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| Welcome to Bettiah / West Champaran |
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| Bettiah
is the headquarters of West Champaran district
in the state of Bihar, in India. It is an agricultural
trade centre, it also manufactures brass, metalware
and leather goods. The seat of the Bettiah Raj
estate, established in the 17th century, it contains
the Maharaja's Palace and a number of temples
beside other places to visit.
Bettiah is a small
town near Indo-Nepal border, Its palaces and temples
narrate its magnificient history. It has a Roman
Catholic Mission established in 1740 and municipality,
established in 1869. It came on the rail-map of
the country, as early as 1883 and witnessed the
first experiment with non-violence by Gandhiji
in India during his Struggle for the Abolition
of Indigo Plantation in 1917. It is an agricultural
trade centre and has several industries, viz.,
sugar, leather, brass and metalware, beside food
processing centres.
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| Bettiah
Raj |
| Bettiah
was the capital of the little Kingdom of Bettiah, known
as Bettiah Raj, one of the great estates of North Bihar.
It possessed a record room or muhafizkhana. Since 1897,
the Bettiah Raj was under the Court of Wards, a colonial
institution whose function was to oversee the administration
of the estates which had no male heir to succeed. The
Bettiah Raj, still has its own officials who oversee day
to day administration of its landholdings and other assets,
that are not confined to Bettiah, but are in several parts
of the country. Bettiah Raj's houses the official records
of administrative and legal affairs of the Raj for the
past two hundred and fifty years or so, which are stored
in two large halls having an storage space of 40,000 and
72,000 cubic feet respectively, with a shelf space that
is about half a kilometer in length. It is in fact a rich
repository of source materials for the study of the agrarian
and political history not only of the Bettiah Raj, but
beyond that also. The records are placed in bastas, which
are individual bundles of records wrapped in cloth. The
records includes rent registers and receipts, cash- books,
village notes and settlement records, village maps, legal
proceedings and historical letters covering more than
200 years of history. Unfortunately, the order in which
the records were classified is now lost and most of them
can only be found by sheer guess work or even by accident!
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| Roman
Catholic Mission |
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noteworthy event occurred in 1740, when Maharani of Bettiah
was sick and could not be cured by the local practitioners,
Raja invited Father Joseph Mary, a medical doctor, settled
at Patna. Father Joseph was successful, and the Raja was
very grateful. In reward, the Raja offered the him the
freedom to spread his religion in the region. With permission
from the Vatican, a mission was set up at Bettiah in 1769
with priests coming from Rome. Now Bettiah is a Diocese
with a Bishop as its head clergy. Severla
schools, orphanages and other welfare institutions are
run by the mission in and around Bettiah. Among the
schools run by the mission, K. R. High School (for boys)
and St. Teresa High School (for girls) are well aclaimed.
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| Gandhiji
at Bettiah |
On October 11, 1917, Gandhiji arrived in Bettiah from
Motihari by train. The local CID described his visit as
follows. About 4,000 people were present at the station
and no sooner the train stopped than people began to shout:
Gandhiji ki jai, Gandhi Maharaj ki jai. There were bajas
(bands), and flags at the station and all the men from
neighbouring and distant villages, including schoolboys
and mukhtiars were present. They showered flowers on Gandhiji
and garlanded him. There were red carpets spread over
the complete length of the platform. Surajmal Marwari
of Bettiah had brought his phaeton and a horse of Puran
Babu Raj, an engineer, was harnessed ........ Gandhiji
was taken to Hazarimal's dharamshala with all the villagers
who had come to see him. The dharamshala was nicely decorated
with flags, flowers, etc." D.G. Tendulkar's Gandhi
in Champaran has a photograph of it, where Gandhiji camped
and conducted his campaign. The site still exists, besides
newly painted signboards reading "Hazarimal dharamshala,
estd. 1892". The original building has been half
demolished and would have disappeared had the Government
of Bihar not woken up belatedly. There is a plaque which
indicate that Gandhiji made his debut in Indian politics,
80 years ago, from the site of the rubble. |
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| Bettiah
Fair |
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This fair is held at Bettiah
(West Champaran) on the Dussehra Durga Puja and
lasts for about fifteen days. It attracts a vast
number of people from the neighbouring villages
at the time of fair. It is estimated that their
number does not fall much short of two lakhs or
so.
The most important feature of this fairs is the
organization of a cattle fair where several thousand
cattle are bought and sold.
The cattle fair also attracts sellers and purchasers
from the neighboring districts of Muzaffarpur
and Saran as well as from Nepal. The cattle brought
for sale here are generally of local breed and
are poor in quality. All kinds of commodities
required in daily use are sold at this fair. It
is the largest fair in the district. |
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| West Champaran |
| Area |
Population Total
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Rural Total |
Urban Total |
| 5,228
sq. kms. |
23,33,666 |
20,98,298 |
2,35,368 |
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| SC Population Total |
Rural Total |
Urban Total |
| 3,35,249 |
3,17,428 |
1,17,821 |
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| ST Population Total |
Rural Tota |
Urban Total |
| 31,104 |
30,733 |
371 |
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| Sub
Divisions |
| Bettiah,
Bagaha, Narkatiyaganj. Blocks Bettiah, Sikta, Mainatand,
Chanpattia, Bairia, Lauria, Bagaha-1, Bagaha-2, Madhubani,
Gaunaha, Narkatiaganj, Manjhaulia, Nautan, Jogapatti,
Ramnagar, Thakraha, Bhitaha, Piprasi. |
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| Location |
225
Kilometres north-west of Patna. It is located at 26.81?N
Latitude and 84.50?E Longitude, 65 metres above Mean
Sea Level |
| Best time to visit |
| Visit October
to March. How To Get There By air |
| How To Get There By air |
| Nearest air-port
is Patna, about 225 Kilometres from Bettiah. |
| By Rail |
From
Delhi : Saptakranti Express,
Satyagrah Express
From Mumbai : Avadh Express
From Kolkata : Howrah-Gorakhpur
Express
From Jammu : Amarnath Express
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| By road |
Luxurious
bus services between Bettiah and Patna and other places.
Getting Around Auto Rickshaw, Cycle Rickshaw, Tonga,
Bus and Unmetered Taxi. Places To Stay Large number
of good quality hotels are present at Bettiah |
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| East
Chaparan |
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Exam Results 2010 |
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| IIT |
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| IIM |
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