Khagaria
History Of Khagaria
Khagaria, as a district, is only twenty Years old. Earlier, it was a part of the district of Munger, as a subdivision. The sub-division of Khagaria was created in the Year 1943-44. It was upgraded as district, with effect from 10th May, 1981, vide Government of Bihar notification no. 7/T-1-207/79 dated 30th April,1981. As a sub-division of the old district of Munger, Khagaria was the youngest, in terms of creation of sundivision, before independence. The other three older subdivision were Munger sadar, Begusarai and Jamui. The Jamui sub-division was created on 22nd July,1864 and Begusarai sub-division on the 14th February 1870.
Khagaria was created as a separate sub-division mainly because of the difficulties arising out of a lack of easy means of communications. Railways were a very old means of communication in this district. As per the Gazetteer of 1960,this Sub-division had three railway lines - the north Eastern Railway, passing west to East had four Stations – Khagaria, Mansi, Maheshkhunt and Pasraha . One branch Line shot off from Khagaria passing through Olapur and Imli, while another branch line shot off from Mansi, which went up to Saharsa. This Mansi- Saharsa branch line, during that period was however disturbed during rains between Katyani Asthan and Koparia, a distance of 6 miles, which had to be covered by boats. Apart from railways, the other means of communication was roads, which were in a very bad shape. The only metalled road at that time was 22 mile long Maheshkhunt- Aguawani ghat road, which was still under construction. During that period Khagaria- Parihara- bakhri Road was also under construction and National Highway linking Moakamaghat to Assam was under contemplation.
Recurrence of floods was an annual affair, as five major rivers – The Ganga, The Gandak, The Bagmati, The Kamala and The Koshi passed through the area of the subdivision of Khagaria. The recurrence of floods along with water logging made communication extremely difficult in the rainy season. Before the construction of South embankment of Baghmati and Gogari- Narayanpur embankment, the vast portion of land between the railway line and three streams, namely, the Bagmati, the Kamla and The Ghaghri ( the main stream of Koshi) and the various streams, as the Maria river and the Maitha river, used to abound in marshes.
It is said that the entire areas, now included in the district of khagaria, was "Dahnal", affected by floods of the Ganga, the Gandak, the Kamla, the Bagmati and the Koshi and that because of its physical situation, any site of importance must have been washed away. That is why, it does not possess any historical site of importance. According to the history, commonly known in this part, it is said that during the time of Emperor Akbar, Raja Todarmal had been entrusted with the duty of making a survey of the entire area, but as he failed to do it, he advise that this area should be excluded, in other words, he adopted the policy of "Farak Kiya" and that is why the area is Known as "Pharkiya Pargana".
Early History
The teritony, included in the old district of Munger, formed part of the Madhya- desaor "Midland" of the first Aryan settlers. It has been identified with Modagiri, a place mentined in the Mahabharata, which was the capital of a kingdom in Eastern India near Vanga and Tamralipta. At the dawn of history, the territory apparently comprised within the Kingdom of Anga, the capital of which was at Champa near Bhagalpur. Anga comprised of the modern districts of Bhagalpur and Munger, and also extended north wards up to the river koshi and included the western portion of the district of Purnea. Rahul Sankritayan in "Budh Charya" has mentioned that the area lying north of the Ganga was known as Anguttarap.
The first historical account of the old district of Munger appears in the Travels of Hiuen-Tsiang who visited the portions of it, towards the close of the first half of the seventh century A.D. After that there is a gap in the history of the district until the ninth century A.D., when it passed into the hands of Pala kings. The history during Pala period has become known mainly through the inscriptions. However, it is true that both Hiuen – Tsang’s account and Pala inscriptions cover maibly the Southern part of Munger district. The area passed through Muslim rule after the advent of Muslim rule in India.
Munger, in the later history, came into prominence, in the year 1762, when Kasim Ali Khan made it his capital instead of Murshidabad , from which he removed his treasure, his elephants and horses, and even the gold and silver decorations of the Imambara. He built himself a palace with a breast work before it for thirty guns, and had the fortifications strengthened; while his favourite General Gurghin Khan, an Armenian who had formerly been a cloth merchant at Ispahan, reorganized the army, had it drilled and equipped after the English model, and established an arsenal; the manufacture of fire-arms, which still is carried on at Munger, is said to date back to this period. Soon after he had established himself at Munger, Mir Kasim Ali came into collision with the English, which finally resulted in capture of Munger in the year 1763.
With the extension of the British dominions, Munger ceased to be an important frontier post. The existence of Munger, as a separate executive centre is believed to date from the year 1812. The extent of the Munger jurisdiction is not mentioned in the local records till september 1814, when it is stated to comprise five Thanas or Police divisions, namely, Munger,Tarapur,Surajgarha, Mallepur and Gogari. In 1834 pargana chakai was transferred from the district of Ramgarh and in 1839 pargana Bishazari from the district of Patna. Numerous minor changes followed but the greatest change was effected in June 1874, when parganas Sakhrabadi, Darra, Singhaul, Kharagpur and Parbatta were transferred from Bhagalpur to Munger, together with tappas Lowdah and Simrawan and 281 villages from parganas Sahuri and Lakhanpur comprising in all an area of 613.62 square miles. The subdivision of Jamui was formed in 1864, at first with headquarters at Sikandra, but in 1869 they were transferred to Jamui. The Begusarai subdivision was established in 1870 and in 1943-44, Khagaria subdivision was established with headquarters at Khagaria.
When Khagaria subdivision was created, it comprised of an area of 752 square miles and as per the census of 1951, had a population of 5,84,625 persons. It had seven Police Thanas, namely, Khagaria, Gogari, Chautham, Parbatta, Alauli, Beldaur and Bakhtiyarpur. Presently, Bakhtiyarpur forms part of Saharsa district, Most of the part of Khagaria district was referred to as ‘ Pharkiya Pargana.’ In the 1926 District Gazetter of Munger, it has been referred as "a pargana in the north east of the Munger subdivision, with an area of 506 square miles comprised mainly within the Gogri thana." This tract formerly belonged to an ancient family of Zamindars, of whose history little is known except what was collected in 1787 by Mr. Adair, the collector of Bhagalpur. Towards the close of the 15th century, the Emperor of Delhi sent a Rajput, namely Biswanath Rai, to contain lawlessness in the area. He successfully accomplished the task and obtained the grant of a Zamindari in this part of the country, and the estate developed on his posterity without interruption for ten generations. The annals of the family, however, after the first quarter of the 18th century, are a record of little but bloodshed and violence. At the time of publication of the 1926 Gazetteer , the greater portion of the estate was the property of Babu Kedarnath Goenka and Babu Deonandan Prasad.
