Patiala Districtਪਟਿਆਲਾ

Patiala district is a district of south eastern Punjab in the Malwa region of India, centred on the royal city of Patiala. Once the heart of the largest cis-Sutlej princely state, it is known for Qila Mubarak, its palaces and gardens, Punjabi University, the National Institute of Sports, and a rich wheat and paddy countryside.

Where is Patiala district?

Patiala district is in the south east of Punjab, India, in the Malwa region south of the river Sutlej, and its headquarters is the city of Patiala. The district forms the south eastern corner of the state. Fatehgarh Sahib, Rupnagar and SAS Nagar lie to its north, Sangrur and Malerkotla to the west, and the Haryana districts of Ambala and Kurukshetra to the east, with Kaithal to the south. It spans from 29 degrees 49 minutes to 30 degrees 47 minutes north latitude and from 75 degrees 58 minutes to 76 degrees 54 minutes east longitude, while the headquarters city sits at about 30.34 degrees north and 76.38 degrees east. The district covers 3,325 square kilometres and is administered through six tehsils and ten development blocks, with Patiala city as its administrative, educational and commercial centre. Chandigarh, the state capital, is about 70 kilometres away, and Delhi about 250 kilometres.

History: from Phulkian state to PEPSU

The district takes its name and its shape from a princely state. Its rulers belonged to the Phulkian family, named for their ancestor Chaudhary Phul, whose descendants also founded the states of Nabha and Jind. Baba Ala Singh, who took up the leadership of his clan in 1714, built a small principality from about thirty villages around Barnala, dealing carefully with Mughal, Afghan and Maratha power as each rose and faded. In 1763 he laid the foundation of Qila Mubarak, a mud fort later rebuilt in brick, and the city that grew around it took its name from patti, a strip of land, joined to his own name: the land of Ala. Patiala grew into the largest of the cis-Sutlej princely states and the largest of the Phulkian states. In 1809 the state accepted British protection under a treaty, keeping its internal rule while the British handled its external security, and it later ranked as a 17 gun salute state. The nineteenth century maharajas gave the capital its palaces, gates and gardens, and its court became a noted patron of music, learning and sport. After independence the last maharaja, Yadavindra Singh, acceded to India. In 1948 Patiala became the capital of PEPSU, the Patiala and East Punjab States Union, formed by joining eight princely states of the region. On 1 November 1956 PEPSU was merged into Punjab, and Patiala continued as a district of the reorganised state. Later boundary changes on its northern side, where Fatehgarh Sahib and SAS Nagar are now separate districts, gave it the outline it has today.

Geography and people

Most of the district is a level alluvial plain of the Indo-Gangetic system, sloping gently and farmed intensively. The Ghaggar is its best known river, a seasonal stream that runs near the southern and eastern edges and can flood in heavy monsoon years, while a network of canals supports irrigation across the plain. The climate is of the tropical steppe type, semi arid and hot, with very hot summers, a cold winter and a monsoon that brings most of the rain. The district's normal annual rainfall is about 677 millimetres, most of it falling between late June and September. The Census of 2011 counted 1,895,686 people in the district, at a density of 570 people per square kilometre. About six in ten residents lived in villages and four in ten in towns. The sex ratio was 891 women for every 1,000 men, and the literacy rate was 75.28 per cent, at 80.20 per cent for men and 69.80 per cent for women. Sikhs formed 55.91 per cent of the population and Hindus 41.32 per cent, with Muslims at 2.11 per cent and smaller Christian, Jain and other communities. Punjabi is the main language, spoken locally in its Puadhi form, and Hindi is also widely understood.

Places of interest

Qila Mubarak, the fort Baba Ala Singh founded in 1763, stands on about ten acres in the heart of the old city. Inside are the Qila Androon, the inner palace of painted chambers, the Ran Baas guest house and the Darbar Hall, ringed by bazaars that still sell jewellery, hand woven cloth and juttis. The Sheesh Mahal, the palace of mirrors, forms part of the Old Moti Bagh Palace complex. Its frescoes were painted under Maharaja Narinder Singh, a lake and the Lakshman Jhula bridge stand in front of it, and its museum is built around the medal collection of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh. Moti Bagh Palace itself, built in 1847 under Narinder Singh, now houses the National Institute of Sports and cultural offices, so a royal residence doubles as the training home of Indian sport. The Baradari Gardens, named for their twelve gates and laid out under Maharaja Rajinder Singh just outside the Sheranwala Gate, hold rare trees, colonial era buildings and the Rajindra Kothi. For worshippers, Gurdwara Dukh Nivaran Sahib at Lehal, now inside Patiala city, marks the place where, by the tradition preserved at the gurdwara, Guru Tegh Bahadur sat under a banyan tree by a pond on 24 January 1672 and the village's sickness lifted. Devotees keep faith in the waters of its sarovar. Six kilometres from the city, Bahadurgarh Fort holds a gurdwara recalling the Guru's stay there. Beyond the capital, Nabha draws visitors to its Hira Mahal and royal cenotaphs, and Samana is an old town of the Sirhind country. The celebrated gurdwaras of Fatehgarh Sahib stand in the neighbouring district of that name, an easy trip north, and not inside Patiala district.

Economy and education

Farming is the district's base. Wheat and paddy are its signature crops, grown on the canal watered plain and traded through the mandis of its towns. Industry clusters where the transport is best. Rajpura, the district's highway and rail gateway, is its main industrial town. Nabha's workshops make farm machinery, a fitting industry for a farming district. Education is the capital's second industry. Punjabi University, established on 30 April 1962 to further the Punjabi language, art and literature, is only the second university in the world named after a language. With the Thapar Institute, the Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, a government medical college and many colleges beside, Patiala teaches students from across Punjab. The National Institute of Sports, founded in 1961 and housed in the Old Moti Bagh Palace, trains the coaches of Indian sport and keeps a national sports museum.

Getting there and today

The district is well connected by road and rail. Rajpura is its great junction town, where routes divide for the rest of Punjab, and Patiala city has its own station and bus stand with services across the state and to Delhi. Chandigarh is about 70 kilometres from Patiala city, the nearest airport is at Mohali, about 70 kilometres away, and Delhi is about 250 kilometres away. Today the district works as three things at once: a farming countryside of wheat and paddy villages, a group of busy market and industrial towns, and a royal capital turned centre of universities, hospitals, courts and sport. Visitors come for the palaces and the gurdwara, students for the classrooms, and athletes for the institute in the palace, and all of them meet in the bazaars under the walls of Qila Mubarak.