Cachar

Cachar District ; কাছাড় জেলা
State	Assam
Administrative headquarters :	Silchar
Area :	3,783 km²
Residents :	1,736,319 (2011)
Population density :	459 inhabitants / km²
Website :	cachar.gov.in

Cachar ( Bengali : কাছাড় Kāchāṛ [ ˈkatʃʰaɽ ], Assamese : কাছাৰ Kāchār [ ˈkasar ]) is a district in the Indian state of Assam . The administrative seat is in Silchar , the second largest city of Assam.

geography

Aerial view of Silchar with the Barak River

Cachar is located in the Barak Valley in southern Assam. The district borders in the northwest on the state of Meghalaya (district Jaintia Hills ), in the north on the district Dima Hasao , in the east on the state of Manipur (districts Tamenglong and Churachandpur ), in the south on the state of Mizoram (districts Aizawl and Kolazib ) as well as in Southwest to the Halakandi and Karimganj districts . In the west lies the state border with Bangladesh .

The district of Cachar has an area of 3,783 square kilometers. The largest part of the district area is presented as a river plain through which the Barak or Surma, a tributary of the Meghna , flows. Mountains rise to the north, east and south. Geographically, the Barak Valley can be seen as an extension of the river plains of East Bengal (Bangladesh), while it is isolated from the rest of Assam by the Barail Mountains .

history

Ruins from the time of the Kachari Kingdom in Khaspur

Cachar was part of the Kachari kingdom in earlier times . The Kachari Rajas , who belonged to the Dimasa ethnic group , originally had their capital further north in Dimapur . After the conquest of Dimapur by the Ahom , the defeated moved their capital to the mountainous region of Maibong in today's Dima Hasao district. In 1706 Maibong was also taken by the Ahom ruler Rudra Singh . The Kacharis then crossed the Barail Mountains and settled in the plain around Khaspur . In 1790 the ruling family professed Hinduism . In 1819, Burma, expanding westward, conquered the Kachari kingdom and forced its ruler Gobind Chandra to flee. After the British , who now ruled over Bengal , defeated the Burmese in the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824-1826), they reinstated Gobinda Chandra. After he died in 1830 without an heir, his territory fell to the British in 1832 according to the Doctrine of Lapse . The northern part of the former kingdom, meanwhile, was under the control of a usurper named Tularam. In 1854 this area was also annexed by the British.

The newly acquired area was incorporated into the Assam Province of British India as the Cachar District . With the independence of India in 1947, the district became part of the Indian state of Assam. The district received the eastern parts of the Sylhet district , which was divided in the course of the partition of India between India and Pakistan (East Pakistan, today's Bangladesh). In 1951, the mountain areas in the north of the district of Cachar and parts of the adjacent districts of Sivasagar , Nagaon and Khasi and Jaintia Hills, mainly populated by tribal peoples, became the district of United Mikir and North Cachar Hills . In 1970 this was divided into the districts of North Cachar Hills (now Dima Hasao ) and Mikir Hills (now Karbi Anglong ). In 1983 the Karimganj district split off from Cachar as an independent district, followed by the Hailakandi district in 1989 .

population

According to the 2011 census, the Cachar district has 1,736,617 inhabitants. With 459 inhabitants per square kilometer, the district is very densely populated. The district is still predominantly rural. Of the 1,736,617 residents, 1,421,153 people (81.83%) live in rural areas and 315,464 people in urban communities.

The district of Cachar belongs to the areas of India that are only sparsely populated by members of the "tribal population" ( scheduled tribes ). (2011) 17,569 people (1.01 percent of the district's population) were among them. There are 264,897 Dalits ( scheduled castes ; 15.25 percent of the district population) in the district.

The majority of the population is made up of people who were born in the district. Of the residents, 1,630,398 people (93.88 percent of residents) were born in the district. A total of 27,348 people were born in other Indian states (including 8,214 people in Tripura, 5,101 people in Manipur, 3,236 people in Bihar, 2,823 people in Meghalaya and 2,390 people in West Bengal). Of the 16,187 foreign-born people, 14,849 are from Bangladesh.

Population development

As everywhere in India, the population in the Cachar district has been growing rapidly for decades. The increase in the years 2001–2011 was 20.2 percent (20.19%). In these ten years the population increased by around 291,000 people. The following table illustrates the development:

Significant places

There are a total of 19 places in the district that are considered cities. These include 17 places that are only statistically considered to be cities (notified towns).

District population by gender

As is common in India, the district always had more male than female residents. Among the youngest residents (256,774 people under 7 years of age), the proportions are 131,417 men (51.18 percent) to 125,357 people (48.82 percent) women.

Distribution of the population by gender in the Cachar district
	1961 census		1971 census		1981 census		1991 census		2001 census		2011 census
	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of
TOTAL	664.351	100%	823.515	100%	-	-	1,215,385	100%	1,444,921	100%	1,736,617	100%
Men	348.251	52.42%	429.434	52.15%	-	-	629.196	51.77%	743.042	51.42%	886.284	51.04%
Women	316.100	47.58%	394.081	47 85,%	-	-	586.189	48.23%	701.879	48.58%	850.333	48.96%

District population by language

Due to its location, the Barak Valley, to which the Cachar district belongs, has strong cultural affinities with Bengal. So the main language is Bengali . At the district level, in Karimganj, as in the other two districts of the Barak Valley , it has an official status alongside Assamese , the official language of Assam.

There are two other languages, Hindi and Manipuri, each spoken by more than 100,000 people. Another six languages are given as the main language by more than 10,000 people each. Bengali clearly dominates in the Zillas Katigora and Sonai. Bengali also have a clear majority in the Zillas Silchar (with 77.68 percent of the population) and Udarbond (with 64.50 percent of the population). In the Zilla Lakhipur (with 49.34 percent of the population) it is the strongest language.

The Zilla Lakhipur is linguistically very mixed. In addition to Bengali, Manipuri (with 21.62 percent of the population), Hindi (with 10.85 percent of the population) as well as Dimasa and Hmar are widespread. There are many speakers of Hindi (with 13.94 percent of the population) and Bhojpuri (with 8.85 percent of the population) in Zilla Udarbond. And in Zilla Silchar, Hindi (with 10.67 percent of the population), Bhojpuri (with 3.35 percent of the population), Manipuri (with 3.12 percent of the population) and Bishnupria Manipuri (with 1.75 percent of the population) are the ones most important minority languages. The most widely spoken languages are shown in the following table:

year	Bengali		Hindi		Manipuri		Bhojpuri		Bishnupria Manipuri		Dimasa		Hmar		Khasi		Odia		Total
year	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%
2011	1,304,566	75.12	147,367	8.49	105.254	6.06	57,700	3.32	22,021	1.27	19,482	1.12	12.092	0.70	12,086	0.70	10,439	0.60	1,736,617	100.00%
Source: 2011 census result

Population of the district by confession

Today a majority of the population is Hindu. Hindus are in the majority in three of the five zillas - Lakhipur, Silchar, and Udarbond. In the other two Zillas they are a strong minority. In the Zillas Katigora (with 53.55 percent of the population) and Sonai (with 56.92 percent of the population) Muslims predominate. There is a significant Christian minority in Zilla Lakhipur (17,137 people; 5.87 percent of the population). The majority of the Hmar and Khasi are clearly Christians. There are also Christian immigrants from other regions of India. The following table shows the exact religious composition of the population:

year	Buddhists		Christians		Hindus		Jainas		Muslims		Sikhs		Other		not specified		Total
year	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%	number	%
2011	341	0.02	37,635	2.17	1,038,985	59.83	1,673	0.10	654.816	37.71	280	0.02	98	0.01	2,789	0.16	1,736,617	100.00%
Source: 2011 census result

education

Thanks to significant efforts, literacy has risen sharply in recent decades. In urban areas, almost 89 percent can read and write. In the countryside, however, only around 77 percent can. The strong differences between the sexes and the urban / rural population are typical of Indian conditions.

Literacy in the Cachar District
unit	2011 census
unit	number	proportion of
TOTAL	1,174,128	79.34%
Men	639.946	84.78%
Women	534.182	73.68%
TOTAL CITY	250.392	88.99%
City men	130.325	91.95%
City women	120,067	85.99%
TOTAL COUNTRY	923.736	77.08%
Country men	509.621	83.12%
Country women	414.115	70.75%
Source: 2011 census result

Administrative division

The district was divided into five zillas (circles) at the last census in 2011.

Population in the Zillas
	Katigora		Lakhipur		Silchar		Sonai		Udarbond
	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of	number	proportion of
TOTAL	291,875	100%	291,872	100%	704.465	100%	324.315	100%	124.090	100%
Men	150.246	51.48%	148.023	50.72%	359.728	51.06%	164.471	50.71%	63,816	51.43%
Women	141,629	48.52%	143,849	49.28%	344,737	48.94%	159,844	49.29%	60,274	48.57%
city	11,869	4.07%	10,277	3.52%	284.267	40.35%	0	0%	9,015	7.26%
country	280.006	95.93%	281,595	96.48%	420.198	59.65%	324.315	100%	115.039	92.74%

literature

The Imperial Gazetteer of India. Volume 9: Bomjur to Central India. New edition. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1908, pp. 248–249 , keyword Cāchār .

Web links

Commons : Cachar District - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

[1] Cachar District: Census 2011 data

[2] A - 2 DECADAL VARIATION IN POPULATION SINCE 1901

[3] Result of the 2011 census on city population

[4] District Census Handbook for Cachar