Gujrat

A region of western India bordering on the Arabian Sea. An independent kingdom after 1401, it was annexed by the Mogul Empire in 1572.

Gujarat, state, W India, on the Arabian Sea. It is comprised of almost all of the Kathiawar peninsula, the desolate Rann of Kachchh, and the districts of Vadovara, Baruch, Surat, and the Dangs. Gujarat was constituted in 1960 from the Gujarati-speaking areas in the northern and western portions of the former state of Bombay. The population is concentrated in the cities of Ahmadabad, Surat, Baroda, Bhavnagar, Rajkot, and Jamnagar. The capital is the new, planned city of Gandhinagar. Gujarat is governed by a chief minister and cabinet responsible to a unicameral elected legislature and by a governor appointed by the president of India.

The state is well-watered, except for the arid Kachchh area in the north; rice, wheat, and cotton are grown. Salt, limestone, manganese, calcite, and bauxite are mined. Hydroelectric power is generated. Heavily industrialized, Gujarat produces textiles, electrical goods, automobiles, chemicals, and building materials; it is the center of the Indian cotton-textile industry. The coastal city of Alang has an immense yard for dismantling and scrapping old ships. Gir National Park, located in the state, is home to the last surviving Asiatic lions.

Archaeological discoveries have linked Gujarat with the Indus valley civilization (c.3,000�1,500 B.C.) and have suggested that it was a part of the Mauryan empire (c.320�185 B.C.). The Gujarat region was the center of Jainism under the Rajput Caulukya dynasty (11th-12th cent.), which fell (1298) to the Delhi Sultanate. In 1390, Gujarat became an independent sultanate. Its immense wealth invited attack, and in 1509 the Portuguese wrested from it the colony of Diu (see Daman and Diu). In 1572 the sultanate was annexed to the Mughal empire. The Marathas were powerful in the area in the first half of the 18th cent. The British East India Company took over control of the region in 1818. Under the British much of the region retained its local princely rulers. In 1947 the region was organized into the state of Bombay. Bombay state was divided into the states of Gujarat and Maharashtra in 1956. W Gujarat was devastated by a strong earthquake in 2001, and the state was the scene of brutal anti-Muslim riots in 2002.

Gujarat is the most industrialized state in India after Maharashtra and is located in western India, bordered by Pakistan to the northwest and Rajasthan to the north. Its capital is Gandhinagar, a planned city close to Ahmedabad, the former state capital and the commercial center of Gujarat.

The state of Gujarat was created on May 1, 1960, out of the northern, predominantly Gujarati-speaking portion of Bombay state. The southern, predominantly Marathi-speaking portion of Bombay state became Maharashtra.

Gujarat has become one of the fastest-growing states in the country; Gujarat had an average per capita income of Rs. 9,289.10, compared to Rs. 6400, the average for all Indian states.

Gujarat has given India three of the most prominent leaders in the independence movement: Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, and Morarji Desai. Gujaratis have also been leaders in the arts and the sciences; Vikram Sarabhai, a Gujarati, was the father of India's space program. They are, however, mostly noted for their entrepreneurial spirit.

Gujarat comprises of 25 districts. The districts are :

Ahmedabad | Amreli | Anand | Banaskantha | Bharuch | Bhavnagar | Dahod | Dang | Gandhinagar | Jamnagar | Junagadh | Kheda | Kutch | Mehsana | Narmada | Navsari | Panchmahal | Patan | Porbandar | Rajkot | Sabarkantha | Surat | Surendranagar | Vadodara | Valsad

Geography

Gujarat is the westernmost state of India. It is bounded by the Arabian Sea to the west, by the state of Rajasthan to the north and northeast, by Madhya Pradesh to the east, and by Maharashtra to the south and southeast.

The relief is low in the most part of the state. The climate is mostly dry, and even desertic in the north-west.

Gujarat has about 1600 km of coastline and it is the longest coastline of all Indian states. This coastline includes the Gulf of Kutch and Gulf of Cambay.

The major cities in Gujarat are Ahmedabad, Vadodara (Baroda), Surat, and Rajkot. Ahmedabad is the largest city in the state and the sixth largest in India. Other important cities in the south of Gujarat are Nadiad, Anand Ankleshwar, Bharuch, Navsari, Vapi, and Valsad; in the north are Jamnagar, Bhuj and Dwarka.

Gujarat is home to several National Parks, including Gir Forest National Park (Girnar), near Junagadh, Velavadar National Park in Bhavnagar District, Vandsa National Park in Bulser District, and Marine National Park on the Gulf of Kutch in Jamnagar District. The last remaining Asian lions, famous for their dark black manes, live in Girnar.

There are also a number of wildlife sanctuaries and nature preserves, including Anjal, Balaram-Ambaji, Barda, Jambughoda, Jessore, Kachchh Desert, Khavda, Nal Sarovar, Narayan Sarovar, Paniya, Purna, Rampura, Ratanmahal, and Surpaneshwar.

History

Situated on the western coast of India, the name of the state is derived from Gujjaratta, which means the land of the Gujjars. It is believed that a tribe of Gujjars migrated to India around the 5th century. The history of Gujarat, however, began much earlier. Settlements of the Indus Valley Civilisation, also known as the Harappan Civilisation, have been found in the area now known as Gujarat. Gujarat's coastal cities, chiefly Bharuch, served as ports and trading centres in the Maurya and Gupta empires.

After the fall of the Gupta empire in the 6th century, Gujarat flourished as an independent Hindu kingdom. The Maitraka dynasty, descended from a Gupta general, ruled from the 6th to the 8th centuries from their capital at Vallabhi, although they were ruled briefly by Harsha during the 7th century. The Arab rulers of Sind sacked Vallabhi in 770, bringing the Maitraka dynasty to an end. A branch of the Pratihara clan ruled Gujarat after the eighth century. In 775 the first Parsi (Zoroastrian) refugees arrived in Gujarat from Iran.

The Solanki clan of Rajputs ruled Gujarat from c. 960 to 1243. Gujarat was a major center of Indian Ocean trade, and their capital at Anhilwara (Patan) was one of the largest cities in India, with population estimated at 100,000 in the year 1000. In 1026, the famous Somnath temple in Gujarat was destroyed by Mahmud of Ghazni. After 1243, the Solkanis lost control of Gujarat to their feudatories, of whom the Vaghela chiefs of Dholka came to dominate Gujarat. In 1292 the Vaghelas became tributaries of the Yadava dynasty of Devagiri in the Deccan.

In 1297 to 1298 Ala ud din Khilji, Sultan of Delhi, destroyed Anhilwara and incorporated Gujarat into the Delhi Sultanate. After Timur's sacking of Delhi at the end of the 14th century weakened the Sultanate, Gujarat's Muslim governor Zafar Khan Muzaffar asserted his independence, and his son, Sultan Ahmed Shah (ruled 1411 to 1442), established Ahmedabad as the capital. Cambay eclipsed Bharuch as Gujarat's most important trade port. The Sultanate of Gujarat remained independent until 1576, when the Mughal emperor Akbar conquered it and annexed it to the Mughal empire. It remained a province of the Mughal empire until the Marathas conquered eastern and central Gujarat in the 18th century; Western Gujarat (Kathiawar and Kutch) were divided among numerous local rulers.

Economy

It is one of India's most prosperous states, having a per-capita GDP significantly above India's average. Major resources produced by the state include cotton, peanuts, dates, sugarcane, and petrol.

Surat, a city by the Gulf of Khambat, is a hub of global diamond trade. Much of its diamond trade is controlled by a handful of families professing the Jain faith.

Also on the Gulf of Khambat, 50 kilometers southeast of Bhavnagar, is the Alang Ship Recycling Yard, the world's largest.

Anand is host to Amul dairy, one of the largest milk product producers of the world. Gujarat is the largest producer of milk in India.

Reliance Industries Limited was founded by one of Gujarat's most respected industrialists, the late Dhirubhai Ambani.

Educational institutions

Gujarat is home to an Indian Institute of Management, located in the city of Ahmedabad. The institute has been rated as the best in Asia by Asiaweek and one of the best in the world. Its graduates work in high positions for Fortune 500 companies and other major companies throughout the world. Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communication Technology is the first institute in India to recognise ICT as the emerging technical discipline and impart education in the same. Gujarat also hosts an extension campus, the National Institute of Design at Gandhinagar, for the prestigious NID at Ahmedabad. Gujarat has got four state agricultural Universities, namely Anand Agricultural University, Junagadh Agricultural University, Navsari Agricultural University and Saradar Krushinagar Dantiwada Agricultural University engaged in Teaching, Research and Extension Education. Nirma Institue of Technology is one of the premier engineering institue of west india.

Gujarat Ayurved University, Jamnagar  
Anand Agricultural University, Anand  
Saurashtra University, Rajkot  
Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, Vadodara  
Hemchandracharya North Gujarat University, Patan  
Gujarat University, Ahmedabad  
Gujarat Vidyapith, Ahmedabad  
Bhavnagar University, Bhavnagar  
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University, Ahmedabad 
Sardar Patel University, Vallabh Vidyanagar  
Junagadh Agricultural University, Junagadh 
Navsari Agricultural University, Navsari  
Sardarkrushinagar Dantiwada Agricultural University, Sardarkrushinagar  
South Gujarat University, Surat 

Tourism

Lothal is the site of the ancient ruins of the first Indian port, during the times of the Indus Valley Civilization.

The Modhera Sun Temple is famous for its rare position as specifically and uniquely designed for the worship of the Sun, Lord Surya. While the main temple is beautifully and intricately designed with complex architecture, painting and sculptures, there is a central pond and surrounding it stand 108 small temples for each of the Sun God's 108 names.

Dwarka city on the tip of the Arabian Sea is famous for being the legendary home of Lord Krishna, the eight Avatara of Vishnu, hero of the Mahabharata epic. Ancient ruins of a city and temple complex found underwater suggest a historical basis for the legend.

The Rann of Kutchch covers a large portion of western Gujarat, and is world-famous for its rare ecosystem, fossils, wildlife and terrain. Only 500 years earlier, the area was the Arabian Sea.

While the city of Ahmedabad is a large and fast-growing modern metropolis, it was also the home of the Indian Independence Movement, with the Sabarmati Ashram of Mahatma Gandhi a standing legacy.

Its main tourist sites include Palitana, Diu, Kutch, Jamnagar, Junagadh, and Rajkot.