs. 2,000. At one time there was a large local trade in rice, sugar,
salt, and grain ; but the opening of the railway has diverted trade to
Khatauli and Muzaffarnagar. Blankets are still made to a large extent,
MIRIALGUDA 363
and also coarse blue pottery and papier mache goods. There are two
small schools.
MIranpur Katra.— Town in Shahjahanpur District, United Pro-
vinces. See Katra.
Miran Shah. — Head-quarters of the Northern Wazlristan Agency,
North-West Frontier Province. See Miram Shah.
Miranzai. — Tahsil and town in Kohat District, North- West Frontier
Province. See Hangu.
Mirganj Tahsil. — West-central tahsil of Bareilly District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Shahi, Sirauli (North), and
Ajaon, and lying between 280 24' and 280 41' N. and 790 6' and
790 24' E., with an area of 149 square miles. Population increased
from 95,300 in 1891 to 103,198 in 1901. There are 158 villages and
one town, Shahi (population, 3,556). The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 1,50,000, and for cesses Rs. 26,000. The density of
population, 640 persons per square mile, is below the District average.
The shifting channel of the Ramganga winds through the south of the
tahsil '; and the Dhakra, Dhora, and West Bangui, after flowing from
the northern border, unite to form the Dojora. Mirganj is a level
well-cultivated plain, the greater portion of which is sufficiently moist
not to require artificial irrigation. It produces sugar-cane largely, and
sugar is refined in many places. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation
was in square miles, of which 17 were irrigated. Tanks or jhlls
supply more than half the irrigated area. The new dam across the
Kuli Nadl will supply irrigation to the north of this tahsil.
Mirganj Town. — Town in the Gopalganj subdivision of Sararj
District, Bengal, situated in 260 25' N. and 840 20' E. Population
(1901), 9,698. It is a large trading centre.
Miri Hills. — A section of the Himalayan range lying north of
Lakhimpur District, Eastern Bengal and Assam, between the hills
occupied by the Gallongs and the Ranganadi, and inhabited by the
Miri tribe. The Mlris are of Tibeto-Burman origin, and have tall,
well-developed frames, with pleasant countenances of the Mongolian
type. Unlike their neighbours they have never given trouble to the
British Government, and large numbers of the tribe have now settled
on the Assam plains. A full account of the Mlris will be found in
Colonel 1 )alton's Ethnology of Bengal.
Mirialguda. — Southern taluk of Nalgonda District, Hyderabad
State, separated from the Guntur District of Madras by the Kistna
river. Till 1905 it was also called Devalpalli. Including jaglrs, the
population in 1901 was 78,545, and the area 768 square miles. The
population in i89r was 87,130, the decrease being due to the transfer
of villages. The taluk contains 154 villages, of which 4 are jag//;
and Mirialguda (population, 3,660) is the head-quarters. The land
VOL. xvii. a a
364 MIRIALGUDA
revenue in iyoi was 2-4 lakhs. Rice is extensively irrigated from
tanks, channels, and wells. The new taluk of Pochamcherla, con-
stituted in 1905, received 35 villages from Mirialguda.
Mirjan. Village in the Kumta tilluka of North Kanara District,
Bombay, situated in 140 30' N. and 74° 28' E., about 5 miles north
of Kumta town. Population (1901), 1,500. It has a ruined fort said
to have been built by Sarpan Malik, probably a reminiscence of the
Bijapur title Sharlf-ul-mulk. Mirjan has been supposed to be the
ancient Muziris mentioned by Pliny as the first trading town in India ;
but an alternative is to be found in Muyiri, the old name of Cranganur,
20 miles north of Cochin. Under the Vijayanagar kings Mirjan was
held by local tributary chiefs. Albuquerque visited it in 15 10. It
subsequently passed to Bijapur, and later to the Bednur chief Sivappa
Naik. The Marathas seized it in 1757. It suffered from the depreda-
tions of Haidar, and was destroyed by Tipu. Fryer visited Mirjan in
the seventeenth century, and has recorded a description of it.
MIrpur Subdivision.— Subdivision of Sukkur District, Sind.
Bombay, consisting of the Mirpuk Mathelo and Ubauro talukas.
Mirpur Town. -Town in the Bhimber district of the Jammu pro-
vince, Kashmir, situated in 330 11' N. and 73°49' E.,at an elevation of
1,236 feet above sea-level. It lies 22 miles north of the British canton
ment of Jhelum, and is said to have been founded about 200 years ago
by the Gakhars, Mlran Khan and Sultan Fateh Khan. It stands on
high ground on the edge of the Kareli Kas, from which drinking-
water is easily procured. There are several rather picturesque temples,
the chief being the Sarkari Mandir, built by Maharaja Gulab Singh; the
Raghunathji ; and the temple of Diwan Amar Nath. The town con-
tains 550 shops, forming a long bazar running east and west. Apart
from the shop-keeping class, Brahmans and Sikhs, of whom many are
settled in Mirpur, the inhabitants are mostly of the artisan or menial
classes. There is a nourishing State school badly housed, and a dis-
pensary in a building wholly unsuited to the purpose. The town has
a neglected appearance. The streets are badly laid, dirty, and un-
drained, and no attempts have been made at conservancy. Trade is
brisk. It is mostly in the hands of Mahajans and Khattrls. The chief
articles of export to British India are grain, ghl from the hills and
Punch, and minor forest products from Kotli, Punch, and Rajauri ; the
chief imports are salt, cloth, tea, and sugar.
Mirpur Batoro. -Tdluka of Karachi District, Sind, Bombay, lying
between 240 36' and 25° 1' N. and 68° 9' and 68° 26' E., with an area
of 269 square miles. The population in 1901 was 37,116, compared
with 35,196 in 1 891, dwelling in 62 villages, of which Mirpur Batoro is
the head-quarters. The density is 138 persons per square mile, and
this is the most thickly populated tdluka in the District. The land
MlRPUR MATHELO 365
revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to over 1-4 lakhs. The taluka
lies on the east of the Indus, which forms its northern boundary. It
is shaped somewhat like a parallelogram, and is an alluvial plain, the
northern portion being watered by canals fed directly by the Indus, and
the central and southern parts by distributaries of the Pinjari Mulchand
canals. The finest rice, known as sugdasi, is grown here, owing to the
soil being very fertile. Jowar and bajra are also grown.
Mirpur Khas Taluka. — Taluka of Thar and Parkar District, Sind,
Bombay, lying between 250 12' and 250 48' N. and 68° 54' and
690 16' E., with an area of 457 square miles. The population rose
from 27,866 in 1891 to 37,273 in 1901. The taluka contains one
town, Mirpur Khas (population, 2,787), the head-quarters ; and 135
villages. The density, 82 persons per square mile, is the highest in
the District. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to
y^ lakhs. The taluka is irrigated by canals, of which the chief is
the Jamrao. The Jodhpur-Bikaner Railway traverses it.
Mirpur Khas Town. — Head-quarters of the taluka of the same
name in Thar and Parkar District, Sind, Bombay, situated in 25c3o'X.
and 690 3' E., on the Luni-Hyderabad branch of the Jodhpur-Bikaner
Railway, on the Let Wah canal, and also on the high road from
Hyderabad to Umarkot, 38 miles south-east of Hala, and 41 miles
east-north-east of Hyderabad via Tando Alahyar (17 miles distant).
Population (1901), 2,787. The local trade is in grain, cotton (said
to be the finest in Sind), and piece-goods, valued at 3-88 lakhs. The
annual value of the transit trade is estimated at 25-67 lakhs.
Mirpur is a comparatively modern town, having been built in 1806
by Mir Ali Murad Talpur, and has increased in importance since
the opening of the Jamrao Canal in 1900. A new suburb is now
being built on approved lines by the colonization officer of the
Jamrao Canal. It was the capital of Mir Sher Muhammad Khan
Talpur, whose army was defeated in 1843 by Sir Charles Napier at
Dabba (Dabo) near Hyderabad. The town was constituted a muni-
cipality in 1901, and had an income in 1903-4 of Rs. 13,000. It.
contains a dispensary and one primary school, attended by 84
pupils.
Mirpur Mathelo. — Taluka of Sukkur District, Sind, Bombay,
lying between 270 20' and 280 7' N. and 690 16' and 70° io' E.,
with an area of 1,720 square miles. The population rose from 48,068
in 1 89 1 to 49,991 in 1901. The taluka contains 100 villages, of
which Mirpur Mathelo is the head-quarters. This is the most thinly
populated tract in the District, with a density of only 29 persons
per square mile. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted
to 2-2 lakhs. The taluka, which produces mostly jowar, is watered
by the Masa Wah. In the south lies a wide tract of sandy desert.
a a 2
366 MIRPUR SAKRO
Mirpur Sakro. — Taluka of Karachi District, Sind, Bombay, lying
between 24° 14' and 240 51' N. and 670 9/ and 67° 55' E., with an
area of 1,137 square miles, of which nearly half is kalar land. The
population in 1901 was 27,600, compared with 26,064 in 1891. There
are 74 villages, but no town. The village of Mirpur Sakro is the
head-quarters. The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to
Rs. 60,000. The western half of the taluka is almost entirely un-
inhabited and uncultivable. Towards the sea, tidal creeks break the
coast-line and form extensive mangrove swamps. Irrigation is derived
chiefly from the Baghar canal, with ten branches, and from two smaller
canals. The chief crops are barley, rice, bdjra, and til.
Mirta. — District and head-quarters thereof in Jodhpur State,
Rajputana. See Merta.
Mirzapur District. — District in the Benares Division of the
United Provinces, lying between 2^ 52' and 250 32' N. and 820 7'
and 830 33' E., with an area of 5,238 square miles. It is bounded
on the north by Jaunpur and Benares ; on the east by the Bengal
Districts of Shahabad and Palamau ; on the south by the Surguja
Tributary State and the State of Rewah ; and on the west by
Allahabad. The District of Mirzapur extends over a larger area
than any other in the United Provinces, except those situated in
the Himalayas, and exhibits a corresponding diversity of natural
features. The northern portion, with an area of about 1,100 square
miles, forms part of the Gangetic plain, extending
asoects on eitner bank of the great river. South of the
Ganges the outer scarp of the Vindhyas forms an
irregular rampart, sometimes advancing to the bank of the Ganges,
and sometimes receding to 10 miles or more away. The Yindhyan
plateau stretches from the northern scarp for a distance of 30 or 40
miles to the Kaimurs, which look down on the valley of the Son.
The eastern portion of the plateau forms part of the Benares Estate,
and a considerable area is set aside by the Maharaja as a game
preserve. The scenery in this tract is among the wildest and most
beautiful in the District, and the portion where the hills meet the
plains is especially picturesque. The Karamnasa descends by a suc-
cession of falls, including two known as the Latlfsah and Chhanpathar,
which, from their beauty, are deserving of special notice. The tribu
tary stream of the Chandraprabha leaves the plateau by a single
cascade, called 1 )eo Dhari, 400 feet in height, whence it passes
through a gloomy and precipitous gorge, 7 miles long, over a huge
masonry dam to the open country beyond.
After passing the crest of the Kaimur hills, a more rugged, imposing,
and elevated range than the Vindhyas, an abrupt descent of 400
or 500 feet leads down into the valley of the Son. The easiest
MIRZAPUR DISTRICT 367
pass is the Kiwai ghat above Markund! on the Ahraura-Chopan
road. The basin of the river lies at the foot of the hills, with
occasional stretches of alluvial land on either bank. South of the
Son is a wilderness of parallel ridges of rocky hills, of no great
height, but exceedingly rugged and clothed with stunted forest.
Excepting a few level patches and valleys, with the large basin of
Singraull in the south-west and the smaller area round Dudhi in the
south, hills cover the whole area.
The two main rivers are the Ganges and Son, which flow from
west to east across the northern and central portions of the District
respectively. The east of the Vindhyan plateau is drained by the
Karamnasa and its tributaries, the Garai and Chandraprabha, and
the centre by the Jirgo and small streams, all of which flow from
south to north. The drainage from the northern slopes of the
Kaimurs, however, passes into the Belan, which has a course from
east to west. South of the Son the chief rivers are the Rihand
and Kanhar, which flow north to join that stream. There are few-
lakes or marshes, Samdha Tal, in the Korh tahsil, being the largest.
Mirzapur presents an unusual variety of geological formations.
The northern portion is Gangetic alluvium, while the plateau which
lies south of it consists of upper Vindhyan sandstone and shale.
The lower Vindhyan series occupies the Son valley. It includes
a compact limestone bed, 250 feet thick, with varying underlying
beds of conglomerate, shale, carbonaceous beds, limestone, por-
cellanite, and glauconitic sandstones. On the south bank are beds
of indurated highly siliceous volcanic ashes, while on the north
limestones and shales belonging to the Kheinjua and Rohtas groups
are found. The hilly tracts south of the Son consist of the Bijawar
slates, quartzites, limestones, basic volcanic rocks, and hematitic
jasper. In the extreme south are found gneiss and the Gondwana
beds of shale, sandstone, and boulders. On the south-west border
adjoining the Rewah State are the remains of an exhausted coal-mine l.
The flora of the Gangetic valley presents no peculiarities. The
area north of the river is well wooded, while trees become scantier
as the hills on the south are approached. The eastern portion
of the plateau has extensive areas of low jungle ; but timber attains
an average growth only in the remoter portions and in the game
preserves. South of the Son the principal jungles are composed
of sa/ai (Bos7ce//ia thiirifera), mixed with thorns and a few dwarfed
trees. Sal (Shorea robusta) is found in the hollows, and khatr (Acacia
Catechu) is common. In the extreme south the sal is of better quality,
but no forest land is ' reserved.'
1 Records, Geological Survey of India, vols, v and vi ; Memoirs, Geological Sitrz'ey
of India, vols, vii and xxxi.
368 MTRZAPUR DISTRICT
Tigers are occasionally found in the preserves of Chakia, and are
more common over the whole tract south of the Son. They are
also met with in the gorges of the Kaimurs near the Rewah boundary,
and in parts of the plateau. Leopards are found over the whole
District south of the Ganges. The hyena, wolf, jackal, and fox are
common, and packs of wild dogs hunt the southern jungle. The
sloth bear occurs on the Vindhyan plateau and on the Kaimurs. In
the Ganges valley are found antelope, 'ravine deer' (gazelle), and
nilgai; while sambar and chltal are common in the preserves, and
the four-horned antelope is met with occasionally. As a rule game-
birds are scarce, aquatic species particularly so. Fish are common
in the Ganges, and are largely caught. Mahseer are found in the
Son and Belan.
The temperature of Mirzapur is subject to smaller extremes than
in the Districts farther west. The greatest heat is less, except where
hare rock is found, and the cold season is also less marked. The
climate is unhealthy at the commencement of the hot season and also
at the end of the rains.
The annual rainfall averages about 41 inches, varying from 3S at
Korh, north of the Ganges, to 45 at Robertsganj on the plateau.
The early history of the greater part of the District is unknown,
as no records exist of the rule of the aboriginal tribes, and their
traditions are vague and unreliable. The Bhars
once held the Ganges valley, and had a city near
the present site of Bindhachal. Eastward from Chunar the country
was held by the Cherus. The Soerls, who are now almost extinct,
were formerly powerful. In the south of the District the Kols and
Kharwars ruled in the forests. About the end of the twelfth century
Rajput clans seized the whole District. Portions of the Gangetic
valley fell into the hands of the Musahnans a few years later ; hut
little is heard of the District till the sixteenth century, when Chunar
became an important post in the wars between Humayun and Sher
Shah. The fort was held by the Pathans for some time after the
accession of Akbar. In the eighteenth century this area was included
in the territory granted to the Nawab of Oudh. In 1 738 the governor
of the sarkars of Benares, Jaunpur, Ghazlpur, and Chunar fell into
disfavour and was replaced by Mansa Ram, who had been in his
employment. Mansa Ram was succeeded by his son, Balwant Singh,
Raja of Benares, who rapidly extended his possessions and acquired
the whole of the present District, except the fort at Chunar. At his
death in 1770 the British compelled the Nawab to recognize the
succession of C'het Singh, an illegitimate son of Balwant Singh.
In 1775 the Nawab ceded sovereign rights to the British, who
confirmed Chet Singh in full civil and criminal powers subject to the
HISTORY 369
payment of a fixed revenue. Chet Singh refused certain demands
made by Warren Hastings in 1781, and an attempt to arrest him
led to an hneute at Benares. Hastings, who had come to Benares,
had to fly to Chunar and collect troops, who defeated Chet Singh's
forces at Sikhar Patlta and Latlfpur. Chet Singh took refuge in
Bijaigarh, his stronghold on the Kaimurs, but again fled on the
approach of the British. His estates were then conferred on Mahlp
Narayan, a nephew of Balwant Singh. In 1788, owing to his mis-
government, Mahlp Narayan's private estates, comprising Korh and
Chakia, were separated from the rest of the District, which was
brought under the ordinary administration. Its history is thenceforth
a blank till the date of the Mutiny in 1857.
At first only a Sikh guard had charge of the treasury at Mirzapur ;
but after the outbreaks at Benares on the 1st and at Jaunpur on
the 5th of June, Colonel Pott arrived with part of the 47th Native
Infantry. The Sikhs were called into Allahabad on the 8th ; and
next day, strong rumours of intended attacks by the rebels being
current, all the officers, except Mr. Tucker, retired to Chunar. On
the 10th Mr. Tucker attacked and defeated the insurgents ; and
on the 13th a detachment of the 1st Madras Fusiliers arrived at
Mirzapur, and destroyed Gaura, a stronghold of the river dacoits.
In the BhadohT pargana, Adwant Singh, head of the Thakurs, rebelled,
but was captured and hanged. The Thakurs vowed vengeance,
attacked Mr. Moore, Deputy-Superintendent of the Benares Domains,
at the Pali factory, and on July 4 murdered him together with two
planters, while endeavouring to make their escape. On June 26 the
Banda and Fatehpur fugitives arrived and passed on to Allahabad.
On August 1 1 the Dinapore mutineers entered the District, but were
put to flight by three companies of the 5th Fusiliers, and left
Mirzapur at once. Kuar Singh, the rebel zamlndar of Shahabad
District, made an incursion on September 8 after his defeat at Arrah,
but the people compelled him to pass on to Banda. On September
16, when the 50th Native Infantry mutinied at Nagod, the officers
and 200 faithful sepoys marched through Rewah to Mirzapur. In
January, 1858, Mr. Tucker led an expedition against Bijaigarh, drove
the rebels across the Son, and re-established order, which was not
again disturbed.
Some interesting cave-dwellings have been discovered on the scarp
of the Kaimurs, the walls of which are occasionally adorned with
rude drawings of the chase, while stone implements have been found
on the floors l. Curious stone images of bearded men, supposed
to be relics of Bhar rule, are found in the north of the District.
1 Journal, Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1894, pt. iii. p. -'i ; fcurnal, Royal Asia
Society, 1899, p. 89.
3"o
MIR /.A PUR DISTRICT
An interesting inscription of Lakhana Deva of Kanauj, dated in
1 196, was dug up near Ahraura. The most striking memorials
of Muhammadan rule occur in the great fort of Chunar, and the
remains of ruined castles exist at various places on the Kaimurs.
Mirzapur contains 7 towns and 4,257 villages. Population increased
from 1872 to 1891, but the famine of 1896-7 caused a decrease in the
next decade. The numbers at the four enumerations
were as follows: (1872) 1,015,826, (1881) 1,136,796,
(1891) 1,161,508, and (1901) 1,082,430. There are five tahsl Is — Mirza-
pur, Chunar, Robertsganj, Korh, and Chakia — each named from
its head-quarters. The principal towns are the municipality of Mirza-
pur, the District head-quarters, which includes Bindhachal, and the
'notified area' of Chunar. The following table gives the chief
statistics of population in 1901 : —
7'ahsil.
Mirzapur
Chunar
Robcrtsganj
Koih
Chakia
District total
Area in square
miles.
Number of
Population.
Population prr
square mile.
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
%
c
H
2
2
2
I
i
>
1,185
562
2,621
296
474
5>23S
964
580
1,222
1,076
4'5
332,34°
176,532
221,717
285,240
66,601
1,082,430
281
3H
85
720
I4I
- IO.7
- 4-9
- 8.3
- 2-1
- 6.1
14-986
7-6i5
4,408
9,662
2,054
7
4.257
207
- 6 8
38.725
Of the total population, 93 per cent, are Hindus, and nearly
7 per cent. Musalmans. North of the Ganges the density of popu-
lation is very high ; but the large area of jungle and rock in the
centre and south of the District reduces the density elsewhere,
and the Robertsganj tahsl/ is one of the most thinly populated
tracts in the Provinces. The boundary between the tracts where
Eastern Hindi and Bihari are spoken passes through the north of
the District ; but Eastern Hindi is the prevailing speech south of the
Son. Bihari is spoken by about 63 per cent, of the population,
and Eastern Hindi by 36 per cent. The aboriginal tribes have
largely given up their own tongues.
The principal Hindu castes are: Brahmans, 153,000: Chamars
(leather-workers and cultivators), 134,000; Ahirs (graziers), 102,000 :
Kurmis (agriculturists), 64,000 ; Rajputs, 42,000 : Kewats (cultivators),
40,000 ; and Koirls (cultivators), 40,000. The District also contains
a number of aboriginal tribes similar to those of Chota Nagpur and
Central India, the most important of which are the Kols, 27,000:
Majh.w5.rs, 21,000; Kharwars, 15,000; Bayars, 12,000; and Cherus,
6,000. These are rapidly becoming Hinduized. Among Muham-
AGRICULTURE 37 1
madans the largest tribes and castes are: Julahas (weavers), 20,000:
Shaikhs, 13,000 ; Behnas (cotton-carders), 9,000 ; and Pathans, 7,000.
The high proportion of 71 per cent, of the total population are sup-
ported by agriculture, and only 4 per cent, by general labour.
Out of 413 native Christians in 1901, Congregationalists numbered
254 and members of the Anglican communion 93. The London
Mission commenced work at Mirzapur in 1837 and at Dudhi in 1862.
In 1897 a hospital and dispensary were founded at Kachhwa. The
Church Missionary Society has a small branch at Chunar.
The soils and consequently the agricultural conditions of the
District present many diversities. In the Gangetic plain the usual
loam and sandy and clayey soils are found, the .
J , J J . , . ' Agriculture,
first variety preponderating ; and this area produces
the ordinary crops — rice, gram, wheat, barley, and the millets. On
the Vindhyan plateau the soil is a stiff and shallow red clay, giving
only scanty crops, with generally two fallows intervening. Kodon,
a small millet, is the chief crop grown here. A remarkable strip of
fertile country, however, stretches across the District between the
Belan and the base of the Kaimurs. The western portion, like the
rest of the plateau, suffers from the lack of facilities for irrigation ;
but in the east the spring-level rises, and large quantities of rice are
grown, while even sugar-cane and poppy succeed. The broad valley
of the Son has a light sandy soil. In the tract south of this river
cultivation is practically confined to four places — the Son, Kon, Dudhi,
and Singrauli valleys. Rice, kodon and other millets, wheat, and
oilseeds are the principal crops grown here. Cultivation is largely
fluctuating ; and, excluding fields round the homesteads, lands are
only cultivated once in three years. The custom of firing the jungle
borders to obtain fertile land is still practised.
The tahslls of Korh and Chakia. form part of the Benares Estate,
and the former includes a number of villages owned by sub-proprietors
called manzuriddrs or mukarrarlddrs. Excluding a few large estates
held by single persons, in some of which sub-proprietary rights exist,
and the Dudhi pargana, the prevailing tenure is the ordinary pattlddri.
The Dudhi pargana is almost entirely managed as a Government
estate, and proprietary rights exist only in a small portion. The main
agricultural statistics for 1903-4 are given in the table on the next
page, in square miles.
The principal food-crops, with their areas in the same year, were —
rice (163 square miles), gram (169), kodon (161), wheat (113), and barley
(109). Bdjra, Jowar, and maize are also grown. Oilseeds (grown on
118 square miles), sugar-cane (10), and poppy (3), are of some impor-
tance.
The system of crop records has only recently been introduced into
372
MIRZAPUR DISTRICT
the permanently settled Districts, and it is impossible to say whether
cultivation is progressing or not, and what changes are taking place
in agricultural methods. The changes, if any, have not been sufficiently
important to attract attention. Advances are rarely made under the
Land Improvement Loans Act, and only small amounts have been lent
under the Agriculturists' Loans Act, amounting to Rs. 82,000 during
the ten years ending 1900, of which Rs. 51,000 was advanced in 1896 7.
Tahsil.
Mirzapur
Chunar
Robertsganj .
Korh .
Chakia
Total
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
I.185
562
2,621
396
474 +
429
242
255*
250
109
45
36
27*
112
27
413
153
225*
38
24
5,238
1,285
247
853
* These figures exclude the unsurveyed area south of the Son.
t Agricultural statistics available for only 160 square miles.
The cattle bred locally are very inferior ; and animals are imported
from Bihiir for the plough, from the Districts north of the Gogra for
other agricultural work, and from Surguja for use as pack-animals.
The buffaloes of the District are of a better stamp, and supply milk
and are used for hauling stone. Ponies are also very inferior. Sheep
and goats are largely kept, but no particular breeds are recognized.
Excluding the Benares Domains, 108 square miles were irrigated
in 1903-4, of which 55 were irrigated from wells, 31 from tanks or
jhl/s, and 22 from other sources. The Gangetic valley is supplied
chiefly by wells and jhlls. On the plateau wells are almost unknown,
except in the fertile strip below the Kaimurs. Tanks and embank-
ments are the usual means for the storage and supply of water here,
and are extensively used for rice cultivation. The artificial lakes at
Karsota on the plateau and at Gaharwargaon south of the Son are the
most important of these works. South of the Son the number of
embankments approaches 900, but increased facilities for water-supply
are still needed. The rivers are rarely used for irrigation ; and there
is only one small canal, made about 1820 by the Raja of Benares,
which supplies water from the Chandraprabha.
The most important mineral product is building stone, which is
largely quarried in the north of the District, and exported as far as
Calcutta. Millstones, curry-stones, boundary pillars, and fencing posts
are also made. The quarries are Government property and a royalty
is levied, which yields about 1 lakh annually. Iron ore is found in
places, and a little is worked by the aboriginal tribes for local use.
Coal was formerly extracted south of the Son and carried on pack-
bullocks to the river steamers at Mirzapur, and as recently as 1896
FAMINE 373
an unsuccessful attempt was made to work it again. Mica and iron
pyrites are also found, but are not used.
The District generally has few arts or industries, excluding those
of the city of Mirzapur. Cane sugar is produced north of the Ganges,
and palm sugar near Chunar. Iron vessels are made
at Kachhwa, lacquered wooden toys at Ahraura, communicati0ns.
and an inferior art pottery at Chunar. The manu-
facture of indigo and weaving of tasar silk, which were formerly of
some importance, have dwindled considerably ; but the silkworm is
still bred, and wild silk is also collected. South of the Son catechu
is extracted in most villages. Mirzapur city is one of the most im-
portant centres of brass manufactures in the United Provinces. It
also contains large industries turning out shellac, lac-dye, and woollen
carpets, besides a cotton-spinning mill.
The District exports stone, shellac, catechu, and other jungle
produce, carpets, brass and iron utensils, grain, ghl, oilseeds, spices
(chiefly betel-nuts), and raw silk ; and imports brass, iron and copper,
salt, cotton, and piece-goods. The chief channel for trade is now the
railway, the Ganges being little used, except for the carriage of stone
and fuel. Trade between the north and south of the District is carried
entirely on pack-Bullocks, and is decreasing owing to the establishment
of markets outside the border. Mirzapur, Kachhwa, and Ahraura
are the chief trading centres, while Chunar railway station is an
important place for the export of stone.
The main line of the East Indian Railway passes through the
District a little distance south of the Ganges, and the Oudh and
Rohilkhand crosses the extreme north. There are 1,025 miles of
road, of which 148 are metalled. The latter are maintained by the
Public Works department, but the cost of all but 69 miles is met from
Local funds. The main lines are the grand trunk road north of the
Ganges, with branches from Mirzapur city to several points on it ;
the great Deccan road ; the road from Mirzapur to Jaunpur ; and the
roads from Mirzapur and Chunar to the south of the District. Avenues
of trees are maintained on 123 miles.
Local tradition tells of serious suffering in the northern parts of
Mirzapur during the great famine of 1783 ; but the District has usually
escaped the worst degrees of famine. In 1864 and
or , • 1 r .1 • Famine.
1865 the rains were scanty and most of the rice
crop perished, and revenue was freely suspended. In 1S6S drought
again caused distress, which deepened into famine in the southern
part, though rain in September saved some of the late crops. Relief
works were opened early in 1S69, and provided work for all who came ;
but the forest tribes remained in their jungles, living on forest produce.
A series of bad seasons caused distress in 1S73, when nearly 44.000
374 MIRZAPUR district
head of cattle were lost owing to the failure of fodder and water, and
small relief works were necessary. The great scarcity of 1877-8 was
only slightly felt in this District. In 1896, however, the rainfall was
short for the second year in succession, and the late rice and the
following spring crops were lost. The Vindhyan plateau and the
tract south of the Son suffered most severely ; but some distress
was also felt in the area between the Ganges and the plateau. North
of the river high prices were the only inconvenience to the people.
By June, 1897, there were 48,000 persons on relief works and 23,000
in poorhouses or receiving gratuitous relief. The Maharaja of Benares
spent i-8 lakhs on relief in his estates.
The Collector is usually assisted by a member of the Indian Civil
Service, and by three Deputy-Collectors recruited in India. The
Deputy-Superintendent of the Family Domains of
Administration. ^ Maharajg of Benares (see Benares Estate) has
his head-quarters at Mirzapur, a tahstlddr is stationed at the head-
quarters of each tahsil, ami there are two officers of the Opium
department in the District.
Civil justice is in the hands of a Munsif, a Sub-Judge, and the
District Judge, the latter being also Sessions Judge. In the two tahslh
of the Benares Estate all civil cases which are in any way connected
with land, and all rent and revenue cases, are tried by the Maharaja's
courts with an appeal to the Deputy-Superintendent. The tract south
of the Son is a separate non-regulation area, in which the tahsildar of
Robertsganj and the Collector and his Assistants have civil powers.
Crime is light, especially in the jungle tracts.
Up to 1830 Mirzapur formed part of Benares District, and most
of it was thus permanently settled by 1795. A survey was carried out
between 1839 and 1841, which was followed by the preparation of
a record-of-rights. The District was again surveyed between 1879 and
1882 ; and the old record-of-rights, which had been of an imperfect
nature and had never been corrected, was thoroughly revised for the
area included in the Gangetic valley. In the two tahslh belonging to
the Benares Estate the Maharaja makes his own settlement with the
subordinate proprietors. The Dudhi pargana was for many years
entirely overlooked by the British administrators, and it thus escaped
the permanent settlement. The Raja of Singrauli usurped the whole
pargana, and complaints against his misgovernment led to its inspec-
tion in 1847. A formal inquiry was held, and it was declared to be
the property of Government. A settlement was made in 1849-56,
which was revised in 1871-5, 1886-7, and 1897-8. Proprietary rights
in this pargana do not exist except in Zappa Gonda Bajia, and the
assessment is based on the number of ploughs maintained by the
cultivators. The area estimated to be cultivated by each plough is
ADMINIS TR. I TIOX 3 7 5
fixed, and the rates per plough vary in different villages. The village
headmen or sapurdars receive concessions for their own cultivation,
and also a percentage on collections.
The collections on account of land revenue and revenue from all
sources have been, in thousands of rupees : —
1880-1.
1890-1. 1900-1.
1903-4.
Land revenue . . 8,56
Total revenue . . 1 1 , 7 *
8,86 9.65
14,90 16.28
8,44
i6;70
The towns include one municipality, Mirzaptjr, one 'notified area,'
Chunar, and four places administered under Act XX of 1856. Be-
yond the limits of these the District board administers local affairs. In
1903-4 the board had an income of 1-2 lakhs, chiefly derived from
local rates, a contribution from Provincial revenues, and ferries ; while
the expenditure was 1-3 lakhs, including Rs. 55,000 spent on roads
and buildings.
The District Superintendent of police has a force of 4 inspectors,
101 subordinate officers, and 1,446 constables, distributed in 26 police
stations, besides 195 municipal and town police, and 1,500 rural and
road police. In 1903 the District jail contained a daily average of
230 prisoners. The Provincial reformatory is now located in the fort
at Chunar.
Mirzapur District takes a fairly high place as regards the literacy
of its population, of whom 3-6 per cent. (7 males and 0-3 females) could
read and write in 1901. The number of public schools rose from 144
with 4,724 pupils in 1 880-1 to 231 with 9.334 pupils in 1900-1. In
1903-4 there were 197 such schools with 7,914 pupils, including 291
girls, besides 55 private schools with 1,560 pupils, of whom 168 were
girls. Only 1,941 pupils in both descriptions of schools were receiving
secondary education. Four of the public schools are managed by
Government and 115 by the District or municipal boards. Out ol
a total expenditure on education in 1903-4 of Rs. 91,000, Local funds
supplied Rs. 47,000, and fees Rs. 8,000.
There are n hospitals and dispensaries, with accommodation lor
75 in-patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 102,000,
including 1,200 in-patients, and 7,800 operations were performed.
The total expenditure was Rs. 24,000, chiefly met from Local funds.
About 34,000 persons were successfully vaccinated in 1903-4, repre-
senting a proportion of 31 per 1,000 of population. Vaccination is
compulsory only in the municipality.
[A. Shakespear, Selections from the Duncan Records (Benares, 1873) ;
District Gazetteer (1883, under revision); G. Dale, Revision of Records
in the Gangetic Valley, Mirzapur District (1887) ; W. Crooke and
376 MIRZAPUR DISTRICT
G. R. Dampier, A Note on the Tract of Country south of the River Son,
Mirzapur District (1894).]
Mirzapur Tahsil. —Western tahsil of Mirzapur District, United
Provinces, comprising the tappas of Upraudh, Chaurasi, Chhiyanve,
and Kon of pargana Kantit, and taluka Majhwa of pargana Kaswar,
and lying between 240 36' and 250 17' X. and 820 7' and S20 50' E.,
with an area of 1,185 square miles. Population fell from 372,015 in
1 89 1 to 332,340 in 1901, the rate of decrease being the highest in the
District. There are 964 villages and two towns, including Mirzapur
(population, 79,862), the District and tahsil head-quarters. The
demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 3,21,000, and for cesses
Rs. 68,000. The density of population, 28 1 persons per square mile,
is above the District average. Most of the tahsil is situated south
of the Ganges, which forms part of the northern boundary and then
cuts off a small portion on the north. The greater part of it is thus
situated on the Vindhyan plateau, the southern portion of which is
drained by the Belan. In the extreme south-west the Kaimur hills
rise abruptly from the plateau. The area under cultivation in 1903-4
was 429 square miles, of which 45 were irrigated. Wells are the
chief source of supply.
Mirzapur City. Head-quarters of Mirzapur District, United Pro-
vinces, situated in 25° 9' X. and 820 35' E., on the right bank of the
Ganges, and on the East Indian Railway, 509 miles from Calcutta and
891 from Bombay, and connected by short branches with the grand
trunk road. The population (including Bindhachal) has fluctuated
considerably. The numbers at the four enumerations were as follows :
(1872) 67,274, (1881) 85,362, (1891) 84,130, and (1901) 79,862.
The earliest mention of Mirzapur is by Tieffenthaler between 1760
and 1770, who refers to it as a mart on the Ganges. Its importance
increased rapidly towards the close of the eighteenth century, and
during the first half of the nineteenth century it was the most important
trading centre in Upper India. Although the District was not separated
from Benares till 1830, the town became the head-quarters of a Judge-
Magistrate as early as 1788, and contained an important custom-house.
The cotton of the Deccan and Central India was brought here on pack-
bullocks and the grain of the Doab in country boats, to be conveyed by
river to Calcutta; while sugar, piece-goods, and metals were carried
up stream for distribution. As the trade of the place depended largely
on its position at the highest point on the Ganges reached by large
steamers, the opening of the East Indian Railway as far as the Jumna
opposite Allahabad in 1864 marked the first step in its decline. The
town has a handsome riverfront lined with stone ghats or landing-
places, and possesses numerous mosques, temples, and dwelling-houses
of the wealthier merchants, with highly decorated facades and richly
MISHMI HILLS 377
carved balconies and door frames. The civil station stretches east-
wards along the river. It is the head-quarters of the usual District
staff, of the Deputy-Superintendent of the Family Domains (Bexarl-
Estate), of two Opium officers, and also of the London Mission.
There are male and female hospitals and a town hall, besides the usual
public offices. Mirzapur has been a municipality since 1867. During
the ten years ending 190 1 the income and expenditure averaged about
Rs. 62,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 83,000, chiefly derived
from octroi (Rs. 69,000) ; and the expenditure was Rs. 67,000, including
conservancy (Rs. 19,000), public safety (Rs. 12,000), administration
and collection (Rs. 1 1,000), and public works (Rs. 10,000). A drainage
scheme to cost 32 lakhs has recently been undertaken. The small
town of Bindhachal, a few miles south-west of the city, is included
within municipal limits. It contains the celebrated shrine of Yin-
dhyeshwarl or Yindhyabasini, which is annually visited by large crowds
of pilgrims from Central and Southern India. In former years the
goddess was especially venerated by the Thags. Close to Bindha-
chal are found extensive ruins believed to be those of Pampapura,
the ancient city of the Bhars. Bindhachal contains a dispensary.
While Mirzapur no longer holds its former importance as a centre of
commerce, it still absorbs the greater part of the trade of the District.
It is also the seat of the largest brass industry in the United Provinces,
as far as the production of domestic vessels is concerned. There are
eighty factories for the preparation of shellac from stick-lac found in the
jungles of the south of the District or imported, which give employment
to about 4,000 workmen. Mirzapur is celebrated for the woollen
carpets produced here, and six of the largest factories employ 700 to
Soo hands. There is also a cotton-spinning mill, which employed
560 workers in 1903. The principal schools are the ordinary District
and town schools, and a school and orphanage supported by the
London Mission; the municipality maintains six and aids fifteen other
schools, attended by 881 pupils.
Mishmi Hills. —A section of the mountain ranges on the northern
frontier of Assam, which shut in the eastern end of the valley of the
Brahmaputra, between the Dibang and the Brahmaputra. These hills
are occupied by the Mishmi tribe, and have never been properly
explored. They consist, as far as is known, of steep ridges, covered
as a rule with tree forest, and some of the peaks are over 15,000 feet
in height. Geologically, these hills seem to be a continuation of the
Burmese axials. The higher ranges are probably composed of gneiss
and granite, and there are reasons for supposing that they may contain
deposits of economic value. Limestone boulders are found in the
beds of the rivers issuing from them.
The Mishmis are divided into four tribes: the Chulikatta or 'crop-
37§ MISHMI HILLS
haired,' the Bebejiya, the Digaru, and the Migu or Midhi. They are
a short, sturdy race of the Tibeto-Burman stock, with features of a
Mongolian type. They are keen traders and devoted to a pastoral
rather than to an agricultural life, cattle and wives being the chief
outward sign of wealth. The first expedition into the Mishmi country
was in 1827, and further attempts were made in 1836 and 1845 I out
none of the explorers succeeded in getting more than three-quarters
of the way to Rima, the frontier town of Tibet. In 1851 M. Krick,
a French missionary, reached that place and returned in safety to
Assam ; but on his revisiting the country in 1854 he was treacherously
murdered by a Mishmi chief. The offender was captured and taken
to Dibrugarh, where he was duly convicted and hanged : and attempts
were again made in 1869 and 1879 to reach the valley of the Zayul, as
the eastern arm of the Brahmaputra is called, but they were unsuc-
cessful. In the cold season of 1885-6, Mr. Xeedham and Captain
Molesworth marched from Sadiya to Rima, but were prevented from
going beyond that place by the obstructive attitude of the Tibetan
authorities. The path followed ran along the north bank of the
Brahmaputra, the total distance traversed being 187 miles. For the
first 46 miles it lies entirely in the plains, and for this portion of
the journey elephants can be used for transport. From thence to the
Tibetan border, 26 miles west of Rima, travelling is somewhat difficult.
The track is rugged and uneven, and crosses ranges of hills varying
from 1,000 to 3,500 feet in height; but these difficulties disappear on
entering the Zayul valley. The upper portion of this valley was described
by M. Krick as a tract cultivated as far as the eye could see, and
abounding in herds of oxen, asses, horses, and mules, and in groves
of bamboo, laurel, orange, citron, and peach trees. Pandit A. K., who
entered the valley from the east, described the winter crops as rice,
millets, and pulses, while wheat, barley, and mustard ripened in the
spring. The Mishmis do a good deal of trade both with the Zayul
valley and with Assam. They receive from the Tibetans cattle,
woollen coats, swords, metal vessels, and other articles, and give them
in exchange Mishmi teeta (a plant much valued as a febrifuge), musk,
and Mishmi poison.
In 1899 the Bebejiya Mishmis murdered three Khamti British
subjects and carried off three children. An expedition was dis-
patched against them in the following cold season, which, after a
tedious and difficult march, succeeded in recovering the captives and
burning the guilty villages. The Bebejiya country lies to the east
of the Dibang river, and was entered by the Maizu pass, which is
8,900 feet above sea-level.
[An account of the Mishmis will be found in Colonel Dalton's
Ethnology of Bengal. \
MITHT TOWN 379
Misrikh. — Western tahsll of Sitapur District, United Provinces,
comprising the parganas of Aurangabad, Chandra, Korauna, Gundla-
mau, Machhrehta, Misrikh, and Maholl, and lying between 270 12'
and 2 70 49/ N. and 8o° 18' and 8o° 50' E., along the GuratT, with
an area of 613 square miles. The Kathna traverses the north-west
of the tahsil, and the Sarayan forms part of the eastern boundary.
Population increased from 243,207 in 1891 to 267,440 in 1901.
There are 649 villages and three towns, including Misrikh (popula-
tion, 2,966), the tahsll head-quarters. The demand for land revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 3,88,000, and for cesses Rs. 66,000. The density
of population is only 436 persons per square mile, a figure much
below the District average. Along the Gumtl is found a considerable
area of light sandy soil, which is liable to fall out of cultivation in
years of either excessive or deficient rainfall. The rest of the tahsll
is composed chiefly of good loam. In 1903-4 the area under cultiva-
tion was 432 square miles, of which 94 were irrigated. Wells supply
rather more than half the irrigated area, and tanks most of the
remainder.
Mithankot. — Town in the Rajanpur tahsll of Dera Ghazi Khan
District, Punjab, situated in 2 8° 57' N. and 700 22' E., on the west
bank of the Indus, 83 miles from Dera Ghazi Khan town, and a few
miles below the confluence of the Panjnad and Indus. Population
(1901), 3,487. The town was once the centre of a large trade, and
head-quarters of what is now the Rajanpur subdivision ; but the
station was abandoned in 1862, when the old town was destroyed by
an encroachment of the Indus. The new town was built 5 miles
from the river, but, being so far away, speedily lost the commercial
importance of its predecessor. The municipality was created in 1873.
The income during the ten years ending 1902-3 averaged Rs. 3,300,
and the expenditure Rs. 3,500. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 3,800,
chiefly from octroi ; and the expenditure was Rs. 3,500.
Mithi Taluka. — Taluka of Thar and Parkar District, Sind, Bom-
bay, lying between 240 17' and 240 57' N. and 690 30' and 700 34' E.,
with an area of 1,563 square miles. The population fell from 36,445
in 1891 to 26,154 in 1901. The taluka contains one town, Mithi
(population, 2,806), the head-quarters ; and 46 villages. The density,
17 persons per square mile, is below the District average. The land
revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 26,000. Cultivation
depends upon rainfall, and to a small extent upon well-irrigation, the
principal crop being bajra. The taluka is liable to famine.
Mithi Town. — Head-quarters of the taluka of the same name in
Thar and Parkar District, Sind, Bombay, situated in 240 44' N. and
690 51/ E., about 60 miles south of Umarkot. Population (1901),
2,806. The trade, both local and transit, consists of grain, cotton,
vol. xvii. B b
380 MITHI TOWN
rattle, camels, ghi, dyes, hides, oil, piece-goods, sugar, tobacco, and
wool. The town was constituted a municipality in i860, and had
an average income of about Rs. 4,000 during the decade ending 1901.
In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 10,000. The municipality was abolished
in 1905. The town contains two primary schools, one for boys and
the other for girls, attended respectively by 143 and 93 pupils.
Mithila (or Videha).— Ancient kingdom in North Bihar, Bengal.
It included the modern Districts of Darbhanga, Champaran, and
North Muzaffarpur, and was a great seat of Sanskrit learning ; it is
mentioned in the Satapatha Brahmana. The capital was at Janak-
pur, in Nepal ; and the boundary seems at one time to have extended
as far east as the Kosi river, so that the kingdom included, besides
the Districts above named, parts of Purnea, Monghyr, and Bhagal-
pur. According to tradition, the court of king Janaka was attended
by philosophers and religious teachers as early as 1000 B.C. Little
is really known of the early history of Mithila. In the ninth cen-
tury a. d. it seems to have been conquered by the Pal dynasty of
Magadha, and it was again subjugated by Ballal Sen of Bengal soon
after he ascended the throne in a. d. 1069. The Lakshman era, which
he inaugurated to celebrate the birth of his son, is in use by the
pandits of Mithila to this day. Mithila was conquered by Muham-
mad-i-Bakhtyar Khilji in 1203, but from the middle of the fourteenth
century it was for 200 years under the rule of a line of Brahmans
given up to learning and poetry. The best known of this line was
Siva Singh, who reigned for four years from 1446, In 1556 Mithila
became merged in the Mughal empire. Mithila has given its name
to one of the five classes of Northern Brahmans, the Maithilas, whose
recognized head is the Maharaja of Darbhanga.
Miyagam. — Village in the Choranda taluka, Baroda prant, Baroda
State, situated in 220 1/ N. and 730 7' E., on the Bombay, Baroda,
and Central India Railway, at the terminus of a State line from
Dabhoi. Population (1901), 2,654. It is inhabited chiefly by Jains,
who carry on a thriving trade.
Mobye. — State in the Southern Shan States, Burma. See Mongpai.
Modasa. — Town in the Parantij taluka of Ahmadabad District,
Bombay, situated in 230 i8/ N. and 730 18' E., on the river Majham,
52 miles north-east of Ahmadabad city. Population (1901), 7,276.
Modasa occupies an important strategical position between Gujarat
and the hilly tracts constituting the Native States of Idar and Dun-
garpur. In the reign of Sultan Ahmad of Gujarat (141 1-43) it was
a fortified post : and at the close of the sixteenth century it was the
chief place in a tract of 162 villages, yielding a revenue of 8 lakhs.
It is an old town with several inscriptions. The chief industries are
dyeing, calico-printing, and oil-pressing. Maluia oil is exported for
MOGALTURRU 381
soap. There is a through camel traffic in raw cotton and opium with
Malwa. Modasa was constituted a municipality in 1859. The income
during the decade ending 1901 averaged about Rs. 6,ooo, and in
1903-4 amounted to Rs. 6,800. The town contains a dispensary and
five schools, of which one is an English middle school for boys with
22 pupils, and four are vernacular schools — namely, three for boys
with 392 pupils and one for girls with 86 pupils.
Modhera. — Village in the Vadavli taluka, Kadi prant, Baroda
State, situated in 230 35' N. and 720 3' E. In ancient times this
town must have been very populous and wealthy, judging from the
ruins still to be seen. The chief of these is Sita's Chavdi or marriage
hall, about which Dr. Burgess remarks : —
'The Sita's Chavdi is rich in carving beyond anything I have met
with elsewhere. The central dome is supported by eight columns of
great elegance with toranas between each pair, outside of which are
eight similar ones. The mandapa is similar to the central dome. The
proportions of the building are beautiful, as it is not deficient in height.'
The temple is really dedicated to the Sun, and was probably built
early in the eleventh century. Modhera is known in Jain legends
as Modherpura or Modhbank Patan, and it has given its name to
the Modha Brahmans and the Modhas.
Moga Tahsil. — Tahsil of Ferozepore District, Punjab, lying
between 300 8' and 300 54' N. and 740 54" and 750 26' E., with
an area of 807 square miles. It is bounded on the south by Patiala,
and on the west by the Fandkot State. It lies almost wholly in the
upland plateau known as the Rohi, which has a good loam soil and
is irrigated by the Sirhind Canal. The population in 1901 was
245,857, compared with 235,806 in 1891. Moga Town (population,
6,725) is the head-quarters. The tahsil also contains 202 villages.
The land revenue and cesses in 1903-4 amounted to 4-7 lakhs. The
village of Mahraj is of some religious importance.
Moga Town. — Head-quarters of the tahsil of the same name in
Ferozepore District, Punjab, situated in 300 49' N. and 750 io' E.,
35 miles south-east of Ferozepore town on the Ferozepore road.
Population (1901), 6,725. The Tayyan fair is held here in the
month of Chet (March-April). The chief educational institutions
are the Dev Samaj Anglo-vernacular high school (unaided), and an
Anglo-vernacular middle school maintained by the municipality.
There is also a Government dispensary.
Mogalturru. — Village in the Narasapur taluk of Kistna District,
Madras, situated in 160 25' N. and 81° 36' E., on the Narasapur canal.
Population (1901), 6,348. It contains the fort of the former zamlndars
of Mogalturru, and was the head-quarters of one of the early Col-
lectorates. There is a small salt factory close by.
b b 2
382 MOGAUNG SUBDIVISION
Mogaung Subdivision.— Subdivision of Myitkyina" District. Upper
Burma, consisting of the Mogaung and Kamaing townships.
Mogaung Township. Western township of Myitkyina District,
Upper Burma, lying between 240 42' and 250 45' N. and 960 o' and
960 1 6' E., with an area of 3,490 square miles. The population in
1901 was 18,867, Shans numbering more than 8,000 and Kachins
more than 7,000, while Burmans and Burmese Shans to the number
of 2,000 inhabited Mogaung itself, and some of the larger river villages.
The township contains 226 villages, of which 172 are in the Kachin
Hill tracts. The head-quarters are at Mogaung (population, 2,742), a
market of importance situated on the Mogaung stream and the rail-
way, about 30 miles west of Myitkyina town. Except in the immediate
neighbourhood of Mogaung, the township is a mass of forest-clad
upland, and the density of population is very low. In 1903-4 the area
cultivated was 6 square miles, in addition to taungyas : and the land
revenue and thaihameda amounted to Rs. 42,000.
Mogok Subdivision. — Southern subdivision and township of the
Ruby Mines District, Upper Burma, consisting of a mass of hills
broken up by ravines, lying between 220 46' and 230 4.' N. and 960 14'
and 960 43" E., with an area of 610 square miles. The population was
18,810 in 1891, and 24,590 in 1901, distributed in one town, Mogok
(population, 6,078), the head-quarters, and 112 villages. The im-
portance of the township is derived from the ruby mines, which are
described in the District article. About 10 miles north-west of Mogok
is Bernardmyo (called after the late Sir Charles Bernard), situated at
an altitude of over 5,000 feet above the sea, where European troops
were once quartered. The township contained about 3,500 acres under
cultivation in 1903-4, and the land revenue and thathameda in the
same year amounted to Rs. 53,000.
Mogok Town. — Head-quarters of the Ruby Mines District, Upper
Burma; situated in 220 55' N. and 960 30' E., in hilly country,
about 4,000 feet above the sea. It lies 36 miles due east of the
Irrawaddy, with which it is connected by a road 60 miles in length
leading to Thabeikkyin. Population (1901), 6,078. The town, which
occupies the middle of a very picturesque mountain-girt valley, is the
head-quarters of the ruby-mining industry in Burma, and is a thriv-
ing trade centre with a large and flourishing masonry bazar, which
brings in a revenue of between Rs. 30,000 and Rs. 40,000. A certain
amount of stone-cutting, polishing, and setting is carried on, but
the work is of a primitive character. Mogok is less a town than a
collection of villages, and is divided into nine quarters. The actual
population of the group of villages that surrounds the District head-
quarters, and owes its existence to the Ruby Mines Company, is about
15,000. Mogok has not, despite its size, been constituted a munici-
MOHANLALGANJ 383
pality, nor has any modified form of local self-government yet been
introduced into it. The District fund benefits by the receipts from
the bazar. Brick buildings are becoming common in the town, and
frequent fires in the past have popularized the use of corrugated iron
for roofing purposes. The usual public buildings include a hospital,
and substantial residences have been built for the local officials and
for the staff of the Ruby Mines Company. A jail is at present in
course of construction.
Mohan Tahsil. — North-eastern tahsil of Unao District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Mohan Auras, Gorinda Parsan-
dan, Jhalotar Ajgain, and Asivvan Rasulabad, and lying between 260 $$'
and 2 70 1' N. and 8o° 25' and 8o° 55' E., with an area of 436 square
miles. Population fell from 257,449 in 1891 to 255,389 in 1901.
There are 474 villages and three towns, Asiwan (population, 6,153)
and Mohan (5,798), the former tahsil head-quarters, being the largest.
The demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 4,27,000, and for
cesses Rs. 43,000. The density of population, 586 persons per square
mile, is the highest in the District. Mohan is intersected by the Sai,
which flows sluggishly through a tortuous channel and is liable to
sudden floods, though in ordinary years its valley is very fertile. The
south and the east of the tahsil are interspersed with barren patches of
usar and stretches of hard clay, which produce excellent rice crops in
favourable years. The north and west consist of loam with sandy
ridges, and are generally fertile. In 1903-4 the area under cultivation
was 262 square miles, of which 118 were irrigated. Nearly half the
irrigated area is supplied from wells, and the remainder from the Sai
and from tanks, which are more important sources here than in any
other tahsil of Unao.
Mohan Town. — Former head-quarters of the tahsil of the same
name in Unao District, United Provinces, situated in 2 6° 47' N. and
8o° 41/ E., on a metalled road from Ajgain railway station. Population
(1901), 5,798. It is pleasantly situated on the banks of the Sai, which
is here crossed by a fine stone bridge built by Maharaja Nawal Rai,
minister of the Nawab Safdar Jang. The old road from Lucknow to
Cawnpore passes through Mohan, which was once a place of some
importance. It has always been celebrated for its Muhammadan
physicians and mimics and actors. The town is administered under
Act XX of 1856, with an income of about Rs. 900. A good deal
of fruit is grown in the neighbourhood, and the town is flourishing.
There is a school with 150 pupils.
Mohanlalganj. — Southern tahsil of Lucknow District, United
Provinces, comprising the parganas of Mohanlalganj and Nigohan,
and lying between 260 30' and 260 51' N. and 8o° 5/ and 8i° 13' E.,
with an area of 273 square miles. Population increased from 150,160
3*4 MOHANLALGANJ
in 1891 to 154,115 in 1901. There are 226 villages and two towns,
the largest being Amethi (population, 6,447). ^n r9°3_4 the demand
for land revenue was Rs. 2,53,000, and for cesses Rs. 51,000. The
density of population, 565 persons per square mile, is below the District
average. Mohanlalganj is bounded on the north by the Gumtl and
on the south by the Sai. The banks of both rivers are sandy ; but the
tahsll contains a large area of fertile loam, which in the centre turns
to clay interspersed with many tanks and jhils. In 1903-4 the area
under cultivation was 150 square miles, of which 66 were irrigated.
Wells supply rather more than half the irrigated area, and tanks most
of the remainder.
Mohanpur. — Petty State in MahI Kantha, Bombay.
Moharbhanj. — Native State in Orissa, Bengal. See Mayurbhanj.
Mohgaon. — Town in the Sausar tahsll of Chhindwara District,
Central Provinces, situated in 210 38' N. and 780 45' E., on a tributary
of the river Jam, 37 miles south of Chhindwara town, and 5 miles
from the Nagpur road. Population (1901), 5,730. The municipality
has recently been abolished, and a town fund is now raised for purposes
of sanitation. A cotton-ginning factory was opened in 1892 with a
capital of Rs. 50,000, and cotton cloths are woven by hand. Mohgaon
contains a vernacular middle school.
Mohindargarh Nizamat (or Kanaud). — A nizamat or administra-
tive district of the Patiala State, Punjab, lying between 270 18' and
2 8° 28' N. and 750 56' and 7 6° 18' E., with an area of 575 square
miles. It is bounded on the north by the Dadri tahsll of the Jind
State ; on the west and south by Jaipur State territory ; and on the
east by the State of Alwar and the Bawal nizamat of Nabha. The
population in 1901 was 140,376, compared with 147,912 in 1891.
The nizamat contains the towns of Narnaul and Mohindargarh or
Kanaud, the head-quarters ; and 268 villages. The land revenue and
cesses in 1903-4 amounted to 3-9 lakhs. Situated in the extreme
south-east of the Province, it is geographically part of the Rajputana
desert, and forms a long narrow strip of territory lying north by south.
It is partially watered by three streams : the Dohan, which rises in the
Jaipur hills, traverses the whole length of the nizamat, and passes into
Jind territory to the north ; the Krishnawati, which also rises in Jaipur
and flows past Narnaul town into Nabha territory in the east ; and the
Gohli. It is divided into two tahsils : Mohindargarh, or Kanaud,
and Narnaul.
Mohindargarh Tahsll (or Kanaud). — Head-quarters tahsll of the
Mohindargarh nizamat, Patiala State, Punjab, lying between 2 8° 6' and
280 28' N. and 750 56' and 760 18' E., with an area of 299 square
miles. The population in 1901 was 55,246, compared with 59,867 in
1 891. The tahsll contains the town of Kanaud (population, 9,984),
MOHMAND COUNTRY 385
the head-quarters, and 1 1 1 villages. The land revenue and cesses
in 1903-4 amounted to 1-5 lakhs.
Mohindargarh Fort. — The fort at Kanaud in Patiala State,
Punjab, was so named in 1861 by Maharaja Narindar Singh, in honour
of his son Mohindar Singh. The fort contains the public offices of
the Mohindargarh nizamat and tahsi/, and the treasury, jail, &c.
Mohmand Country. — A tract north-west of Peshawar District,
North-West Frontier Province, lying between 330 30' and 34° 40' N. and
700 30' and 710 30' E., with an area of about 1,200 square miles.
Its boundaries are : on the east and north, the Swat and Ambhar
rivers ; on the west, the Afghan territory of Kunar ; and on the
south, the watersheds of the Kabul river. Those of the Mohmands
who live west of the Afghan boundary are subject to the Amir.
The majority of the tribe, who live between Afghanistan and the
border of Peshawar District, are under the political control of the
Deputy-Commissioner of Peshawar ; but there is an increasing ten-
dency to settle in the District, in the dodbs between the rivers. The
Mohmand settlers seldom remain, however, during the summer
months, being what is described as Do-Kora (' two homes '). The
tract is naturally divided into the rich alluvial lands along the Kabul
river from Jalalabad to Lalpura, and a network of hills and valleys
from Lalpura eastward. The aspect of the Mohmand hills is dreary
in the extreme, coarse grass, scrub wood, and dwarf-palms being the
only vegetation. In summer the desert tracts radiate an intolerable
heat, and water is scarce. This, coupled with the unhealthiness of
the river lowlands, accounts for the inferiority of the Mohmands to
their Afridi and Shinwari neighbours in physique; and they are
little recruited for the Indian army. The crops are largely dependent
on the rainfall, and should this fail, considerable distress ensues.
The hills, indeed, cannot support the population. The country
exports little except grass, firewood, dwarf-palm, and charcoal. But
there is a considerable through trade, the carrying of which supple-
ments the people's resources. They also levy dues on the timber
rafted down from Kabul. Since the Khyber Pass was opened, however,
the routes through the Mohmand country have lost much of their
importance. The Mohmands are closely allied to the Yusufzai
Pathans. Under them are two vassal tribes : the Satis, probably Kafirs
converted to Islam, of whom little is known ; and the Mullagoris,
who inhabit the country between the Kabul river and the Khyber
Pass. This tribe is a small one and cannot muster more than 500
to 800 fighting men, but has now for many years maintained its
independence and denies ever having held a position of subordination
to the Mohmands. The Mohmands formed one of the group of
Afghan tribes which, driven eastward by Mongol inroads between
386 MOHMAND COUNTRY
the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, overran the country west and
north of Peshawar District, expelling or subduing the Hindu and
non-Afghan races. Their success was in great measure due to their
possession of hereditary chiefs or Khans, who kept together forces
which have gradually worn down the resistance of the disunited Shin-
waris. The chief of these is the Khan of Lalpura, but there are several
minor Khans, and one family claims that title as the hereditary
guardian of the saris hia or code of tribal law and custom. The
Khans of Lalpura at various times owed allegiance to Akbar and
Shah Jahan, to Nadir Shah and Ahmad Shah Durrani. About
1782, however, Arsala Khan of Lalpura revolted against Timur Shah
Durrani, but was compelled to submit, and was executed at Peshawar
in 1791. Thereafter the history of the family is one of constant
bloodshed. Saadat Khan, who held the Khanship for forty years,
was a faithful vassal of the Barakzai dynasty of Afghanistan ; but in
1864 he was arrested by the Amir for constant aggressions on the
British border and died a prisoner at Kabul. After a period of
anarchy, Akbar Khan was appointed in 1880 by the British Govern-
ment. His extravagance and dissipation, however, greatly diminished
his influence, and in 1896 he resigned his position and now lives
at Kabul. In 1896 also the Utmanzai, Dawezai, Halimzai, Tarakzai,
and Pindiali Mohmands came under the sole control of the British
Government, and have received allowances from that date. In 1903
allowances were also fixed for the Musa Khel Mitai Mohmands.
The Mohmands have a great reputation for bravery among the neigh-
bouring tribes, and can muster about 18,000 fighting men. They are
fairly well armed.
During the early period of British rule the Mohmands gave more
trouble than any other frontier tribe : and for many years their his-
tory was a series of wanton outrages in British territory, culminating
in the unprovoked murder of a British officer in 1873. and followed
by the usual punitive expeditions. In 1895 the Mohmands, with
no other justification than the Adda Mulla's fanatical preaching, joined
in the resistance to the Chitral relief force. In 1897 they were among
the first to raise the standard of jihad against the British power, and
attacked Shabkadar. The Mohmand country was accordingly in-
vaded from Bajaur by two brigades of the Malakand field force under
Sir Bindon Blood, and from Shabkadar by two more under Sir Edmond
Elles.
A branch of the tribe has settled in the south-west corner of
Peshawar District, and is now quite separate from the main body.
Mohol.— Village in the Madha tdluka of Sholapur District,
Bombay, situated in 170 49' N. and 750 39' E., on the Poona-
Sholapur road, about 20 miles south-east of Madha, on the Great
MOKOKCHUXG 387
Indian Peninsula Railway. Population (1901), 4,904. A weekly
market is held on Sunday. A school is maintained by the American
Mission. The town contains two temples, an old fort used under
Maratha. rule for the offices of the former Mohol subdivision, and two
ruined forts outside the town, built about 200 years ago by the local
Deshmukhs. The two temples of Bhaneshwar and Nilkantheshwar
or Chandramauli are both said to have been built by Hemadpant.
A yearly fair is held at the Nilkantheshwar temple during three
days, beginning with the fourth of the bright half of Vaishakh (April-
May). According to local tradition, Mohol is a very old town. It is
supposed to have suffered severely in the war between Hindus and
Musalmans at the close of the thirteenth century, and the present
Deshmukh and Deshpande families of the Madha taluka claim
descent from officers appointed by the victorious Musalmans. During
the great Durga-devi famine (1396-1408) the town is said to have
been abandoned and to have taken twenty-five years to recover.
Another local story says that Mohol was the residence of the god
Nagnath, who afterwards proceeded to Vadval, 5 miles to the
south-east. Nagnath's temples at Mohol and Vadval were built
about 1730 by Ghongre, a rich merchant of Vairag.
Mohpa. — Town in the Katol tahsll of Nagpur District, Central
Provinces, situated in 210 19' N. and 780 50' E., 21 miles north-
west of Nagpur city by road. Population (1901), 5,336. Mohpa is
not a municipality, but a town fund is raised for sanitary purposes.
A cotton-ginning factory with a capital of about Rs. 35,000 has
been opened, and another is under construction. The town is sur-
rounded by gardens, from which vegetables are sent to Nagpur. It
has a vernacular middle school.
Mokameh {Mukdma). -Town in the Barh subdivision of Patna
District, Bengal, situated in 25° 25' N. and S5" 53' E., on the right
or south bank of the Ganges. Population (1901), 13,861. It is a
station on the East Indian Railway, 283 miles distant from Calcutta,
and is a junction for passengers proceeding by the Bengal and
North-Western Railway. The town contains a large number of
European and Eurasian railway employes, and is an important centre
of trade.
Moka Pagina Muvada. — Petty Slate in Rlwa Kaxtha,
Bombay.
Mokokchung. — Subdivision of the Naga Hills District, Eastern
Bengal and Assam, lying between 26° 6' and 260 48' N. and 940 16'
and 940 50' E., with an area of 733 square miles. The population
rose from 26,416 in 1891 to 33,783 in 1901, giving a density of
46 persons per square mile. A large portion of this increase was
due to the immigration of tribes from beyond the frontier. The
3§8 MOKOKCHUNG
subdivision was formed in 1889, in order to protect the Ao Nagas
from the aggression of the tribes that live to the east of the Dikho
river, and is in charge of a European officer of police. The annual
rainfall at MokokchQng village averages 96 inches. The principal
source of revenue is house tax, which in 1903-4 amounted to
Rs. 23,800.
Mokundurra. — Village and pass in Kotah State, Rajputana. See
MUKANDWARA.
Molakalmuru. — North-eastern taluk of Chitaldroog District,
Mysore, lying between 140 34' and 150 2' N. and 760 36' and
760 52' E., with an area of 290 square miles. The population in
1 901 was 37,744, compared with 32,560 in 1891. There are three
towns, Molakalmuru (population, 2,915), the head-quarters, Deva-
samudra (2,004), and Rampura (1,845); an^ 94 villages. The land
revenue demand in 1903-4 was Rs. 54,000. The taluk is a long
and narrow strip of country jutting into Bellary District. A few
isolated villages on the west are entirely separated from the re-
mainder. The surface is very undulating, and except where rice
and garden lands exist is covered with rocks and loose stones. A
range of bare rocky hills runs right across the taluk from south-
east to north-west, among which are the Nunke Bhairava hill (3,022
feet) and the Jatinga Ramesvara hill (3,469 feet). More than a
third of the surface is occupied by these hills, which are so barren
that not a blade of grass or a tree will grow on their sides. Nearly
9 square miles in the south are taken up with kammar jungle. The
south is comparatively level, but the soil very poor. The Janagahalla
river flows along the western boundary for a short distance, and then
turns north-east across the taluk under the name of Chinna-Haggari,
receiving the drainage of the bare rock)* hills around. All tanks of any
importance are close to the river and fed by channels from it. Wells
are numerous, and two crops of rice are raised in the year by their
means. Betel-vines, tobacco, wheat, and jola are also grown, the first
in the north for the Bellary market. Blankets, coarse cotton cloth,
women's saris with silk borders, and tape for belts, are the principal
manufactures. Iron ore from the Kumarasvami hill in Sandur State
is smelted in one or two villages.
Momeik. — Shan State and subdivision of the Ruby Mines District,
Upper Burma. See Mongmit.
Mominabad. — Town in Bhir District, Hyderabad State. See
Ami? a Town.
Mone. — One of the Southern Shan States, Burma. See Mongnai.
Mong. — One of the three circles into which the Chittagong Hill
Tracts, Eastern Bengal and Assam, arc divided for administrative
purposes. It occupies the north-west corner of the District, lying
MONGHYR DISTRICT 389
between 22° 45' and 230 47' N. and 91° 41' and 92° 7' E., with an
area of 653 square miles. The greater part of the country consists of
hills and ravines covered with dense tree jungle. The population
in 1901 was 31,898, compared with 22,708 in 1891. Most of the
people are Tipperas (see Hill Tippera). There are 128 villages,
of which Maxikcheri is the residence of the chief who administers
the circle. The title of Along Raja is hereditary ; the present in-
cumbent is Raja Nephru Sain.
Mong (Afftng). — Milage in the Phalia tahsll of Gujrat District, Pun-
jab, situated in 320 39' N. and 73° ^ E., 35 miles from Gujrat town.
It stands on an old ruined mound, the modern houses being built
of large ancient bricks. Greek and Indo-Scythian coins are found
in numbers among the ruins, many of them bearing the monogram
NIK \ but General Cunningham's identification of Mong as the
site of Nikaia, the city built by Alexander to commemorate his
victory over Porus, is no longer accepted. Tradition assigns the
origin of the mound to Raja Moga, whom Cunningham identified
with the Maues of the coins. The head-works of the Jhelum
Canal are situated in the neighbourhood.
Monghsu and Mongsang (Burmese, Maingshu and Maingsin). —
Two small States (recently amalgamated) in the north of the eastern
division of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 210 31/
and 220 5' N. and 980 11/ and 980 32' E., with an area of 164 square
miles. Both States used formerly to be part of the Northern Shan
State of North Hsenwi, but were made separate charges in 1S57.
The combined State is bounded on the north and east by Manglon ;
on the south by Mongnawng ; and on the west by Mongnawng and
Kehsi Mansam. It consists mainly of rugged hills and broad valleys,
watered by the Nam Pang and its affluents ; and rice is the only
crop grown to any extent. The population in 190 1 was 17,480,
distributed in 265 villages. More than 14,000 of this total consisted
of Shans, and the greater part of the remainder were Yins. A few
Palaungs live in the hills. The residence of the Myoza is at Monghsu
(population, 244), to the east of the Nam Pang on a tributary of that
stream. The revenue in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 11,000 (all from
thathameda) ; and the chief items of expenditure were Rs. 5,600
tribute to the British Government, Rs. 2,700 privy purse, and Rs. 1,700
general charges on account of administration.
Monghyr District (Mungtr). — District in the Bhagalpur Division
of Bengal, lying between 240 22' and 250 49' N. and 850 36' and
86° 51/ E., with an area of 3,922 square miles. Monghyr is bounded
on the north by the Districts of Bhagalpur and Darbhanga ; on the
east by Bhagalpur ; on the south by the Santal Parganas and
Hazaribagh ; and on the west by Gaya, Patna, and Darbhanga.
39o MONGHYR DISTRICT
The Ganges flows through the District from west to east, dividing
it into two portions of unequal size and of very different character.
The northern portion is a great alluvial plain,
^e'ts' differing but little from the adjoining portions
of Darbhanga and Bhagalpur. This portion is
again subdivided by the Burhi Gandak, the country to the west
of that river being similar to the indigo-growing tracts of North
Bihar. The remaining portion is traversed by the Tiljuga, also
called the Kamla, and by the Baghmati, which was possibly at one
time a continuation of the river of the same name which joins
the Gandak to the east of Muzaffarpur. It is seamed by deserted
channels ; and the whole area, which covers about 200 square miles,
is low-lying, swampy, and liable to inundation. The south of the
District is also to a great extent alluvial ; but the general level
is higher and the surface more undulating, and several ranges of
hills, outliers of the Vindhyan series, enter the District from the
south and converge towards Monghyr town. The principal are the
Kharagpur hills, which form a distinct watershed, the Kiul river
draining the western, and the Man and other streams the eastern
portion of the range. The main channel of the Ganges has several
times shifted both to the east and to the west of the rock on which
the Monghyr fort stands, alternately forming and washing away large
areas of didra lands ; but since the earliest times of which any record
exists, it has washed the base of the rock immediately to the north
of the fort. The largest areas of alluvial deposit formed by these
changes in the main channel are comprised in the Government estates
of Kutlupur to the west, and Binda didra to the east of Monghyr
town. A large marsh, known as the Kabartal, in the north of the
Begusarai subdivision, apparently marks the old bed of one of the
large rivers, and drains eastward through the low tract lying in
the north-east of the District.
North of the Ganges the older rocks are concealed by the alluvium
of the Gangetic plain ; but south of the river the level rises rapidly
and the older rocks soon appear, first as more or less disconnected
hill groups, and farther south as a continuous uninterrupted outcrop.
These rocks consist of the oldest system recognized by geologists,
that known as Archaean. They include a vast series of crystalline
rocks of varied composition, including granitic and dioritic gneisses,
hornblende and mica-schists, epidiorites, crystalline limestones, and
many other rocks collectively known as Bengal gneiss ; another very
ancient series consisting of highly altered sedimentary and volcanic
rocks, including quartzites, quartz-schists, hornblendic, micaceous,
talcose, and ferruginous schists, potstones, phyllitcs, slates, &c, forming
an assemblage very similar to that which has received the name
PHYSICAL ASPECTS 391
of Dharwar schists in Southern India ; and vast granitic masses
and innumerable veins of coarse granitic pegmatite, intruded amongst
both the schists and the Bengal gneiss. The Bengal gneiss occupies
principally the southernmost part of the District. The ancient
stratified series assimilated with the Dharwars forms several hill
groups situated between the southern gneissose area and the valley
of the Ganges : these are the Kharagpur hills, the largest of the
hill masses situated south of Monghyr and east of Luckeesarai, the
Sheikhpura hills and the Gidhaur range, respectively west and south
of Luckeesarai. The rocks of the Gidhaur range are highly meta-
morphosed by innumerable veins of coarse granitic pegmatites, which
are of great economic importance on account of the mica they contain,
and constitute the eastern portion of the great mica-belt of Bengal.
The coarsest grained, and consequently the most valuable, pegmatites
are the comparatively narrow sheets which intersect the schists of the
metamorphosed stratified series. The larger and more uniform com-
paratively fine-grained intrusions are valueless so far as mica is
concerned, though they belong to the same system of intrusions.
On account of its habit of weathering in the shape of large rounded
hummocks, the rock forming these more massive intrusions has often
been described under the name of dome-gneiss, which, more accurately,
should be dome-granite. The rocks of the Kharagpur hills are not
nearly so much altered as those of the Gidhaur range. The strata
originally constituted by shales, which, in the latter range, have been
transformed into schists, are only altered to slates in the Kharagpur
hills. These slates, which are regularly cleaved and of fairly good
quality, are quarried to a certain extent *.
In the portions of the District near the Ganges the rice-fields
abound with the usual weeds of such localities.' In the swampy
tract to the east of the BurhT Gandak, rank pod grass and the
graceful pampas grow in abundance, and below them dubh and
other succulent grasses. Near villages there are often considerable
groves of mango-trees and palmyra palms ; and north of the Ganges
perhaps nine-tenths of the trees are mangoes, the fruit of which forms
an important item in the food-supply of the poorer classes. Farther
from the river on the south the country is more diversified ; and,
though no Government forests exist, an area estimated at about
427 square miles is under forest, chiefly towards the southern con-
fines of the District and in the Kharagpur estate of the Maharaja
of Darbhanga. The principal trees growing in the alluvial and
1 T. H. Holland, ' Mica Deposits of India,' Memoirs, Geological Survey of India,
vol. xxxiv. pt. ii. The above account was contributed by Mr. E. Yredenburg,
Deputy-Superintendent, Geological Survey of India.
392 WONGHYR D /STRICT
cultivated areas are the mango {Mangifera indicd), plpal (Fia/s
religiosa), banyan {Incus indtca), sin's {Mimosa Sirissa), nlm {Alelia
Azadirachta), jamun {Eugenia Jambolaua), sissu {Dalbergia Sissoo),
red cotton-tree {Bombax malabaricum), pakar {Ficus infectoria), jack-
fruit tree {Artocarpus integrifolia), bel-ftmt tree {Aegle Afarmelos),
babul {Acacia arabica), palmyra {Borassus flabellifer), and date-palm
{Phoenix sylvestris) ; while the most important of the trees which
clothe the hills and the undulating country in their neighbourhood
are the sal {Shorea robusta), kend {Diospyros melanoxylon), the black
heart of which forms the ebony of local commerce, the dsan {Ter-
minalia tomentosa\ palds {Butea frondosa), pidr {Buchanania latifolia),
gamhar {Gmelina arborea), gular {Ficus oppositifolia), and the mahud
(Bassia latifolia). Perhaps the most useful of all these trees is the
mahud, which yields food, wine, oil, and timber. From its flowers
the common country spirit is distilled, and whether fresh or dried
they furnish the poorer classes with wholesome food ; from its fruit
is pressed an oil largely used for the adulteration of ghl ; and the
tough timber is used for the naves of wheels.
Rope is made in large quantities from a jungle creeper called chehdr
{Bauhinia Vahlii), and also from the coarse sabai grass {Ischaemutn
atigustifolium). Lac is collected to a very small extent for exportation
and for making bracelets, toys, Szc. The insects are found chiefly on
the small branches and petioles of the palds-tree {Butea frondosa).
This tree also affords a valuable gum and a yellow dye of considerable
permanence.
Tigers are not common, though they are said to have been respon-
sible for sixty-nine deaths in 1900. Leopards, hyenas, and black bears
are found in the hills, and wild hog in most parts of the District. Several
varieties of deer are met with, such as the sdmbar, chital or spotted
deer, and barking-deer. The ' ravine deer ' — more properly the Indian
gazelle {Gazella bennetti) — also occurs. The marshes in the north are
visited during the cold season by myriads of geese, ducks, and cranes ;
and peafowl, jungle-fowl, and spur-fowl are still found in small numbers
among the hills in the south of the District. These birds, however,
like the larger wild animals, have now been nearly exterminated by
hunters and the forest tribes.
The temperature is moderate except during the hot months of April,
May, and June, when the westerly winds from Central India cause high
temperature with very low humidity. The annual rainfall averages
47 inches, of which 6-9 inches fall in June, 13-2 in July, 11-9 in August,
and 8 in September. In the earthquake of 1897 considerable damage
was done to masonry buildings at the head-quarters station and at
Jamalpur.
In early times the present site of Monghyr town lay within the
HISTORY
old Hindu kingdom of Anga, while a portion of the western part of
the District appears to have been included within the limits of the
ancient kingdom of Magadha. There are still several
traces of Buddhist remains in this portion of the Dis-
trict ; and ruins at Rajaona have been identified by General Cunning-
ham with those of a monastery visited by the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen
Tsiang. The District subsequently passed under the Pal dynasty ;
and a relic of their rule still exists in a copperplate found on the site
of the fort in 1780, which contains an inscription of uncertain date
recording that the armies of Raja Deb Pal (tenth century a.d.) crossed
the Ganges by a bridge of boats. The next mention of Monghyr is in
connexion with the conquest of Bihar and Bengal by the Muhamma-
dans, when Monghyr town wras taken by Muhammad-i-Bakhtyar Khiljl
(circa 1198). In 1580, when Raja Todar Mai was sent by the emperor
Akbar to reduce the rebellious chiefs of Bengal, he made Monghyr his
head-quarters and constructed lines of entrenchment there. In the
next century Shah Shuja, after his defeat by Aurangzeb in 1659,
retreated to Monghyr and strengthened the fortifications and outer lines
of entrenchment, but hurriedly abandoned the fort on hearing that
Mir Jumla was threatening his line of retreat. Subsequently in 1763
the Nawab, Mir Kasim AlT, selected the town as his capital and
established an arsenal here. After the defeat of his army at Udhua
Nullah, he retreated to Monghyr, but fled on the approach of the
British under Major Adams ; and the governor in command of the
fort capitulated after a two days' bombardment. The greater part of
the country, especially to the south of the Ganges, remained for some
time in the hands of semi-independent chieftains, the most powerful
of these being the Raja of Kharagpur, who ruled at one time over
24 parganas. The founder of this family was a Rajput soldier of
fortune, who overthrew the original Khetauri proprietors by an act
of gross treachery ; and in the reign of the emperor Jahanglr his son
and successor strengthened his position by embracing Islam and taking
a wife from the imperial zana?ia. The downfall of the line dates from
the British occupation, when the ancestral estates were rapidly sold
one after another for arrears of revenue, a large portion being bought
by the Maharaja of Darbhanga. Other ancient families are those of
Gidhaur and of the Rajas of Pharkiya, the latter of whom trace their
descent from a Rajput who first brought the lawless tribes of Dosadhs
under subjection in the reign of Humayun, and subsequently received
a zamindari grant in 1494. Portions of the property still continue in
his family, but the estate has been much broken up by subdivision and
alienation. The modern history of Monghyr will be found in the
article on Bhagalpur District, within which it was included in the
earlier days of English administration. The local records do not give
394
MONGHYR DISTRICT
the date of the establishment of the District as a suhsidiary executive
circle, but this change appears to have been effected about the begin-
ning of the nineteenth century. In 1832 Monghyr was made an
independent Deputy-Collectorship and Joint-Magistracy, and the title
of Magistrate and Collector was subsequently given to the District
officer.
The District contains several remains of antiquarian interest. In
addition to the great fort at Monghyr, there are the ruins of other
forts at Indpe (near Jamui), Naulakhagarh near Khaira, Chakai, Jai-
mangalgarh in the Kabartal and Naula in the Begusarai subdivision.
Buddhist remains are to be found at Rajaona and Hasanganj near
Luckeesarai, and at Uren near Kajra. There is an inscription of about
the tenth century at Kashtharani Ghat and another referring to the
Bengal Sultan Rukn-ud-din Kaikaus (1297) at Luckeesarai. The oldest
extant building of the Muhammadan period is the dargah of Shah
Nafah, built in 1497-8 by Daniyal, son of Ala-ud-dTn Husain, king of
Bengal.
The population increased from 1,814,638 in 1872 to 1,969,950 in
i88r, to 2,036,021 in 1891, and to 2,068,804 in 1901. The District is
fairly healthy, though cholera is epidemic ; and the
Population. falljng off in the rate of progress indicated by the
census returns is chiefly due to the appearance of plague in 1900,
which, in addition to the consequent mortality, caused a large number
of persons to leave the District. The principal statistics of the Census
of 1901 are shown below: —
Subdivision.
Area in square
miles.
Number of
Population.
u
§a
--- CO
Q«cr
O Vi
554
346
857
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween 1891
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
09
c
0
H
3
1
4
v>
>
Monghyr .
Jamui
Begxisarai .
District total
1,578
i,593
75i
923
838
755
874,611
551,227
642,966
+ 0-4
- 0-5
+ 5-2
26,875
15,537
18,315
3,922
2,516
2,068,804
527
+ 1.6
60,727
Note.— In 1904 and 1905 changes of jurisdiction were effected, with the result that
the area of the Monghyr subdivision was increased to 1,895 square miles, and that of
the Jamfii subdivision* reduced to 1,276 square miles. The population of the sub-
divisions as now constituted is 1,050,840 and 374,998, and the density 555 and 294
persons respectively per square mile.
The density is greatest north of the Ganges, where there are 693 per-
sons per square mile, as compared with only 412 persons in the south
Gangetic tract, while in the extreme south, on the borders of Hazari-
bagh, there are barely 250 persons per square mile. The greatest
growth has occurred in the fertile Begusarai subdivision on the north
AGRICULTURE, ETC 395
of the Ganges ; but the sparsely inhabited hilly thdnas in the south-
east also show a steady development. The four towns are Monghyr,
the head-quarters, Jamalpur, Sheikhpura, and Khagakia, the first
two being municipalities. There is considerable emigration among
the labouring classes, especially to Central and North Bengal and to
Assam. The vernacular in the north is the Maithili, and in the
south the Magadhi dialect of Bihari. Hindus constitute 90-3 per cent,
of the total population and Muhammadans 9-5 per cent.
The most numerous Hindu castes are Ahirs and Goalas (240,000),
Babhans (189,000), Dhanuks (132,000), Musahars (123,000), Dosadhs
(115,000), and Koiris (110,000); while Brahmans, Chamars and
Kandus, Rajputs, Tantis, and Telis have each more than 50,000
representatives. The Babhans are for the most part occupancy ryots
or tenure-holders. The Musahars, Dosadhs, and Chamars may be
considered semi-Hinduized aborigines. The Musalmans are chiefly
Shaikhs, Jolahas, and Kunjras. Two-thirds of the population are
supported by agriculture, 13-6 per cent, by industries, i-i per cent, by
commerce, and i«6 by the professions.
Christians number 1,433, of whom 423 are natives. The Baptist
Mission, which is said to have been established at Monghyr in 1816,
has stations at Begusarai and Luckeesarai. There are two European
missionaries, and two European ladies also work among the native
women. The United Free Church of Scotland opened a branch at
Chakai in 1879, which works chiefly among the Santals ; the mission
maintains a hospital, with a branch dispensary and several schools.
The fertile plain north of the Ganges, from the boundary of Dar-
bhanga District to the mouth of the Gandak, is almost entirely under
cultivation, the chief crops being bhadol and rain. .
_. , ' , , r 1 • cl Agriculture, &c.
The depressed tract to the east of this grows fine
rabi crops in some places and rice in others ; but during the rains it is
to a large extent inundated and uninhabited, and there are large tracts
of pasture where herds graze in the dry and hot season. South of the
Ganges the cultivated area lies chiefly in the basin of the Kiul river and
its tributaries, and in pargana Kharagpur, where the largest area is
under winter rice. The tract to the north of Sheikhpura and west
of Luckeesarai, which is also liable to inundation, is nearly all devoted
to bhadol and rabi.
The chief agricultural statistics for 1903-4 are shown in the tabic
on the next page, areas being in square miles.
About 67 per cent, of the cultivated area is estimated to be twice
cropped.
In the Begusarai subdivision north of the Ganges, for which exact
figures are available on account of the survey in progress, it has been
found that in the Begusarai thdna 79 per cent, and in Teghra 86 per
vol. xvu c c
;96
MONGHYR DISTRICT
cent, of the total area is cultivated. In both thdnas maize is the most
important crop, covering about one-fourth of the total. Wheat, gram,
marud, and barley are also extensively grown. Winter rice accounts
for less than 10 per cent, of the land in Begusarai and less than 5 per
cent, in Teghra. Indigo is grown on 3 per cent, of the area in Begu-
sarai and on 5 per cent, of that in Teghra. In the whole District, rice
is the crop most extensively grown, and it was estimated to cover
447 square miles in 1903-4. The chief variety is winter rice, which is
raised for the most part south of the Ganges. Among other crops the
poppy is important, but is cultivated only in the southern portion of
the District ; while tobacco is almost confined to the portion north
of the Ganges.
Subdivision.
Total.
Cultivated.
Cultivable
waste.
Monghyr*.
Jamul* ....
Begusarai ....
Total
1,578
1-593
751
749
119
556
Il6
67
83
3>9^
i>424
266
* Owing to changes of jurisdiction, the area of the Monghyr subdivision has sub-
sequently been increased to 1,895 square miles, and that of the lamui subdivision
has been reduced to 1,276 square miles.
Cultivation is extending chiefly in the low-lying lands of the GogrI
thana, where the recently constructed railway from Hajipur to Katihar
has prevented inundation from the south. During the decade ending
1 90 1-2 an average of Rs. 3,000 per annum was advanced under the
Land Improvement Loans Act ; these advances are granted chiefly for
improving the means of irrigation. In the same period an average
of Rs. 7,000 per annum was advanced under the Agriculturists' Loans
Act, large loans being granted where necessary on account of the
failure of the crops owing to drought or flood.
The cattle are generally small and inferior to the breeds in Patna
and Shahabad Districts. There is ample pasturage among the hills in
the south during the rainy season, and on the grass lands of Pharkiya
in the dry season.
The only large irrigation work is in the Kharagpur estates of the
Maharaja of Darbhanga. While the estate was under the Court of
Wards, a dam was built across the river Man about two miles above
Kharagpur, by which water is banked up in a valley and thence
distributed by irrigation channels over an area of about 28 square
miles. This useful scheme, which cost less than 7 lakhs, has been
chiefly instrumental in raising the rent-roll of the estates by more than
300 per cent, or from about Rs. 40,000 to nearly Rs. 1,30,000.
Llsewhere in the southern portion of the District there are a few
TRADE AND COMMUNICATIONS 397
artificial irrigation channels taking off from hill-streams, but the
principal method of irrigation consists in storing water in artificial
reservoirs, known as dhars. Wells are also used for irrigation purposes
north of the Ganges, where artificial irrigation is little required as the
country is subject to inundation during the rains.
The fisheries in the Ganges and Gandak and in the large jhils lying
in pargana Pharkiya are very extensive, and the supply of fish is
abundant during the greater part of the year. There is an extensive
trade in the shells of the fresh-water mussel ( Unio) and marsh snail
(Ampul/aria), which are collected in tons in the Pharkiya marshes and,
when burned, yield a very pure lime.
Minerals are entirely confined to the tract lying south of the Ganges.
Galena, a sulphuret of lead containing a small quantity of silver, is
found in the hill tracts of the Chakai pargana, and minium or
protoxide of lead in the beds of the Kharagpur hill streams. Mica
occurs in the belt of schists and gneissose granite which stretches
north-eastwards from Gaya District to near Nawadih (Jha-Jha) on the
East Indian Railway. In 1903-4 four mines were worked, with an
output of 227 tons. Iron ores are found in the schists of the
Kharagpur hills, and in several places ochreous ores are employed as
pigments. Slates are quarried near Jamalpur, the output in 1903-4
being 213 tons; and stone quarries are also worked. Felspar fit for
the manufacture of porcelain occurs in abundance in the south of the
District. Corundum is obtained from the hills near Jamui, but the
precious forms are not met with. Travertine is found near Gidhaur
and in the Kharagpur hills.
Monghyr has long been famous for its manufacture of firearms,
which was introduced when there was a Musalman garrison in the fort.
A serviceable double-barrelled gun can be obtained at
Monghyr for Rs. 30, a single-barrelled gun for Rs. 15, communications#
and a large double-barrelled pistol for the same sum.
Swords and iron articles ot various kinds are also made, but of no
special excellence. Cotton-weaving is largely carried on ; and there are
a few dyers and calico printers, the centre of the latter industry being
Sheikhpura. Coarse blankets are woven by a few families of Gareris.
Among other minor industries may be mentioned cabinet-making and
boat-making, soap-boiling, making porous water-bottles of clay, carving
lingams or emblems of Siva out of chlorite, basket -weaving, and straw
work. Sticks, jewellery cases, and other articles are made of ebony
and inlaid with ivory or bone. Imitation fish are made of silver and
used as caskets and scent phials. Sheikhpura is noted for its manu-
facture of tubes for the hukka or native pipe. The East Indian
Railway Company's works at Jamalpur are the largest manufacturing
workshops in India, employing over y.000 hands. All the constituent
c c 2
398 MONGHYR DISTRICT
parts of a locomotive can now be constructed there, and railway
material of all descriptions is manufactured from malleable iron, cast
iron, and steel. The manufacture of indigo has declined, the out-turn
of dye in 1903-4 being 85 tons. The Gidhaur gur (raw sugar) from
the Jamui subdivision has a special reputation, and generally sells at
higher prices than that manufactured in other places. Aerated water
is made from various mineral springs.
The District is favourably situated for trade by both rail and river.
The most important river marts are Khagaria on the Gandak, and
Simaria, Monghyr, and Gogri on the Ganges. Barhiya, Luckeesarai,
Jamalpur, Sheikhpura, and Bariarpur are the chief centres of trade on
the railway, while a considerable volume of traffic passes via Tarapur to
Sultanganj station in Bhagalpur District. The chief articles of import
are piece-goods, coal and coke, rice, and sugar. The exports consist
mainly of agricultural produce, the chief items being gram and pulses,
linseed, wheat, mustard, rapeseed, chillies, and tobacco leaf. . There
is also a considerable export of raw sugar, and an equal import of
refined sugar ; ghl also is largely exported. The chief trading castes
are the local Baniyas, but there are many Marwaris in the towns and
larger villages.
South of the Ganges the loop-line of the East Indian Railway
(broad gauge) passes through the District from east to west, and the
chord-line from north-west to south-east, while the South Bihar
Railway runs through the Sheikhpura thana westwards to Gaya. The
Katihar-Hajipur section of the Bengal and North-Western Railway
(metre gauge) traverses the District north of the Ganges from east to
west. The District board maintains 95 miles of metalled and 1,471
miles of unmetalled roads, including 194 miles of village tracks. The
most important roads are : the Tirhut road running westwards from
the north bank of the Ganges opposite to Monghyr town, the Monghyr-
Bhagalpur and Monghyr-Patna roads, and the roads from Bariarpur to
Kharagpur, and from Luckeesarai to Sheikhpura and to Jamui. The
District board controls 56 ferries.
The Ganges, which intersects the District from west to east for
70 miles, is navigable at all seasons by river steamers and the largest
country boats ; and a considerable river traffic is carried on. The
steamers of the India General and River Steam Navigation Companies
convey goods and passengers to places between Calcutta and Patna.
The East Indian Railway has also a steamer service between Monghyr,
Mansi, and Gogri, and a ferry service across the Ganges opposite
Monghyr in connexion with the Bengal and North-Western Railway.
The Little Gandak and Tiljuga are navigable all the year round, but
only small craft of 10 tons burden can ply on them in the hot season.
During the rains a large portion of the northern part of the District
. / DMINIS TR. i TTOX 399
remains under water, and boats are then largely used as a means of
communication.
The famine of 1865-6 was severely felt in the south-west of the
District, and there were a large number of deaths from starvation and
diseases engendered by want. In 1874 another
failure of the rice crop threatened famine, which
was, however, averted by the facilities for importation afforded by the
railway and by the relief which Government provided on a lavish scale:
the total expenditure on this occasion amounted to 23-30 lakhs, of
which the larger portion consisted of advances. The crops were again
short in 1891, especially in the north of the District, and relief works
were open for some months. They were only resorted to by a small
proportion of the population, and the number on relief at no time rose
above 2,171. In 1896-7 the poor suffered from the high prices
consequent on famine elsewhere, but the crops were fairly good.
For administrative purposes the District is divided into three sub-
divisions, with head-quarters at Monghyr, JamuI, and Begusarai.
The District Magistrate-Collector is usually assisted ....
, ° „ . . r t ■ - Administration.
at head-quarters by a staff consisting of a Joint-
Magistrate and six Deputy-Magistrate-Collectors; while the subdivisions
of Begusarai and JamuI are each in charge of a Joint Magistrate.
Subordinate to the District Judge for the disposal of civil suits are
a Sub-Judge and five Munsifs, of whom two sit at Monghyr, two at
Begusarai, and one at JamuI. Criminal courts include those of the
District and Sessions Judge, who is also Judge of Bhagalpur, and
the above-mentioned magistrates. Riots are a very common form of
crime, due generally to disputes about land ; burglaries are numerous,
and dacoities are occasionally committed.
Sarkar Monghyr, assessed by Todar Mai at 7-41 lakhs, appears
to have embraced areas not included within the present Monghyr
District, and to have been almost entirely unsubdued ; it was probably
also largely unexplored. At the time of the British accession to the
Dlwani in 1765 it was assessed to a net revenue of 8-o8 lakhs, and
covered 8,270 square miles. It is not, in fact, practicable to institute
any comparison between the present revenue of Monghyr District and
the figures for years earlier than 1850, as till that year the land, excise,
and other revenue was for the most part paid into the Bhagalpur
treasury, and the accounts were not kept separately. Subdivision of
landed property has gone on rapidly ; the number of estates in 1 903-4
amounted to 8,027, of which 7,916 with a current demand of 7-77 lakhs
are permanently settled, 65 with a demand of Rs. 52,000 are temporarily
settled, and 46 with a demand of Rs. 72,000 are held direct by Govern
ment. Owing to the backward condition of the country at the time of
the Permanent Settlement, the incidence of the land revenue is very
4oo
MONGHYR DISTRICT
low, amounting to only 10 annas per cultivated acre, or less than
1 8 per cent, of the rental. Survey and settlement operations have
been completed in the portion of the District north of the Ganges and
in the Government estates south of that river. Occupancy holdings
average 1-75 acres in the Begusarai thdna, where there are large diara
holdings and jhlls, and 1-35 acres in Teghra; and the average rent is
Rs. 3-14-7 per acre in Begusarai, compared with Rs. 3-6-2 in Teghra.
For the whole District the incidence of rental per cultivated acre
is about Rs. 5-10-9. In the south the tenure known as bhaoli is
common ; under this system the tenant pays a rent in kind equal
to a certain proportion of the out-turn in each year, which is usually
one-half the produce.
The following table shows the collections of land revenue and of
total revenue (principal heads only), in thousands of rupees : —
1880-1.
1890-1.
1 900- 1.
'903-4.
Land revenue
Total revenue
8,87
r5»53
8,97
'7.71
8,82
20,70
9,00
22,28
Outside the municipalities of Monghyr and Jamalpur, local affairs
are managed by the District board, with the assistance of local boards
in each subdivision. In 1903-4 its income was Rs. 3,41,000, of which
Rs. 1,58,000 was derived from rates ; and the expenditure was
Rs. 3,13,000, the chief item being Rs. 2,11,000 spent on public works.
The District contains 18 police stations and independent outposts.
In 1903-4 the force subordinate to the District Superintendent con-
sisted of 3 inspectors, ^ sub-inspectors, 34 head constables, and
415 constables ; there was, in addition, a rural police of 310 daffadars
and 3,599 chaukidars. The District jail at Monghyr has accommo-
dation for 274 prisoners, and subsidiary jails at Jamul and Begusarai
for 72.
The great majority of the population are illiterate, only 2-9 per cent.
5-8 males and 0-2 females) being able to read and write in 190T.
The number of pupils under instruction decreased from 30,617 in
1882-3 to 25,449 in 1892-3, after which there was a large increase;
but it again declined to 25,738 in 1 900-1, when the attendance fell
off very greatly owing to the outbreak of plague. In 1903-4, 28,752
boys and 2,841 girls were at school, being respectively 18-9 and
1-7 per cent, of those of school-going age. The number of educational
institutions, public and private, in that year was 1,326, including one
Arts college, 22 secondary, 1,025 primary, and 278 special schools.
The most important of these are the Diamond Jubilee College and
the District school in Monghyr town, and the high schools at Begusarai
and Jamul. Among aborigines a few Santals in the south attend
MONGHYR TOWN _,oi
primary schools. The expenditure on education was 1.33 lakhs, of which
Rs. 9,000 was met from Provincial funds, Rs. 42,000 from District
funds, Rs. 4,000 from municipal funds, and Rs. 60,000 from fees.
In 1903 the District contained 13 dispensaries, of which 6 had
accommodation for a total of 132 in-patients. The cases of 8o,coo
out-patients and 1.200 in-patients were treated during the vear, and
5,503 operations were performed. The expenditure was Rs. 32,000, of
which Rs. 800 was met from Government contributions, Rs. 12,000
from Local and Rs. 5,000 from municipal funds, and Rs. to, 000
from private subscriptions.
Vaccination is compulsory only in municipal areas. In 1903-4 the
number of persons successfully vaccinated was 76,000, representing
37-9 per 1,000 of the population.
[M. Martin (Buchanan Hamilton), Eastern India, vol. ii (1838) ;
Sir W. W. Hunter, Statistical Account of Bengal, vol. w (1877).]
Monghyr Subdivision. — Head-quarters subdivision of Monghvr
District, Bengal, lying between 240 57' and 250 49' N. and 850 36" and
86° 51' E., with an area of 1,895 square miles. The subdivision is
divided into two portions by the Ganges. The northern portion
is a low, but fertile, alluvial plain ; the south is also to a great extent
alluvial, but the general level is higher and the surface more undulating,
and it contains hill ranges which gradually converge towards Monghyr
town. The population in 1901 was 874,611, compared with 870,755
in 1891, the density being 554 persons per square mile. At the time
of the Census it comprised an area of 1,578 square miles, but the
Sheikhpura thana was subsequently transferred to it from the Jamui
subdivision. The population of the subdivision as now constituted is
1,050,840, and the density 555 persons per square mile. It contains
four towns, Monghvr (population, 35,880), the head-quarters, Jamal-
pur (13,929), Khacaria (11,492), and Sheikhpura (10,135); ar>d
1,262 villages. The chief centres of trade are Monghyr town and
Khagaria. The head-quarters of the locomotive department of the East
Indian Railway are situated at Jamalpur. Kiul near Luckeesarai is
an important railway junction.
Monghyr Town (Mungir). — Head-quarters of Monghyr District,
Bengal, situated in 250 23' N. and 86° 28" E., on the south bank of
the Ganges. The origin of the name of Monghyr is very uncertain.
It is said that the place was formerly called Madgalpur, or Madgalasram,
from its having been the abode of Madgal Muni, a hermit saint who
lived in early Hindu times. Another explanation, founded on the
authority of the Harivansa, derives the name from a certain Madgal
Raja, one of the sons of Visvamitra, son of a Gadhi Raja, who received
this part of his father's dominions. Dr. Buchanan Hamilton states
that on an inscription seven or eight centuries old, found at Monghyr
402 MONGHYR TOWN
and perhaps more ancient than the Harivansa, the name is written
Madgagiri, or 'the hill of Madga,' and not Madgalpurl, or 'the ahode
of Madgal.' The existence, therefore, of both the saint and the prince
is very doubtful. Possibly the original name was Munigriha, ' the
abode of the muni] and was corrupted into Munglr, in the same way
as Rajagriha has been corrupted into Rajglr.
Tradition assigns the foundation of the town to Chandra Gupta,
after whom it was called Guptagarh, a name which has been found
inscribed on a rock at Kashtharani Ghat at the north-western corner
of the present fort. A copperplate found on the site of the fort in
1780 contains an inscription of uncertain date, recording that the
armies of Raja Deb Pal here crossed the Ganges by a bridge of boats ;
the date usually assigned to Deb Pal is the tenth century. Monghyr
is first mentioned by Muhammadan historians as having been taken
by Muhammad-i-Bakhtyar KhiljT, during the conquest of Bihar, about
1198; and henceforth it is often referred to as a place of military
importance. Prince Daniyal, son of Ala-ud-dln Husain, the Afghan
king of Gaur, repaired the fortifications in 1497 and built a vault over
the tomb of Shah Nafah, the Muhammadan patron saint of the town ;
and in 1580 Raja Todar Mai, on being deputed by Akbar to reduce
the rebellious Afghan chiefs of Bengal, made Monghyr his head-
quarters and constructed entrenchments between the Ganges and the
hills. Shah Shuja, after his defeat by Aurangzeb near Khajuha,
retreated here in 1659, and, resolving to make a stand against the
imperial troops, strengthened the fortifications and threw up lines of
entrenchment; on learning, however, that Mir Jumla had got round
to his rear by forced marches through the hills of Jharkand, he hurriedly
withdrew his troops from the trenches and beat a retreat to Rajmahal.
In the next century, when the Nawab, Mir Kasim AIT, determined on
war against the English, he selected Monghyr as his capital in 1763,
and established an arsenal under the supervision of his Armenian
general, Ghurghin (Gregory) Khan : the gun-making industry for which
the town is famous is said to date from the establishment of this
arsenal. He retreated here after the defeat of his army at Udhua
Nullah, but fled on the approach of the British troops under Major
Adams ; and the governor who was left in command of the fort
capitulated after a two days' bombardment. A spot by the side of
the fort is still pointed out as the scene of the memorable outrage,
when the two Seths, the great Hindu bankers of Murshidabad, were
thrown into the Ganges on a charge of favouring the British cause.
Monghyr has been a place of considerable importance since the earliest
days of the British occupation of Bengal, although it did not become
a civil station until 1812 ; and the old Musalman fort was once
occupied by a regiment belonging to the East India Company.
MONGKUNG 403
At present Monghyr is a purely civil station, and in some respects
one of the most picturesque in Bengal. It consists of two distinct
portions — the fort, within which are situated the public offices and
residences of the Europeans ; and the native town, stretching away
from the former eastward and southward along the river. The fort
is formed by a great rampart of earth enclosing a rocky eminence,
and is faced with stone. It was probably at one time a strong position ;
towards the west the river comes up to the walls, forming a natural
defence, while to the landward a deep wide ditch surrounds and
protects it.
The population fell from 59,698 in 1872 to 55,372 in 1881 ; it rose
again to 57,077 in 189 1 but dropped to 35,880 in 1901, when it
included 26,715 Hindus and 8,950 Muhammadans. The decrease on
the last occasion was due to the fact that the plague was raging
severely in the town at the time when the Census was taken, and
that a large number of the inhabitants had temporarily left to
escape its ravages. A second enumeration, taken at the end of July
when the plague had disappeared, gave a population of 50,133. The
town is favourably situated for trade by both rail and river ; formerly
the trade was carried almost exclusively by river, but the greater part
has been diverted to the railway. It is connected by a short branch
with the loop-line of the East Indian Railway, and by a steam ferry
with the railway system on the north of the Ganges.
Monghyr was constituted a municipality in 1864. The income
during the decade ending 190 1-2 averaged Rs. 64,000, and the
expenditure Rs. 60,000. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 73,000,
including Rs. 23,000 derived from a tax on houses and land, Rs. 13,000
from tolls, Rs. 10,000 from a conservancy rate, Rs. 3,000 from a tax
on vehicles, &c, Rs. 7,000 from revenue from municipal property and
interest on investments, and Rs. 12,000 as grants from various
sources. The incidence of taxation was nearly R. 1 per head of the
population. In the same year the expenditure amounted to Rs. 68,000,
the chief items being Rs. 1,500 spent on lighting, Rs. 6,000 on drainage,
Rs. 21,000 on conservancy, Rs. 13,000 on medical relief, Rs. 8,000 on
roads, and Rs. 3,000 on education. A drainage scheme and a project
for providing a filtered water-supply are under preparation.
Mongkiing (Burmese, Maitigkai/ig). — A large State in the eastern
division of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 210 15' and
220 4' N. and 970 8' and 970 58' E., with an area of 1,643 square miles.
It is bounded on the north by the Northern Shan State of HsTpaw; on
the east by HsTpaw, Kehsi Mansam, and Mongnawng : on the south by
Laihka ; and on the west by Lawksawk. The eastern part and the centre
of the State are drained by the head-waters of the Nam Teng ; and the
large plain surrounding Mongkiing (population, 1,190), the residence of
404 MONGKUNG
the Myoza, is almost entirely under cultivation and thickly populated.
The western side is watered by the Nam Lang. Excepting the central
plain and the valley of the Nam Lang, the country is formed of low
hills covered with oak and pine. Rice is grown in the central plain
and in the bottoms of valleys where water is obtainable, and a good
deal is exported. Taungya cultivation is but little practised. On the
hills towards the western border, and on the range lying west of the
capital, poppy is cultivated by the Palaungs. The population in 1901
was 30,482, distributed in 627 villages. Of the total, about 27,500 were
Shans and nearly 2,000 Palaungs, the rest being Yins (Yanglam) and
Taungthus. Like other States in this neighbourhood, Mongkiing has
only recently recovered from the dire effects of the disturbances that
followed the annexation of Upper Burma. The revenue in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 34,000 (nearly all from thathamedd) ; and the chief
items of expenditure were Rs. 15,000 tribute to the British Govern-
ment, Rs. 7,400 officials' salaries and administration charges, Rs. 8,900
privy purse, and Rs. 2,700 public works.
Mongmit State. — A Shan State, at present administered as a
temporary measure as a subdivision of the Ruby Mines District, Upper
Burma. It lies between 2 20 44' and 240 6' N. and 960 io'and 97°38' E.,
comprising the townships of Mongmit and Kodaung, with an area of
about 3,562 square miles. The population in 1901 was 44,208. Except
in the valley of the Shweli, it is mountainous. At the time of the
annexation of Upper Burma Mongmit was in a very disturbed con-
dition ; and in 1889 Saw Maung, who had been driven out by rebels
from the Sawbwaship of Yawnghwe, was appointed regent as an experi-
mental measure, with a view to the restoration of order. It was not
long, however, before it became apparent that Saw Maung was unable
to manage the affairs of the State, and in 1892 the administration was
taken over by Government. The State is about to be restored to the
Sawbwa, who has attained his majority. The revenue in 1903-4 was
Rs. 14,900.
Mongmit Township (Burmese, Momeik). — A tract occupying the
greater part of the Mongmit State, and at present administered as a
township of the Ruby Mines District, Upper Burma. It lies between
220 44' and 240 6' N. and 960 10' and 970 10' E., with an area of
2,802 square miles. In 1901 the population was 22,581, composed
of Burmans, Shans, Palaungs, and Kachins in the ratio of 10, 5, 4,
and 2. It contains 236 villages, the head-quarters being at Mongmit
(population, 1,767), on a tributary of the Shweli. The township
occupies almost the whole drainage of the Shweli river. Away from
the Shweli valley it is hilly and forest-clad, and a large number of the
inhabitants are occupied in tree-felling and in bamboo-cutting under
forest contractors. Rice is exported to Mogok and Tawngpeng.
MONGNA WNG 405
Mongnai (Burmese, Mone). — A large State in the eastern division
of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying hetween 200 22' and
210 12' N. and 970 33' and 980 56' E., with an area (including its
dependency of Kengtawng or Kyaingtaung) of 2,717 square miles.
A large isolated circle abuts on the eastern boundary of Yawnghwe,
bringing the effective western boundary to 970 17' E. The State is
bounded on the east by Kengtung, from which it is separated by the
Salween ; on the south by Mongpan and Mawkmai ; on the west by
Mongsit and Laihka ; and on the north by Laihka, Mongnawng, and
Kenghkam. Mongnai proper occupies only the western half of this
area. The eastern half forms the Kengtawng dependency, the two
being separated by a long range, running north and south, averaging
about 4,000 feet in height. The Nam Teng river, entering the State
near its north-west corner, runs eastward till it doubles round the
northern end of this range, and waters the greater part of Kengtawng.
The southern part of Mongnai proper is watered by the Nam Tawng,
which runs in a southerly direction past the capital to join the Nam
Teng, the valley being shut in on the west by a lofty range of moun-
tains that forms the greater part of the boundary of the State. In the
central plain watered by the Nam Tawng, and in the wide valley of the
Nam Teng, rice is grown in considerable quantities, the latter area
being particularly fertile. Sugar-cane and tobacco are cultivated here
and there, while gardens contain betel, coco-nut, oranges, and other
fruits. Large quantities of Shan paper are manufactured from the
bark of a species of mulberry, and exported to other States and to
Burma for use in decorations, and for the manufacture of umbrellas,
&c. The early records of Mongnai are vague and unsatisfactory.
The part it played after annexation is briefly touched upon in the
article on the Southern Shan States. The population of the
State in 1901 was 44,252, distributed in 981 villages. Of this total,
more than five-sixths are Shans. The Taungthus are fairly well
represented (their total being over 4,000), and there are a certain
number of Yins. The Sawbwa's head-quarters are at Mongnai (popu-
lation, 3,078), near the Nam Tawng, once the largest place in the
Southern Shan States, and still of considerable importance. The
American Baptist Mission has a station at Mongnai, with a hospital
attached which does valuable work locally. The revenue in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 46,000 (mainly from thathameda) ; and the main
items of expenditure were Rs. 20,000 tribute to the British Govern-
ment, Rs. 18,000 spent on official salaries and general administration,
Rs. 4,800 credited to the privy purse, and Rs. 3,000 spent on public
works.
Mongnawng (Burmese, Maingnaung). — A large State in the
eastern division of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between
406 MONGNAWNG
2o° 59' and 210 55' N. and 970 48' and 980 49' E., with an area
°f i,575 square miles. It is bounded on the north by Kehsi Mansam,
Kenglon, and Mongsang ; on the east by the Shan States of Manglon
and Kengtung, from which it is separated for the most part by the
Salween river ; on the south by Kenghkam and Mongnai ; and on the
west by Laihka and Mongkiing. The State at one time formed part
of Hsenwi, but was made independent in 1850. In 1886 its ruler
joined the Linbin confederacy, and was involved in the disturbances
which culminated in the Linbin prince's surrender. The greater part
of the State is open undulating country, with here and there jagged
limestone hills rising from it. To the north and west are regular
downs, almost treeless ; to the south scrub jungle ; to the east are
rugged hills extending towards the Salween. The only river of
importance is the Nam Pang, adjoining whose banks are many fertile
paddy-fields. Rice is grown both on these plains and in taungyas,
the level area round Mongnawng (population, 693), the residence of
the Myoza, in the northern part of the State, being especially fertile.
The population in 1901 was 39,102, distributed in 777 villages.
Of the total more than 37,000 were Shans, the rest being Yins,
Palaungs, and other hill tribes. The revenue in 1903-4 amounted
to Rs. 23,000 (mainly from thathameda) ; and the chief items of
expenditure were Rs. 10,000 tribute to the British Government,
Rs. 6,700 official salaries and administration charges, Rs. 3,300
privy purse, and Rs. 3,000 public works.
Mongpai (Burmese, Mobye). — State in the central division of the
Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 190 20' and 190 53' N.
and 960 36' and 970 9' E., with an area of 660 square miles. It is the
most south-westerly of the Shan States, being bounded on the south
and east by Karenni ; on the north by Loilong and Sakoi ; and on the
west by the Districts of Toungoo and Yamethin. The general char-
acter of the country is hilly, rising gently from the Nam Pilu (or Balu
r/iai/ng), which traverses the north-east corner. The western part of
the State consists of a confused mass of hills running generally north
and south, and culminating in a ridge about 5,000 feet in height, which
separates the basins of the Sittang and the Salween. Most of the level
rice land is situated near the Pilu, and is irrigated from it by water-
wheels, or by the diversion of small affluents. In the hills taungya
(shifting) cultivation prevails. The Shans and Taungthus till the
usual homestead gardens, in which mustard, tobacco, sugar-cane,
cotton, and various fruits and vegetables are grown ; and maize and
millet are cultivated by the Red Karens. The population of the
State in 1901 was 19,351, distributed in 158 villages, and consists of
Padaungs, Zayeins, Taungthus, and other Karen tribes, besides a few
Shans. Only 4,612 persons were returned as Buddhists, and 13,380
MONGPAN 407
as Animists. The Padaung speakers numbered 9,321, the Shan
speakers 2,837, and the Taungthu speakers 1,416. The revenue of
the State amounts to Rs. S,ooo, derived almost entirely from thatha-
meda. In 1903-4 the expenditure included Rs. 3,000 tribute to the
British Government, Rs. 2,200 spent on general administration,
Rs. 1,500 on the pay of officials, and Rs. 1,200 made over to the
privy purse. The head-quarters of the Sawbwa are at Mdngpai
(population, 642), on the bank of the Pilu river.
Mongpan (Burmese, Maingpaii). — State in the eastern division
of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying (with its trans-Salween
dependencies) on both sides of the Salween river, between 190 40'
and 200 32" N. and 980 2' and 990 12' E., with an area of 2,300
square miles. On the north it is bounded by Mongnai ; on the north-
east by Kengtung ; on the east and south by Siam : on the west
by Mawkmai. Little is known of the early history of Mongpan. It
went through troublous times after the annexation of Upper Burma,
and was ravaged by the troops of the Linbin confederacy in 1886.
The negotiations between the British and Siamese Governments in
connexion with its trans-Salween dependencies are alluded to in the
article on the Southern Shan States. The centre of the State
proper is a large fertile plain surrounding the capital, Mongpan.
On all sides rise low hills covered with scrub jungle, culminating in
a range about 5,000 feet in height, on the other side of which runs
the Nam Teng. Between the central plain and the Salween, to the
south and east, and towards the northern border is a confused mass
of mountains. Of the trans-Salween dependencies, Mongton is the
most northerly. It borders on the Kengtung State ; and population
is confined practically to the narrow valley of the Nam Ton, which
joins the Me Hang, a tributary of the Salween, from which the neigh-
bouring dependency of Monghang takes its name. This sub-State is
mostly covered with jungle, its main feature being Loi Hkilek, a moun-
tain nearly 7,000 feet high. On the border of the State, along the
Salween west of Monghang, is the dependency of Mongkyawt, a moun-
tainous tract, with a small population, confined to the valley of the
Nam Kyawt, which runs through the sub-State first eastwards, then
westwards, and then northwards, to join the Salween. The minute
dependency of Monghta lies in the basin of the Nam Hta, a tributary
of the Nam Kyawt, to the west of Mongkyawt. Gultivation is prac-
tically confined to rice, both irrigated and taungya ; and the central
plain round Mongpan (population, 1,355), tne residence of the Sawbwa,
is very fertile. The State contains valuable teak forests, which in
1904 brought in a revenue of Rs. 17,700. The population in 1901
was r6,629 (distributed in 196 villages), of whom nearly all were
Shans, only a few being Taungthus. The revenue in 1903-4 amounted
4o8 MONGPAN
I
to Rs. 15,000 (mainly from thathameda); the items of expenditure
were Rs. 5,000 tribute to the British Government, Rs. 7,700 official
salaries, &c, and Rs. 2,300 privy purse.
Mongpawn (Burmese, Maingpuri). — A small State in the eastern
division of the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 200 24'
and 210 o' N. and 970 20' and 970 32' E., with an area of 371 square
miles. It lies in the Upper Nam Pawn valley, and is bounded on the
north by Laihka ; on the east by Laihka and Mongsit ; on the south
by Hsahtung; and on the west by Wanyin, Nawngwawn, Namhkok,
Hopong, and an outlying portion of Mongnai. Mongpawn played an
important part in the history of the Shan States after the annexation
of Upper Burma, its chief being the most active supporter of the
Linbin prince. The State consists of the narrow valley of the Nam
Pawn, on which rice irrigated by water-wheels is cultivated, the other
main crops being taungya rice, cotton, sugar-cane, and thanatpei. The
population in 1901 was 13,143, of whom about 7,000 were Shans and
about 4,500 Taungthus ; the former live in the valley, the latter on the
hill-slopes. A few Yins are also found in the State. In 1901 the number
of villages was 212, the residence of the Sawbwa being at Mongpawn
(population, 1,230), on the Nam Pawn, where it is crossed by a bridge
on the main road between Burma and Kengtung. The revenue in
1903-4 was Rs. 14,000 (mainly from thathameda) ; and the chief items
of expenditure were Rs. 4,500 tribute to the British Government,
Rs. 3,000 official salaries, &c, and Rs. 5,300 privy purse.
Mongsang. — State in the Southern Shan States, Burma. See
Monghsu.
Mongsit (Burmese, Maingseik). — State in the eastern division
ui the Southern Shan States, Burma, lying between 200 20' and
200 47' N. and 970 27' and 970 47' E., with an area of 303 square
miles. It is bounded on the north and east by Mongnai ; on the south
by Mawkmai ; and on the west by Mongpawn. The State consists of
a plain about 12 miles long, the northern part lying in the basin
of the Nam Teng, the southern in that of the Nam Pawn. The chief
crop is lowland rice, a large part depending for irrigation upon the
rainfall, but rice is also cultivated in taungyas. The population in
1901 was 9,013, distributed in r84 villages. Of the total, about
6,500 were Shans, 1,200 Yins (Yangsek), and 1,000 Taungthus.
Mongsit (population, 1,223), the residence of the Myoza, lies in a
valley towards the north of the State. The revenue in 1903-4
amounted to Rs. 11,000 (mostly from thathameda); and the chief
items of expenditure were Rs. 4,500 tribute to the British Govern-
ment, Rs. 3,800 general administration charges, and Rs. 2,500
privy purse.
Montgomery District. — District in the Lahore Division of the
MONTGOMERY DISTRICT 409
Punjab, lying between 290 58' and 31° 21' N. and 72° 27' and 74° 8' E.,
with an area of 4,771 square miles. It is named after the late Sir
Robert Montgomery, sometime Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab.
In shape it is a rough parallelogram, whose south-east side rests on
the Sutlej, while the Ravi flows through the District parallel to the
Sutlej and not far from the north-west border. It is bounded by
the Districts of Lahore on the north-east, J hang on the north-west,
and Multan on the south-west, while on the south-east it marches
with the Native State of Bahawalpur and the British District of
Ferozepore. Except along the river banks and
where watered by canals, Montgomery is practically aspects.
a waste of sand. The desert strip or Bar to the
north of the Ravi is a continuation of the Jhang Bar. The Gugera
branch of the Chenab Canal has now been extended to it, and the
country is rapidly assuming a fertile appearance, though part of it is
still desert. On either bank of the Ravi is a strip of riverain culti-
vation ; here inundation canals carry the water for varying distances
up to 23 miles, population is fairly thick, and cultivation good. South
of this tract stretches the Dhaia or central ridge of the District.
Absolutely bare in a dry season, this tract produces a good crop of
grass if the rains are plentiful. The head-quarters of the District are
situated in the middle of it. The Dhaia is bounded on the south by
the high bank which marks the ancient bed of the Beas, south of
which is the Sutlej valley, watered by the Khanwah and Upper Sohag
canals of the Upper Sutlej Canal system. The Deg torrent enters
the District from Lahore, and after a course of 35 miles through the
Gugera tahsil flows into the Ravi.
Montgomery contains nothing of geological interest, being situated
entirely on the alluvium. The flora is essentially of the Bar or desert
type, jand (Prosoftis), van (Salvadora), kari (Capparis aphylla), and
a tamarisk {Tamarix articulata) abounding where the soil can support
them ; but wide stretches show nothing but saltworts (/ana, lani, ike),
such as Haloxylon recurvum, Saisola foetida, Suaeda, &c. The type
is, however, changing with the spread of cultivation. In the low
grounds near the Ravi there is a good deal of klkar {Acacia arabica),
which may possibly be indigenous in this part of the Punjab and
in Sind.
Wolves and wild cats are the principal beasts of prey. ' Ravine
deer' (Indian gazelle) are fairly numerous, but nilgai and antelope
are confined to the banks of the Ravi on the Lahore border. Wild
hog are becoming scarce as cultivation advances.
The climate is very dry and the temperature in summer is oppressive.
From May to the middle of October, and especially in June and July,
the heat during the day is intense ; but, except on the frequent occa-
410 MONTGOMERY DISTRICT
sions when heavy dust-storms blow, the nights are comparatively cool.
The District is fairly healthy. Pneumonia is common in the winter,
caused by the intense cold and dryness of the air. Fevers are preva-
lent, as the majority of the population live along the banks of the
rivers and in the canal tracts.
The rainfall is generally scanty, the annual average ranging from
8 inches at Pakpattan to 10 inches at Montgomery town. The average
number of rainy days is twenty-three between April and October, and
eight during the winter.
In the time of Alexander the District of Montgomery appears to
have been held by the Malli, who occupied the cities of KaMalia
and Harappa taken by the Macedonian conqueror.
All that is known of its history during the next
2,000 years is summarized in the paragraph on Archaeology and in
the articles on Pakpattan and Dipalpur. After the hold of the
Mughal empire had relaxed, the District was divided among a number
of independent tribes engaged in a perpetual warfare with one another,
and with invaders belonging to the Sikh confederacies. The most
important of the Muhammadan tribes were the Kharrals, Sials, Wattus,
and Hans, while the Sikh Nakkais occupied a considerable part of
the District. Between 1804 and 1810 Ranjit Singh obtained possession
of the whole District except a strip on the Sutlej, held, on payment
of tribute, by the Nawab of Bahawalpur, and occupied in default of
payment by the Lahore government in 1830. About 1830 all but
the Dipalpur tahsll and the cis-Ravi portion of Gugera was entrusted
to Diwan Sawan Mai. The Kharrals and Sials took the opportunity of
the first Sikh War to rise against the Sikhs, but were suppressed. British
influence extended to the District for the first time in 1847, when an
officer, under orders from the Resident at Lahore, effected a summary
settlement of the land revenue. Direct British rule commenced on
the annexation of the Punjab in 1849, when a District was formed
with its head-quarters at Pakpattan, including as much of Montgomery
as now lies in the Bari Doab. The trans-Ravi portion of the District
was added in 1852, and the head-quarters were then moved to Gugera.
In 1865, when the railway was opened, a village on the railway, thence-
forward known as Montgomery, became the capital.
During the Mutiny of 1857 the District formed the scene of the
only rising which took place north of the Sutlej. Before the end of
May, emissaries from Delhi crossed the river from Sirsa and Hissar,
where open rebellion was already rife, and met with a ready reception
from the Kharrals and other wild Jat clans. The District authorities,
however, kept down the threatened rising till August 26, when the
prisoners in jail made a desperate attempt to break loose. At the
same time Ahmad Khan, a famous Kharral leader, who had been
POPULATION 411
detained at Gugera, broke his arrest, and, though apprehended, was
released on security, together with several other suspected chieftains.
On September 16 they fled to their homes, and the whole country
rose in open rebellion. Kot Kamalia was sacked; and Major Chamber-
lain, moving up with a small force from Multan, was besieged for some
days at Chichawatni on the Ravi. The situation at the civil station
remained critical till Colonel Paton arrived with substantial reinforce-
ments from Lahore. An attack which took place immediately after
their arrival was repulsed. Several minor actions followed in the open
field, until finally the rebels, driven from the plain into the wildest
jungles of the interior, were utterly defeated and dispersed. Our troops
then inflicted severe punishment on the insurgent clans, destroying
their villages, and seizing large numbers of cattle for sale.
Mounds of brick debris at Harappa, Kamalia, Akbar, Satghara,
and Bavanni mark the sites of forgotten towns. The coins found at
Harappa and Satghara prove that both were inhabited in the time of
the Kushan dynasty, while General Cunningham upholds the identity
of Kamalia and Harappa with cities of the Malli taken by Alexander
in 325 B.C. Carved and moulded bricks have been found at Bavanni
and Akbar, and it is not .improbable that Harappa was one of the
places visited by Hiuen Tsiang. The fortified town of Dipalpur is
built on an old Kushan site. The fortifications themselves are very
ancient, though it is impossible to determine their date. All that can
be said is that they are older than the visit of Timur (1398). The
tomb of the famous saint Baba Farid, at Pakpattan, is supposed to
have been built about 1267 and was repaired by Firoz Shah. The
style is simple and destitute of ornament. There are shrines at
Shergarh and Hujra, decorated with floral designs and dating from
about 1600.
Montgomery District contains 3 towns and 1,371 villages. Its
population at the last four enumerations was : (1868) 360,445, (1881)
426,529, (1891) 499.521. and (190O 497.706- In Popuiation>
seasons of drought large numbers of people migrate
to the Chenab Colony, where their friends or relatives have obtained
grants ; but when there is a prospect of a good harvest they return to
their homes. The District is divided into four tahsils : Montgomery,
Gugera, Dipalpur, and Pakpattan, the head-quarters of which
are at the places from which each is named. The towns are the
municipalities of Montgomery, the head-quarters of the District,
Kamalia, and Pakpattan. The principal statistics of population in
1 901 are shown in the table on the next page.
Muhammadans number 355,892, or more than 72 per cent, of the
total; and there are 118,837 Hindus and 22,602 Sikhs. The density
of population is considerably below the average for the Punjab
vol. xvii. d d
412
MONTGOMER Y DISTRICT
(209 persons per square mile), and varies with the extent of cultivation
from 52 in the Montgomery tahsll to 184 in DIpalpur. The decrease
of 18 per cent, in the Montgomery tahsll is due almost entirely to
migration into the Chenab Colony. The language of the people is
a form of Western Punjabi, very much tinged by the MultanI dialect.
Tahsil.
0
V-
d
3 .
cr <n
ir. V
-
<
Number of
c
0
"J
"3
0.
0
Oh
u
a. «
§1
Percentage of
variation in
population be-
tween i8gi
and 1901.
Number of
persons able to
read and
write.
c
0
H
0
be
>
Montgomery .
Gugera .
DIpalpur .
Pakpattan
District total
1,47!
824
978
!,339
2
I
218
341
458
354
76,573
119,622
179.735
121,776
52-1
M5-2
183.8
90.8
- 18.2
+ 5-4
- 0.4
+ 8-8
4,732
3,907
6,378
4,046
4-771*
3
J.37i
497,706
104-4
- 0.4
19,063
* The only figures available for the areas of tahsils are those derived from the
revenue returns, and the tahsil densities have been calculated on the areas given in
the revenue rrturns for iqoo-i. These returns do not always cover the whole of the
country comprised in a tahsil, and hence the total of the tahsil areas does not agree
with the District area as shown in the table above, which is the complete area as
calculated by the Survey department. The tracts not included in the revenue survey
are as a rule uninhabited or very sparsely populated.
Here, as in all the western Districts of the Punjab, where the
influence and example of the frontier races is strong, caste is little
more than a tradition, and the social unit is the tribe. Thus the
terms Jat and Rajput are of the most indefinite significance, Jat
including all pastoral or agricultural tribes who (being Muhammadans
of Indian origin) do not distinctly claim Rajput rank. The pastoral
clans inhabiting the District bear collectively the name of the ' Great
Ravi' tribes, in contradistinction to the purely agricultural classes,
who are contemptuously nicknamed the ' Little Ravi.' Their principal
subdivisions include the Kathia, who have been identified with the
Kathaeoi of Arrian ; the Kharral, the most turbulent and courageous
of all the clans ; together with the Fattiana, Murdana, Vainiwal,
Baghela, Wattu, and Johiya. The Great Ravi Jats possess a fine
physique, and have handsome features ; they lay claim to a Rajput
origin, and look down upon all who handle the plough. In former
days they exercised practical sovereignty over the agricultural tribes
of the lowlands. There were 56,000 persons returned as Jats and
53,000 as Rajputs in 1901. The Mahtams (12,000), Arains (34,000),
and Kambohs (23,000) are hard-working tribes, the two latter being,
as elsewhere, first-rate cultivators. The Kharral (21,000), Baloch
(13,000), and Khokhar (8,000) are chiefly pastoral. Brahmans
number only 4,000 and Saiyids 5,000. Aroras (51,000) are the
principal commercial tribe, and there are 5,000 Khattris and 10,000
Muhammadan Khojas. Of the artisan and menial classes, the chief
AGRICULTURE
4i3
are the Chuhras (scavengers, 31,000), Julahas (weavers, 23,000),
Kumhars (potters, 20,000), Machhis (fishermen and water-carriers,
18,000), Mochls (cobblers, 16,000), Nais (barbers, 7,000), Mirasls
(village minstrels, 9,000), Kassabs (butchers, 6,000), Sonars (gold-
smiths, 4,000), and Tarkhans (carpenters, 12,000). Chamars, so
common in the Eastern Punjab, are hardly represented. Nearly
50 per cent, of the population are supported by agriculture, 20 per cent,
by industries, and 5 per cent, by commerce.
A branch of the Reformed Presbyterian Mission was established at
Montgomery town in 1895. In 1901 the District contained 314 native
Christians.
The scanty and uncertain rainfall makes systematic cultivation in
unirrigated land precarious, and agriculture depends almost entirely
on artificial irrigation or river floods. The prevailing
soil of the District is loam, but sandy and clay soils
are also found ; soils impregnated with soda and other salts are not
uncommon. The spring harvest (which in 1903-4 occupied 69 per
cent, of the total area harvested) is sown from the middle of Sep-
tember to the middle of December j the autumn harvest is sown
chiefly in June, July, and August, except cotton, which is sown as
early as May.
The District is held chiefly by small peasant proprietors ; but large
estates cover about 491 square miles, and lands leased from Govern-
ment 220 square miles. The area for which details are available from
the revenue records of 1903-4 is 4,619 square miles, as shown
below : —
Taksil.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
Montgomery
Gugera
DTpalpur . .
Pakpattan .
Total
M72
824
984
1,339
96
162
475
331
33
66
355
196
230
205
300
260
4,619
1,064
650
995
About 837 square miles were harvested in 1903-4. Wheat is the
chief spring crop, covering 354 square miles ; gram and barley covered
89 and 19 square miles. In the autumn, cotton is the principal crop,
covering 64 square miles ; rice is the chief food-crop (27 square miles),
followed by the great and spiked millets, joivar and bajra (22 and 26
square miles), pulses (18 square miles), and maize (16 square miles).
The cultivated area fluctuates violently from year to year according
to the rainfall and the amount of water in the rivers ; and the in-
creasing tendency to leave the District in bad years and to seek
employment in the Chenab Colony has already been mentioned. The
d d 2
4i4 MONTGOMERY DISTRICT
chief prospects of improvement in the agricultural conditions lie in
the direction of increased irrigation. The Sohag Para Colony, estab-
lished on Government lands irrigated by the canals of the Upper
Sutlej Canal system, has a population of over 25,000, cultivating
about 21, 000 acres. Loans for the construction of wells are popular,
and during the five years ending 1904 more than Rs. 22,000 was
advanced under the Land Improvement Loans Act. Nothing has
been done in the way of improving the quality of the crops grown.
Camels are the most important live-stock of the District, and a large
proportion of the population returned as agricultural earn their chief
livelihood by camel-breeding. The horses bred in the country on the
Lahore border had a great reputation in ancient times. The District
board now maintains two horse and two donkey stallions. The stud
farm of the nth Prince of Wales's Own Lancers is situated at
Probynabad in the Dlpalpur tahsll. The District breeds all the cattle
it requires, and a considerable surplus is exported. The cows are
famous as the best milkers in the Province. Buffaloes are but
little used.
Of the total cultivated area in 1903-4, 650 square miles were
irrigated, 2 23 square miles being supplied from wells, 103 from wells
and canals, 307 from canals, and 17 from streams and tanks, in addition
to 190 square miles which were irrigated or moistened by inundation
from the Sutlej. Ten villages north of the Ravi are irrigated from the
Gugera branch of the Chenab Canal, which is designed to water
45 square miles ; but the chief canal-irrigation is near the Sutlej from
the Khanwah and Upper and Lower Sohag canals of the Upper
Sutlej Canal system, from which it is proposed to irrigate ultimately
about 400 square miles. Some small canals from the Deg and Ravi
serve a small area in the north of the District, and the spill water from
the Sutlej is controlled by dams and channels in many places. Except
in the riverain tracts, wells are of masonry and worked with Persian
wheels by cattle; the District has 11,546 masonry wells, besides
1,536 lever wells, water-lifts, and unbricked wells.
The District, which forms a Forest division, contains 87 square
miles of 'reserved' and 703 of ' unclassed ' forests under the Forest
department. The forest growth consists chiefly of tamarisk (Tamarix
orientaIis),jand (Prosopis spicigera), leafless caper (Capparis aphylla),
and van {Sa/vadora oleoides), with a considerable crop of munj grass
(Saccharum Sara). In 1903-4 the total receipts were 1-7 lakhs. The
wood is chiefly sold to the North-Western Railway for fuel, while the
forests afford valuable fodder reserves. The District also contains
1,804 square miles of 'unclassed' forests and Government waste under
the control of the Deputy-Commissioner.
The only mineral products are saltpetre and some beds of inferior
FAMINE 415
kankar or nodular limestone. Okara contains an important saltpetre
refinery. Impure carbonate of soda is also produced by burning the
weed known as khangan khdr {Chloroxylon Griffithii).
Various articles, such as bed-legs, boxes, toys, spinning-wheels, &c,
are made of lacquered woodwork at Pakpattan, and the industry has
more than a local celebrity. The cotton fabrics of
the same place are of good quality, and very good communications.
cotton prints are prepared at Kamalia. Cotton
carpets are made at Kamalia and in the Central jail ; and carpets, both
cotton and woollen, are woven at an orphanage at Chak Baba Khem
Singh established by Baba Sir Khem Singh Bedi. Vessels of brass and
white metal are made in a few places. Silk is used to a small extent
for embroidery, and in the manufacture of lungis. There are four
cotton-cleaning factories in the District, at Montgomery, Dipalpur,
and Okara. The three which were working in 1904 gave employment
to 86 persons.
The principal exports are wheat, cotton, oilseeds, wool, hides, and
ghi ; and the principal imports are millets, rice, sugar, cloth, hardware,
and piece-goods. Wheat, wool, cotton, and oilseeds go chiefly to
Karachi. Kamalia and Pakpattan are the only trading towns of
importance.
The North-Western Railway from Lahore to Multan runs through
the District, and takes practically all the export and import trade. The
District has only 5 miles of metalled road ; but as there is no wheeled
traffic the want is not felt, and it is traversed in all directions by broad
unmetalled roads, the most important being the trunk road from Lahore
to Multan, and that from Jhang via Pakpattan to the Sutlej, which is a
great route for caravans from Afghanistan bound to Delhi. The total
length of unmetalled roads is 1,079 miles, of which 25 are under the
Public 'Works department, and the rest are maintained by the District
board. The Ravi is crossed by fourteen and the Sutlej by ten ferries,
but there is practically no traffic up and down these rivers.
The great famines of 1783, 1813, and 1833 all affected this District,
while the famine of 1860-1 was severely felt, and there was considerable
distress in 1896-7. Owing to the extremely small
proportion of cultivation depending on rainfall, real
famine such as occurs from a total or partial failure of the crops is not
likely to affect the District ; but, on the other hand, the effect of the
shortage of fodder for the cattle is most serious, as large numbers
die, and with the half-starved animals that remain it is impossible to
plough and irrigate more than half the area that can be cultivated in
a good year. The area matured in the famine year 1899-1900
amounted to 65 per cent, of the normal.
The District is in charge of a Deputy-Commissioner, with three
4 1 6 MONTGOMER Y DISTRICT
Assistant or Extra-Assistant Commissioners, one of whom is in
charge of the treasury and another is District Judge. Montgomery is
... . . also the head-quarters of the Executive Engineer in
charge of the Upper Sutlej Canals, and the Extra-
Assistant Conservator in charge of the Montgomery Forest division.
The Deputy-Commissioner as District Magistrate is responsible
for criminal justice, and civil judicial work is under the District
Judge. Both are supervised by the Divisional Judge of the Multan
Civil Division, who is also Sessions Judge. There is one Munsif,
who sits at head-quarters. Burglary and cattle-theft are the chief
forms of crime.
The first summary settlement, made between 1848 and 185 1, was
based on a scrutiny of the revenue returns of the Sikhs. The main
defect of the assessment was its inequality of distribution. A second
summary settlement was completed in 1852, and local knowledge
was then available to adjust the demand to the varying capacity
and resources of estates with a considerable degree of fairness.
The regular settlement was begun by Mr. Vans Agnew in 1852, and
completed by Captain Elphinstone in 1856. Mr. Vans Agnew pro-
posed a fluctuating assessment on land irrigated by canals or floods,
but it was finally decided to impose a water-rent. This was to be
paid for all canal-irrigated land, in addition to the ordinary revenue
assessed at rates for unirrigated land ; but remissions could be claimed
if the supply of water failed. The total demand so fixed amounted
to 3-4 lakhs.
The settlement was revised between 1868 and 1872. A system of
fixed assessments was continued in the Ravi tahslls (Gugera and
Montgomery), the revenue consisting of a lump sum for each well
in use (Rs. 8-12), a charge of from 8 annas to R. 1 per acre on
all cultivation, and a rate on all new fallow of 4 or 6 annas per
acre. In 1879 fluctuating assessments were introduced in the riverain
villages of this tract. All cultivable land was assessed at a fixed rate
of 1 or 1 i annas an acre, and a charge of Rs. 10 per wheel was levied
on each well worked during the year, while, in addition, fluctuating
crop rates were framed for different forms of irrigation, varying
from Rs. 1-10 to R. 0-12 per acre. Experience showed that the
new system pressed hardly on the flood lands, and the rates were
modified three times before 1886. In 1887 a still more lenient system
was adopted, which practically assessed all crops at R. 1 an acre. This
was extended to an increasing number of estates, so that by 1892-3
364 villages were under fluctuating assessments, and the demand had
fallen from Rs. 85,000 to Rs. 31,000. In 1891 the Ravi tahslls again
came under settlement. A fixed demand was imposed on wells, deter-
mined by the area it was estimated they could irrigate during the
ADMINISTRATION 417
year. All crops actually maturing on areas supplied by wells in excess
of this estimate were liable to assessment at a rate per acre which was
the same for all crops, though it varied in different tracts. The result
of reassessment in the Ravi tahs'ils was an increase of a quarter of
a lakh.
The system adopted at the regular settlement was no more successful
in the Sutlej tahslls (Pakpattan and Dipalpur). It was found that the
people wasted water, for which they were paying next to nothing, and
the canal tracts were not yielding their fair share of the public burdens.
It was therefore decided to adopt Mr. Vans Agnew's original proposals
in carrying out the revised settlement. Thus the fixed revenue of a
village consisted of the amount which would have been assessed if it
had no source of irrigation, plus a charge for each well it contained.
In addition, villages taking canal water had to pay separately a sum
proportionate to the area of crops matured by its means, as calcu-
lated by the canal officer. The new Sohag Para Colony, established in
1888-91, was also placed under a fluctuating assessment. Consolidated
rates for land revenue and canal water were imposed, varying from
Rs. 3-4 to Rs. 1- 1 2 per cultivated acre for irrigated land, while
a uniform rate of 12 annas was imposed on 'dry' land. The total
assessment of the two Sutlej tahslls for the year preceding the latest
settlement (1897-8) was 2-2 lakhs. The latest revision was made
between 1894 and 1899 ; and the new demand, including the estimated
fluctuating revenue, was 3-5 lakhs, representing 40 per cent, of the net
'assets.' The land revenue of the whole District in the current settle-
ment is thus about 5 lakhs, an increase of 47 per cent, on the previous
assessment.
The grazing tax (tirni) is an inheritance from the Sikhs. Captain
Elphinstone imposed it on all cattle, including well-bullocks. In 1857
the tax produced Rs. 32,000, in 1872 Rs. 1,08,000, in 1881 Rs. 48,000.
In 1870 Government waste lands were divided into blocks and leased
annually to farmers, who then realized grazing dues at fixed rates for
all cattle grazing in their respective blocks. This system, however,
led to extortion and was given up in 1879. In 1886 the Multan system
was introduced, by which each ftVm-paying village contracted to pay a
fixed annual sum for a period of five years. In March, 1S91, the sum
for the succeeding five years was fixed at Rs. 1,41,000. The coloni-
zation of the Sandal Bar seriously curtailed the grazing grounds, and
in 1899 the system was again altered. The quinquennial assessment
was retained for camels only, and the grazing for cattle, sheep, See, was
auctioned annually in large blocks. The amount realized under the
new system in 1903-4 was Rs. 46,000.
The collections of land revenue and of revenue from all sources have
been, in thousands of rupees : —
4i8
MONTGOMER Y DISTRICT
1 880-1.
1890-1.
IQOO-I.
I903-4.
Land revenue .
Total revenue .
4.87
5,82
5:36 3.41
6,62 5,18
4>i9
6,54
The District contains three municipalities : Montgomery, Kamalia,
and Pakpattan. Outside these, the affairs of the District are managed
by a District board, whose income, derived mainly from a local rate,
amounted in 1903-4 to Rs. 50,000. The expenditure was Rs. 43,000,
schools and dispensaries forming the largest items.
The regular police force consists of 449 of all ranks, of whom 21
are municipal police. The Superintendent usually has 4 inspectors
under him. The village watchmen number 584. There are 17 police
stations, one outpost, and 5 road-posts. Trackers are enlisted in the
District police force, and one is kept at each police station. They
often render most valuable assistance in the pursuit of criminals and
stolen cattle. The combined Central and District jail at head-quarters
has accommodation for 1,522 prisoners. The principal jail manu-
factures are carpets, matting, and cotton and woollen clothing.
Montgomery stands thirteenth among the twenty-eight Districts of
the Province in the literacy of its population, of whom 3-8 per cent.
(6-7 males and 0-4 females) are able to read and write. The pro-
portion is highest in the Montgomery tahsil. The number of pupils
under instruction was : 1,505 in 1880-1 ; 3,371 in 1 890-1 ; 3,097 in
1900-1; and 3,824 in 1903-4. In the last year there were 5
secondary and 37 primary (public) schools, and 2 advanced and 116
elementary (private) schools, with 125 girls in the public and 128 in
the private schools. The District possesses two high schools, one the
Government high school at Montgomery and the other a private school
at Kamalia. The total expenditure on education in 1903-4 was
Rs. 23,000, of which fees brought in Rs. 8,000, District and municipal
funds contributing Rs. 10,000 and Rs. 3,000 respectively.
Besides the civil hospital at Montgomery town, the District possesses
six outlying dispensaries. In 1904 the number of cases treated was
91,816, of whom 1,859 were in-patients, and 3,649 operations were
performed. The expenditure was Rs. 15,000, chiefly contributed by
municipal funds.
The number of persons successfully vaccinated in 1903-4 was
13,398,. representing 29-9 per r,ooo of the population.
[P. J. Fagan, District Gazetteer (1898-9); and Settlement Report
(1899).]
Montgomery Tahsil. — Tahsil of Montgomery District, Punjab,
lying between 300 16' and 310 2' N. and 720 27' and 730 26' E., on
both banks of the Ravi, with an area of 1,472 square miles. The
MONYO 419
population in 1901 was 76,573, compared with 93,648 in 1891, the
decrease being due to migration into the Chenab Colony. It contains
the towns of Montgomery (population, 6,602), the head-quarters, and
Kamalia (6,976); and 218 villages. The land revenue and cesses
in 1903-4 amounted to Rs. 78,000. The greater part of the tahsll is
uncultivated. It includes on the south a narrow strip of the Sutlej
valley, from which it rises abruptly into the desert uplands lying between
the old banks of the Beas and the Ravi. Farther north lie the Ravi
lowlands, interspersed with great stretches of jungle, and, beyond the
river, sloping gently upwards towards the fertile plateau irrigated by
the Chenab Canal. Cultivation is confined to the lands along the river,
and a few scattered patches round the wells elsewhere. The scanty
cultivation accounts for the low density of population, 52 persons per
square mile.
Montgomery Town. — Head-quarters of the District and tahsil of
the same name, Punjab, situated in 300 39' N. and 730 8' E., on the
North-Western Railway. Population (1901), 6,602. In 1865 the village
of Sahlwal was selected as the head-quarters of the District and re-
named after Sir Robert Montgomery, then Lieutenant-Governor of the
Punjab. Situated in the most arid and dreary part of the uplands
between the Ravi and Sutlej, the station is almost unequalled for dust,
heat, and general dreariness, but is not unhealthy. It has no commer-
cial or industrial importance, and merely consists of a bazar and the
residences of the District officials. The Central jail situated here
usually contains about 1,500 prisoners. The municipality was consti-
tuted in 1867. Its income and expenditure during the ten years ending
1902-3 averaged Rs. 13,100. In 1903-4 the income was Rs. 16,600,
chiefly derived from octroi and school fees ; and the expenditure was
Rs. 15,200. It maintains a girls' school and a dispensary. The high
school is managed by the Educational department. The town contains
two factories for ginning cotton, of which one was working in 1904 and
gave employment to 37 persons.
Monwel. —Petty State in Kathiawar, Bombay.
Monyo. — Western township of Tharrawaddy District, Lower Burma,
lying between 170 51' and 180 21' N. and 950 15' and 950 38' E., with
an area of 182 square miles. It extends along the eastern bank of the
Irrawaddy, and is flat and level throughout. It is the only township
of the District not traversed by the railway. The population was
34,648 in 1891, and 39,964 in 1901. The density is 219 persons per
square mile, which, for Burma, is high. The township contained 172
villages in 1901, its largest urban area being Monyo (population, 3,042),
the head-quarters, situated on what was once the bank of the Irrawaddy
but now some distance from the stream. The area cultivated in 1903-4
was 55 square miles, paying Rs. 33,000 land revenue.
420 MONYWA SUBDIVISION
Monywa Subdivision. — Subdivision of the Lower Chindwin Dis-
trict, Upper Burma, lying east of the Chindwin river. It comprises
the Budalin and Monywa townships.
Monywa Township. — South-eastern township of the Lower Chin-
dwin District, Upper Burma, lying between 210 55' and 220 21' N. and
950 3' and 950 39' E., from the Mu river in the east to the Chindwin
river in the west, with an area of 487 square miles. The population
was 71,971 in 1891, and 90,164 in 1901, distributed in 297 villages, and
one town, Monywa (population, 7,869), the head-quarters of the Dis-
trict. The township head-quarters are at Alon (population, 3,624), the
terminus of the Sagaing-Alon branch railway, on the Chindwin, about
7 miles above Monywa. Trade has greatly increased since the annexa-
tion, and communications have been largely improved. The township,
which is on the whole level and dry, contained 191 square miles under
cultivation in 1903-4, and the land revenue and thathameda amounted
to Rs. 1,89,500.
Monywa Town. — Head-quarters of the Lower Chindwin District,
Upper Burma, situated in 220 6' N. and 950 8' E., on the left or eastern
bank of the Chindwin river, about 50 miles north of its junction with
the Irrawaddy, and 65 miles west of Sagaing, with which it is connected
by a branch railway. The town, which is low-lying and fairly well
shaded by tamarind-trees, is protected from the annual rise of the river
by an embankment along the water's edge. It contains the usual head-
quarters buildings, courthouse, and jail, all of which are situated at its
northern end, as well as large barracks and a hospital for the Chindwin
military police battalion. The railway station is at some little distance
from the river, to the east of the civil station. The club and a good
many of the houses of the European residents are close to the river
bank. The town is said to derive its name (which being interpreted is
' cake village ') from a baker maiden whom a king of ancient days
found selling cakes, and took to himself as queen. It was of little
importance at the time of annexation, the head-quarters of the wim
being at Alon, about 7 miles farther up the river ; but it has since then
grown in importance and prosperity, and the last Census showed that
the population had increased from 6,316 in 1891 to 7,869 in 1901, the
latter total including over 1,000 natives of India. It is a fairly thriving
trade centre, and one of the chief ports of call for river steamers on
the Chindwin. Monywa was constituted a municipality in 1888. The
municipal revenue and expenditure during the ten years ending 190 r
averaged about Rs. 17,000. In 1903-4 the receipts were Rs. 26,800,
including Rs. 1 r,8oo from bazars and slaughter-houses. The ex-
penditure was Rs. 27,000, including Rs. 6,700 spent on conservancy,
Rs. 3,300 on the hospital, and Rs. 4,400 on roads. The town is well
laid out and intersected by good thoroughfares. A civil hospital has
MORADABAD DISTRICT 421
accommodation for 32 in-patients. There is no municipal school, but
the Wesleyan Mission school supplies most of the higher educational
needs of the town.
Moodkee. — Town and battle-field in Ferozepore District, Punjab.
See Mudki.
Mooltan. — Division, District, tahsil, and town in the Punjab. See
Multan.
Moradabad District.— District in the Bareilly Division, United
Provinces, lying between 280 20' and 290 16' N. and 780 4' and
790 o' E., with an area of 2,285 square miles. On the north it is
bounded by Bijnor and NainI Tal ; on the east by the State of
Rampur ; on the south by Budaun ; and on the west the Ganges
divides it from the Districts of Meerut and Bulandshahr. Near the
Ganges lies a stretch of low khadar land, from which
rises a high sandy ridge. The central portion of Physical
the District comprises a fertile level plain, chiefly
drained by the Sot or Yar-i-VYafadax river, into which many smaller
channels flow. This plain sinks gradually into the broad valley of
the Ramganga, whicli crosses the north-east corner of the District,
cutting off a portion which borders on the Tarai and presents the
usual characteristics of the sub-Himalayan tracts ; many small streams
rising for the most part in the Tarai flow through it. There are a few
ponds in the District, but none of considerable size.
Moradabad consists almost entirely of alluvium, in which boulders
of stone occasionally occur. Kankar or nodular limestone is obtained
in all parts south-west of the valley of the Ramganga. The saline
efflorescence called reh is found in the southern part of the Ganges
khadar.
The sandy tracts in the west are extremely bare, and produce
nothing spontaneously except long thatching-grass. In the richer
tract near the centre trees are more common, especially near the
older towns, which are shaded by fine mango groves. On the whole
the District is net well wooded.
Tigers are occasionally shot in the jungles in the north-east of the
District or in the Ganges khadar, and leopards are more common.
Hog deer and wild hog are numerous in the same tracts, and nilgai
are found in small numbers. The wolf, fox, badger, otter, weasel,
porcupine, and monkey are found more or less throughout the District.
The commoner game-birds include quail, sand-grouse, grey and black
partridge, wild duck of many varieties, snipe, wild geese, &c. Fish
of many kinds are found in the rivers, and form an important element
in the food-supply of the people.
The climate of Moradabad is generally healthy, except in the sub-
montane tract which borders on the Tarai, and in the lowlands of the
422 MORADABAD district
Ganges and Sot. The temperature is cooler than in Districts west
of the Ganges and farther from the Himalayas, and frost is common
in the winter. The annual mean is about 75° the minimum monthly
temperature being 560 in January, and the maximum 900 to 920 in May
or June.
The annual rainfall averages about 40 inches, varying from 35 inches
in the sandy tract to 45 in the damp submontane area in the north-
east. Variations are considerable, and the amount has ranged from
about 20 to nearly 60 inches.
Tradition ascribes great antiquity to Sambhal, but very little is
known of the early history of the District. Prithwl Raj, the last Hindu
king of Delhi, is said to have fought, first with the
half-mythical Saiyid Salar, and later with Jai Chand,
king of Kanauj. The first historical events are, however, in the early
Muhammadan period. Sambhal became the seat of a series of gov-
ernors, whose duties were largely taken up with suppressing revolts of
the turbulent Katehriyas. In 1266 Ghiyas-ud-din Balban attacked
Amroha, where he ordered a general massacre. In 1365 Firoz Tughlak
invaded Katehr, as Rohilkhand was then called, to punish a chief
named Rai Kakara, who had murdered the Musalman governor. Rai
Kakara fled to Kumaun, whereupon the emperor plundered the
country, and left Malik Khitab as governor. Ibrahim, the famous
Sultan of Jaunpur, conquered Sambhal in 1407, and placed his own
deputy in the town ; but a year later Mahmud Tughlak, emperor of
Delhi, expelled the intruder, and replaced his own officials. In 1473,
under Sultan Husain, the Jaunpur dynasty once more established itself
for a while in Sambhal. The emperor Sikandar LodI recovered the
District in 1498 for the Delhi throne, and resided at Sambhal for four
years. Thenceforward the surrounding country remained a permanent
fief of the imperial court. In the middle of the sixteenth century,
Ahya Maran, governor of Sambhal, rebelled against Sultan Muhammad
Adil, and defeated a force sent against him by the emperor. In the
succeeding year, Raja. Mittar Sen, Katehriya, seized Sambhal, and
Ahya Maran attacked him. A fierce battle ensued at KundarkhT,
in which the Raja sustained a crushing defeat. Under Humayun,
All Kull Khan was governor of Sambhal and repelled an incursion
of the still-independent Katehriyas. In 1566 some Mirzas, descendants
of Tlmur, rebelled and seized Akbar's officers, whom they confined
in the fort of Sambhal. Husain Khan marched against them, and
they fled to Amroha. On his following them up to their retreat, they
finally escaped across the Ganges. Shah Jahan appointed Rustam
Khan governor of Katehr ; and the latter founded Moradabad about
1625, calling it after Murad Bakhsh, one of the imperial princes, who
was afterwards- murdered by Aurangzeb. After the death of that
POPULATION 423
emperor, and subsequent decline of the central power, the Katehriyas
revolted, becoming independent for a time, and the Musalman governor
removed his head-quarters to Kanauj. On the rise of All Muhammad,
the Rohilla chief, an attempt was made by the governor of Moradabad
to crush him ; but the new leader was victorious and by 1 740 had
acquired the whole of this District. Rohilla rule lasted till 1774, when
Rohilkhand became subject to Oudh, and the District passed to the
British with other territory by the cession of 1801. Very soon after-
wards, in 1805, the notorious Amir Khan, a native of Sambhal, swept
through the District with a swarm of Pindari horsemen, but was not
successful in his attempt to plunder the Government treasury.
Apart from a few serious riots the District remained peaceful till
1857. News of the Meerut rising arrived on May 12 in that year, and
on the 1 8th the Muzaffarnagar rebels were captured. Next day, how-
ever, the 29th Native Infantry mutinied, and broke open the jail j but
on the 21st they united with the artillery in repelling a Rampur mob.
On the 31st the Rampur cavalry, who had gone to Bulandshahr,
returned ; and on the succeeding day news of the Bareilly and Shah-
jahanpur outbreaks arrived. On June 3 the 29th Native Infantry
fired on the officials, who then abandoned the station, and reached
Meerut in safety on the 5th. Ten days later, the Bareilly brigade
arrived at Moradabad, and shortly afterwards marched on for Delhi,
taking with them the local mutineers. At the end of June, the Nawab
of Rampur took charge of the District for the British ; but he possessed
little authority, and a rebel named Majju Khan was the real ruler of
Moradabad, till the arrival of General Jones's brigade on April 25, 185S,
when he was hanged. Early in May the District was occupied by
Mr. (afterwards Sir S.) Cracroft Wilson, the Judge of Moradabad, with
a body of troops, and order was restored.
Many ancient mounds exist in the District, especially in the Bilari
tahsil, but they have not been explored. Amroha and Sambhal
contain some fine mosques and shrines, and the former has also a few
Hindu remains. Moradabad city dates only from the seventeenth
century.
There are 15 towns and 2,450 villages in the District. Population
is increasing steadily, though variations occur in different areas owing
to the vicissitudes of the seasons. The numbers _ , .
1 • c 11 / o \ Population,
at the four enumerations were as lollows : (1072)
1,122,357, (1881) r,i55»i73i (l890 i,i79.398>_an_d (i9°0 1,191, 993-
There are six iahslls — Moradabad, Thakurdwara, Bilari, Sambhal,
Amroha, and Hasanpur— each named from its head-quarters. The
principal towns are the municipalities of Moradabad, Chandausi,
Amroha, and Sambhal. The chief statistics of population in 1901
are shown in the following table : —
424
MORADABAD DISTRICT
Tahsil.
Moradabad
Thakurdwara
Bilari
Sambhal .
Amroha .
Hasanpur
District total
V
a
Number of
3 .
w aj
■
c'5
n
v
— E
c
M
rt
rt
u
0
<
3
>
313
298
240
1
26l
333
0
^
3S7
469
3
466
383
2
508
547
3
53°
2,2S5
!5
2,45°
3
c
o
Ph
245,369
116,814
216,340
245,886
206,564
161,020
i,i9I>993
<-
°.si- •
0
aJH
0 S"3
§E
tjc ;» 0
t- ^2 C .
SOO«»
D id rt U
•3§
cent
riati
ulati
reen
ndl
umb
ons
ead
writ
o-g.
P-
« > 0-
a.
784
+ 1.9
7,668
487
- 3-6
1,605
65O
- 6.7
5.°°3
524
+ O-I
4.035
539
+ 10-9
4,467
294
+ 4-8
2,412
521
+ Li
25,190
About 64 per cent, of the total are Hindus and 35 per cent. Musal-
mans, the latter being a high proportion. Christians number 6,103,
and Aryas 2,834. Moradabad is the head-quarters of the Arya Samaj
in the United Provinces. More than 99 per cent, of the population
speak Western Hindi, the prevailing dialect being Hindustani.
The most numerous Hindu caste is that of the Chamars (leather-
dressers and cultivators), who form more than 21 per cent, of the
total. Other important castes are Jats, 71,000; Rajputs, 62,000;
Brahmans, 44,000; Khagis (cultivators), 41,000; and Ahars (agri-
culturists), 37,000. Jats are not found in considerable numbers east
of this District, while Ahars and Khagis chiefly reside in and near
it. Bishnois, a small caste with 1,600 members, which was originally
a religious sect, are hardly found elsewhere in the United Provinces.
More than one-third (153,000) of the Musalmans are so-called Shaikhs,
many of whom are descended from converts. The Julahas (weavers),
33,000; Barhais (carpenters), 23,000; and Telis (oil-pressers), 16,000,
are also largely of Hindu origin. The Saiyids, numbering 16,000, are
the most considerable of the foreign tribes. About 62 per cent, of
the total population are supported by agriculture, more than 6 per cent,
by personal services, nearly 5 per cent, by general labour, and 3 per
cent, by weaving.
Of the 5,866 native Christians in 1901, 4,780 were Methodists.
The American Methodist Church commenced work in 1859, and the
American Reformed Presbyterian Church in 1894.
The Ganges khadar is raised in the centre and escapes ordinary
floods, but the lower portions are liable to inundation and to over-
saturation. This tract chiefly produces wheat, rice,
and sugar-cane. Above the khadar is a broad sandy
tract, consisting of ridges separated by level plains and minor drainage
channels. The land is poor and liable to waterlogging in wet years,
while crops fail in seasons of drought. Wheat, mixed with barley,
and bajra are the chief crops. The great central plain is a fertile
tract, known as Katehr, which produces wheat, jowar, bajra, rice, and
Agriculture.
AGRICULTURE
425
sugar-cane. In the Ramganga khddar floods frequently occur, and
the autumn harvest is liable to great loss ; but wheat, rice, and sugar-
cane are grown. Rice is the principal crop grown in the damp sub-
montane area north-east of the Ramganga. In good years irrigation
is hardly required. A striking feature of the cultivation is the distribu-
tion of manure in all parts of a village where sugar-cane is grown,
instead of its concentration on the fields near the village site.
The ordinary tenures of the United Provinces are found ; but
zanilnddri mahdls are more common than patt'idari, and bhaiyachara
mahdls are rare. A large number of separate blocks of land are found
in the Amroha tahsll, the owners of which have no connexion with
the village communities. About half of the mahdls in the same tahsll
are revenue free, subject to a peculiar quit-rent payable to Government.
The main agricultural statistics for 1902-3 l are shown below, in
square miles : —
Tahsil.
Total.
Cultivated.
Irrigated.
Cultivable
waste.
Moradabad .
Thakurdwara
Bilari .
Sambhal
Amroha
Hasanpur
Total
313
240
333
469
383
547
221
164
279
399
304
315
l9
H
34
25
19
16
41
38
21
26
34
157
2,285
1,682
127
317
Wheat is the crop most largely grown, covering 599 square miles,
or 35 per cent, of the total cultivated area. Rice (152 square miles),
bdjra (260), barley (160), gram (125), and jotvdr (59), are also important
food-crops. The most valuable crop is, however, sugar-cane, grown
on 70 square miles. Cotton, oilseeds, and hemp (san) are the remain-
ing products of importance.
There have been no marked improvements in agricultural practice,
and no increase in cultivation in recent years. The area double
cropped is probably increasing, and the more valuable crops — wheat,
sugar-cane, and rice — are being more largely grown. The cultivation
of poppy is spreading. Advances under the Agriculturists' Loans and
Land Improvement Loans Acts are rarely taken. The total amounted
to only Rs. 56,000 between 1892 and 1904, and Rs. 45,000 of this
sum was advanced in two unfavourable seasons.
The cattle bred in the District are of the ordinary inferior typo.
Something has been done to improve the breed of horses and ponies,
and Government maintains one stallion and the District board six,
besides three donkey stallions for mule-breeding. The sheep and goats
are inferior.
1 Later figures are not available, owing to settlement operations.
426 MORADABAD DISTRICT
Masonry wells are rarely used for irrigation, except in the south of
the rich Katehr tract ; but earthen wells lasting for a single harvest can
be made in most parts of the District, except in the sandy tract above
the Ganges khddar. Out of 121 square miles irrigated in 1903-4, wells
supplied 89, tanks or jhlls 18, and rivers 14. In drier years the rivers
are more largely used.
Kankar or nodular limestone is the only mineral product, and is
used for metalling roads and for making lime.
The chief industry in the District is sugar-refining, which is carried
on in many places after native methods. Cotton cloth is woven,
especially in the towns, and woollen carpets are made
ra e. ai\ in a few places. Moradabad city is known for the
communications. * J
ornamental brassware produced there, and other
local industries are the pottery of Amroha and the manufacture of
rough glass in the south-west of the District, where reh is found.
Cotton-weaving is said to be declining. There are four cotton gins
and presses at Chandausi, besides one steam press and several hand
presses for baling hemp (san).
Agricultural products form the chief exports, sugar being the most
important, followed by wheat, rice and other grain, and cotton. A
good deal of the trade is with Calcutta, but the old trade with Delhi
has been revived by a railway extension. Salt, tobacco, metals, and
piece-goods are the principal imports. The largest commercial centre
after Moradabad is Chandausi, and there are several smaller flourish-
ing market towns.
The main line of the Oudh and Rohilkhand Railway passes through
the north-east of the District, while the south is crossed by the Bareilly-
Allgarh branch through Chandausi, whence another line runs to
Moradabad city. A branch from Moradabad to Ghaziabad on the
East Indian Railway traverses the north-west of the District. Another
branch from Gajraula to Chandpur in Bijnor has been surveyed, and
a branch of the Rohilkhand and Kumaun Railway is being constructed
from Moradabad to Ramnagar. There are 118 miles of metalled roads
and 473 miles of unmetalled roads. The cost of all but 52 miles of
the former is met from Local funds, but the Public Works department
has charge of all the metalled roads. Avenues of trees are maintained
on 119 miles. The main route is that from Bareilly through Morad-
abad city to the Ganges and on to Meerut. Communications are, on
the whole, not good beyond the few metalled roads.
The District has suffered repeatedly from scarcity, but has escaped
visitations of great severity. In 1803-4 distress was chiefly due to
. losses caused by the Maratha invasions and the raids
of the Pindari freebooter, Amir Khan. The second
famine after cession, in 1825, was aggravated by rack-renting, and the
AD MINIS TRA TIOA r 427
throwing of lands out of cultivation by landholders in view of the
approaching settlement. In the famine of 1837-8, Moradabad, like
all Rohilkhand Districts, suffered less than the Doab. The famine
of 1 860-1 was aggravated by the effects of the Mutiny. Relief works
were undertaken, but this was not among the Districts where distress
was most intense. Relief was again necessary in 1868-9 and m
1877-8, but the number of workers never became high. In the latest
famine of 1896-7 the labouring classes were distressed, but the cultiva-
tors suffered comparatively little, and the number on relief was only
about 7,000.
The Collector is usually assisted by a member of the Indian Civil
Service, and by five Deputy-Collectors recruited in . .
India. A tahsilddr is stationed at the head-quarters
of each tahsil.
There are five District Munsifs. The District Judge, an Additional
Judge, and the Sub-Judge have civil jurisdiction over the neighbouring
District of Bijnor. Both Bijnor and Budaun are included in the
Sessions Judgeship of Moradabad. Serious crime is heavy, and
offences against public tranquillity and crimes of violence are especially
common. Religious differences, both between Hindus and Musal-
mans, and between the Sunni and Shiah sects of the latter, have
caused serious riots from time to time. Female infanticide was
formerly suspected, but no repressive measures are now necessary.
At cession in 1801 Rohilkhand was divided into two Districts
called Moradabad and Bareilly, the former including, besides its
present area, the District of Bijnor, parts of Budaun, Bareilly, and
the Rampur State. Bijnor was made a separate subdivision called
Northern Moradabad in 1817, and Budaun was taken away in 1822.
The early settlements were for short periods, and proprietary rights
were only gradually recognized, the system being practically a farm to
the highest bidder. A feature of the early settlements was the inquiry
into the terms on which the very numerous revenue-free grants were
held. The District was surveyed between 1831 and 1836, and the first
regular settlement under Regulation IX of 1833 was carried out
between 1840 and 1843. It involved a summary inquiry into rents
actually paid in each village ; but the ' assets ' assumed as the basis of
the assessment were very roughly estimated, and a good deal of reliance
was placed on the reports of the hd/um^os as to the annual value of
villages. The revenue assessed amounted to 11-5 lakhs, which rose to
12 lakhs during the currency of settlement owing to additions to the
District area. In the Thakurdwara tahsil, which is dependent on rice
cultivation, a succession of bad seasons ruined the zamlndars, who had
fallen into the clutches of a usurer, and from 1S60 to 1863 the tahsil
was taken under direct management. Elsewhere the settlement worked
VOL. xvii. e e
423
moradabad district
well. The next revision was carried out between 1872 and 1880.
Soils were carefully classified, either according to the estimate of their
productive value formed by the Settlement officer, or according to their
physical characteristics. Rates were then ascertained for application to
these. In some parts of the District cash rents were paid, and these
were carefully analysed and rent rates were selected, which were applied
with necessary corrections to the large area of land paying rent in kind.
The revenue fixed was 14-3 lakhs, amounting to half the assumed
' assets.' This has been raised by small alterations to 14-6 lakhs, which
falls at an incidence of Rs. 1-3 per acre, varying from R. o-6 to Rs. i-8
in different parts. A new revision of settlement commenced in 1905.
The total collections on account of land revenue and of revenue
from all sources have been, in thousands of rupees : —
1 880- 1.
1890-1.
1 900-1.
1903-4-
Land revenue .
Total revenue .
13,36
18,14
13,88
22,09
24,48
14,61
24,J7
There are four municipalities — Moradabad, Amroha, Sambhal,
and Chandausi — and eleven towns are administered under Act XX of
1856. Beyond the limits of these, local affairs are managed by the
District board, which in 1903-4 had an income of i-6 lakhs and an
expenditure of 1-7 lakhs. The expenditure included Rs. 92,000 on
roads and buildings.
There are 20 police stations in the District ; and the Superintendent
of police has a force of 4 inspectors, 100 subordinate officers, and
480 constables. Municipal and town police number 284, and rural
and road police 2,285. There is a police training school at Morad-
abad city. The District jail contained a daily average of 393 prisoners
in 1903.
The population of Moradabad is not distinguished for its literacy,
and in 1901 only 2 per cent, of the total (4 males and 0-3 females)
could read and write. The number of public schools rose from 184
with 5,549 pupils in 1 880-1 to 290 with 9,167 pupils in 1900-1. In
1903-4 there were 301 such institutions with 10,794 pupils, of whom
1,280 were girls, besides 293 private schools with 4,122 pupils. Five
of the public schools were managed by Government, and 139 by the
District and municipal boards. The total expenditure on education
was Rs. 50,000, of which Rs. 40,000 was provided by Local funds
and Rs. 9,000 from fees. A normal school for teachers is maintained
at Moradabad city, which is also the head-quarters of an Inspector
and an Inspectress of schools.
There are 13 hospitals and dispensaries, with accommodation for
116 in-patients. In 1903 the number of cases treated was 160,000, of
MORADABAD CITY 429
whom 3,500 were in-patients, and 7,000 operations were performed.
The expenditure amounted to Rs. 16,000, chiefly met from Local
funds.
About 41,000 persons were vaccinated in 1903-4, representing 34 per
1,000 of population. Vaccination is compulsory only in the munici-
palities.
[District Gazetteer (1883, under revision) ; E. B. Alexander, Settle-
ment Report (\2&x).~\
Moradabad Tahsil. — North-eastern tahsil of Moradabad District,
United Provinces, conterminous with the pargana of the same name,
lying between 280 41' and 290 8' N. and 780 42' and 790 E., with an
area of 313 square miles. Population increased from 240,795 in 1891
to 245,369 in 1 901. There are 298 villages and three towns, including
Moradabad City (population, 75,128), the District and ta/fo7/ head-
quarters. The demand for land revenue in 1903-4 was Rs. 2,58,000,
and for cesses Rs. 47,000. The density of population, 784 persons per
square mile, is the highest in the District, owing to the inclusion of the
city. A large part of the tahsil consists of the valley of the Ramganga
and is liable to inundation, but it is generally fertile and irrigation is
easy when required. In 1902-3 the area under cultivation was 221
square miles, of which only 19 were irrigated. Wells supply about
half the irrigated area, and tanks or j'hils and rivers the remainder
in equal proportions.
Moradabad City. — Head-quarters of the District and tahsil of the
same name, United Provinces, situated in 2 8° 51' N. and 7 8° 46' E.,
on the Delhi-Bareilly road, and on the main line of the Oudh and
Rohilkhand Railway, 868 miles by rail from Calcutta and 1,087 fr°m
Bombay. Population is rising steadily. The numbers at the four
enumerations were as follows: (1872) 62,417,(1881)69,352,(1891)
72,921, and (1901) 75,128. Hindus numbered 31,141 in 190 1 and
Musalmans 42,472. The city was founded by Rustam Khan, governor
of Katehr under Shah Jahan, and named after the ill-fated Murad
Bakhsh, the emperor's son. From this time Moradabad takes the
place of Sambhal as the seat of the local governor. Early in the
eighteenth century it was for a few years ruled by Nizam-ul-Mulk, who
afterwards distinguished himself as Nizam of the Deccan. A later
governor of Moradabad attempted to arrest the growing power of All
Muhammad, leader of the Rohillas, but was defeated and slain ; and by
1740 Moradabad was included in the new State of Rohilkhand. Its
subsequent history is that of the District, which has already been
related. In 1774 the Rohilla possessions fell into the power of Oudh,
and in 1801 were ceded to the British. Four years later Amir Khan,
the Pindari leader of part of Holkar's forces, dashed through Rohil-
khand, but was foiled in his attempt to plunder the Government
43o MORADABAD CITY
treasury by Mr. Leycester, the Collector, who shut himself up in the
courthouse, defended by two small field-pieces.
Moradabad is built on a ridge forming the right bank of the Ram-
ganga, and drains naturally into that river. The Jama Masjid, or chief
mosque, which stands high on the river bank, is a handsome building,
erected in 1631 by Rustam Khan. Close by are the ruins of the fort
built by the same governor. The city contains a municipal hall, a
tahsill, male and female dispensaries, and a mission church. Part of
the barracks of the old cantonment, which is no longer a station for
troops, is used as a police training school, where candidates for
employment as sub-inspectors and newly appointed Assistant Super-
intendents pass a period of probation, the school being in charge of
a selected District Superintendent assisted by an inspector. A poor-
house and leper asylum were built near the railway station in 1881.
Moradabad is the head-quarters of an Inspector and an Inspectress of
schools, and is the central station of the American Methodist and
Reformed Presbyterian Missions in the District.
The municipality was constituted in 1863. During the ten years
ending 1901 the income averaged Rs. 66,000 and the expenditure
Rs. 64,000. In 1903-4 the income was i-i lakhs, chiefly derived from
octroi (Rs. 81,000) and municipal property (Rs. 25,000). The expendi-
ture was 1-2 lakhs, including conservancy (Rs. 29,000), public safety
(Rs. 22,000), and administration (Rs. 11,000).
The trade largely consists of sugar, wheat, and, in good years, rice,
which are exported by rail. The recent extension of direct railway
communication with Delhi, which has long been one of the important
markets for the produce of Rohilkhand, has favoured commerce. The
principal manufacture of Moradabad is brassware, some of which is highly
ornamental. Formerly brass articles were plated with tin and patterns
were then engraved, so that the pattern showed the brass ground. In
place of tin a coating of lac is now generally used, the lac being coloured
black, blue, or red. Cotton is also woven, and some calico-printing
is done ; but both the brass and cotton industries are declining in
prosperity. The municipality manages three schools and aids twelve
others with 1,458 pupils. The District school has 274 boys, and the
Arya Samaj, the Muhammadan Association, and a private school
educate about 450 more. A normal school for training teachers is also
maintained here. There are twenty-three printing presses, about half of
which issue newspapers, but none is important.
Oxford : Printed at the Clarendon Press by HORACE Hart, M.A.
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