Bhandra block is a CD block that forms an administrative division in the Lohardaga subdivision of

Lohardaga district Lohardaga district is one of the twenty-four districts of the Indian state of Jharkhand. The district is named after the town of Lohardaga, the administrative headquarters of the district. The district was created from a portion of Ranchi distr ...

, in the Indian state of

Jharkhand Jharkhand (; ; ) is a state in eastern India. The state shares its border with the states of West Bengal to the east, Chhattisgarh to the west, Uttar Pradesh to the northwest, Bihar to the north and Odisha to the south. It has an area of . It ...

History

Lohardaga was made a subdivision of Ranchi district in 1972. Ranchi district was split into three districts namely Ranchi, Gumla and Lohardaga, in 1983.

Maoist activities

Lohardaga has been identified as an “A” grade highly

Maoist Maoism, officially called Mao Zedong Thought by the Chinese Communist Party, is a variety of Marxism–Leninism that Mao Zedong developed to realise a socialist revolution in the agricultural, pre-industrial society of the Republic of Ch ...

infested district. Kuru, Bhandra, Kairo, Kisko, Jowang and Senha police stations are totally affected and Lohardaga police station is partially affected. The Maoist outfits are mainly interested in extorting the bauxite mining and transport industry. The police force has been trained to take on the Maoist outfits and has been extending support at important points. Lohardaga has lost one Superintendent of Police, Ajay Kumar Singh, IPS in the anti-insurgency operations.

Geography

Bhandara is located at . Lohardaga district consists of two broad physiographic divisions – the hilly tract and the plateau region. The hilly tract extends over the western and north-western parts of the district. The high hill tops of this region are known as ''pat''. The plateau region is a part of the Gumla Plateau, which lies in the southern portion of

Chota Nagpur Plateau The Chota Nagpur Plateau is a plateau in eastern India, which covers much of Jharkhand state as well as adjacent parts of Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal and Bihar. The Indo-Gangetic plain lies to the north and east of the plateau, and the bas ...

. Lohardaga and Bhandra CD blocks are entirely in the plateau region. Other administrative areas, such as Kisko, Senha and Kuru CD blocks are partly in the plateau region and partly in the hilly tract. Bhandara CD block is bounded by the

Kairo Kairo may refer to: * Kairo (band), Mexican boy band from 1993 to 1999 with Eduardo Verástegui as member until 1996 * ''Kairo'' (video game), independently published exploration video game made by Richard Perrin * ''Kairo'' (film), A.K.A. ''Pul ...

CD block on the north,

Bero Bero may refer to: Places: * Bero (woreda), a woreda in Ethiopia * Bero block, an administrative block in Ranchi district, Jharkhand, India * Bero, India, a village in Jharkhand state, India * Bero River, Angola People: * Bero (name), a list of p ...

CD block in Ranchi district on the east, Bherno CD block in Gumla district on the south and

Senha Senha is a village in the Senha CD block in the Lohardaga Sadar subdivision of the Lohardaga district in the Indian state of Jharkhand. Geography Location Senha is located at Area overview The map alongsid ...

and

Lohardaga Lohardaga is a town and the district headquarters of Lohardaga district in the Indian state of Jharkhand, west of Ranchi, the state capital. Earlier (early 1900s) Lohardaga was the commissionary headquarters for Chotanagpur. It was only lat ...

CD blocks on the west. Bhandra CD block has an area of 160.48 km².

Bhandra Bhandra (also called Bhendra) is a census town in the Nawadih CD block in the Bermo subdivision of the Bokaro district in the Indian state of Jharkhand. Geography Location Bhandra is located at . Area overview Bokaro district consists of u ...

police station serves Bhandra CD block. The headquarters of Bhandra CD block is located at

village.

Demographics

Population

According to the

2011 Census of India The 2011 Census of India or the 15th Indian Census was conducted in two phases, house listing and population enumeration. The House listing phase began on 1 April 2010 and involved the collection of information about all buildings. Information ...

, Bhandra CD block had a total population of 57,303, all of which were rural. There were 28,754 (50%) males and 28,549 (50%) females. Population in the age range 0-6 years was 9,765.

Scheduled Castes The Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) are officially designated groups of people and among the most disadvantaged socio-economic groups in India. The terms are recognized in the Constitution of India and the groups are designa ...

numbered 2979 (1.71%) and

Scheduled Tribes The Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) are officially designated groups of people and among the most disadvantaged socio-economic groups in India. The terms are recognized in the Constitution of India and the groups are designa ...

numbered 43,491 (63.93%).

Literacy

According to the 2011 census, the total number of literate persons in Bhandra CD block was 30,078 (63.27% of the population over 6 years) out of which males numbered 17,426 (73.24% of the male population over 6 years) and females numbered 12,652 (53.28% of the female population over 6 years). The

gender disparity Sex differences in humans have been studied in a variety of fields. Sex determination occurs by the presence or absence of a Y in the 23rd pair of chromosomes in the human genome. Phenotypic sex refers to an individual's sex as determined by the ...

(the difference between female and male literacy rates) was 22.34%. census, literacy in Lohardaga district was 78.62%. Literacy in Jharkhand was 67.63% in 2011. Literacy in India in 2011 was 74.04%. See also –

List of Jharkhand districts ranked by literacy rate This is a list of districts in the Indian state of Jharkhand ranked by literacy rate as per provisional data of 2011 census. With a literacy rate of 67.63%, below the national average of 74.04%, as per the 2011 Census, Jharkhand ranks 32nd amongst ...

Language and religion

According to the ''District Census Handbook, Lohardaga, 2011 census,'' “the distribution of different mother tongues (languages mentioned under 8th Schedule of Constitution of India) as returned during the 2001 Census for Lohardaga district was” Kurukh (42.15%),

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

(39.66%),

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

, 38.96% of the population in the Lohardaga district spoke Kurukh, 33.17%

Sadri Sadri is a municipality in the Pali district of Rajasthan, India. It is considered the gateway to Marwar from Mewar. Sadri is one of the main places of worship for the Jain community. Ranakpur Temple and Shri Parshuram Mahadev Mandir are locate ...

, 13.87%

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

and other languages 1.50% as their first language.

is the official language in Jharkhand and

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

According to the ''District Census Handbook, Lohardaga, 2011 census,'' ‘Other Religions and Persuasions’ formed 47.2% of the population, followed by

Hindus Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

(28.6%),

Muslims Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abraha ...

(20.1%),

Christians Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

(4.0%). The

Oraon people The Kurukh or Oraon, also spelt Uraon, or Dhangar (Kurukh language, Kurukh: ''Karḵẖ'' and ''Oṛāōn'') are a Dravidian languages, Dravidian speaking ethnolinguistic group inhabiting Chota Nagpur Plateau, Chhotanagpur Plateau and adjoining ...

dominate in Lohardaga district. In the 2001 census they numbered 164,379 and formed 80.95% of the Scheduled Tribes population, who in turn constituted 55.70% of the population in the district. The Lohras formed 4.79% of the ST population.

Rural poverty

70-80% of the population of Lohardaga district were in the BPL category in 2004–2005.In 2011-12, the proportion of BPL population in Lohardaga district came down to 38.0%.According to a study in 2013 (modified in 2019), "the incidence of poverty in Jharkhand is estimated at 46%, but 60% of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes are still below poverty line."

Economy

Livelihood

In Bhandra CD block in 2011, amongst the class of total workers, cultivators numbered 20,718 and formed 66.23%, agricultural labourers numbered 7,888 and formed 25.21%, household industry workers numbered 358 and formed 1.14% and other workers numbered 2,320 and formed 7.44%. Total workers numbered 31,284 and formed 54.59% of the total population, and non-workers numbered 26,019 and formed 45.41of the population.

Infrastructure

There are 45 inhabited villages in Bhandra CD block. In 2011, 16 villages had power supply. 4 villages had tap water (treated/ untreated), 45 villages had well water (covered/ uncovered), 45 villages had hand pumps, and all villages have drinking water facility. 9 villages had post offices, 4 villages had sub post offices, 7 villages had telephones (land lines), 30 villages had mobile phone coverage. 45 villages had pucca (paved) village roads, 7 villages had bus service (public/ private), 10 villages had autos/ modified autos, 26 villages had tractors. 6 villages had bank branches, 2 villages had agricultural credit societies, 32 villages had

public distribution system The Public Distribution System (PDS) is an Indian food security system that was established by the Government of India under the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution to distribute food and non-food items to India's poor a ...

, 35 villages had

assembly Assembly may refer to: Organisations and meetings * Deliberative assembly, a gathering of members who use parliamentary procedure for making decisions * General assembly, an official meeting of the members of an organization or of their representa ...

polling stations.

Agriculture

Large areas of the district were earlier covered with forests. With gradual deforestation, more land is being brought under cultivation. At present around 32-35% of the total area is covered with forests. Rice is grown in the terraced lowlands called ''don''. In the uplands called ''tanr'', a coarse form of rice, millets, pulses and oil seeds are grown. Agriculture is mostly monsoon-dependent. “The wells, springs and ''ahars'' are the only traditional sources of irrigation. The average land holding per household is 1.65 Ha. The per capita agriculture land is around 0.28 Ha. Net irrigated area is 13.4% of net sown area”.

Bauxite

Bauxite Bauxite is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (Al(OH)3), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)) and diaspore (α-AlO(O ...

is the raw material from which aluminium is produced. Lohardaga district has large reserves of world class bauxite across Pakhar, Hisari, Rudhali Pat, Khamar Pat and the mining area also extends to neighbouring districts. The district has approval of mining of approximately 11 lakh tones of bauxite mineral in a year. Hindalco Industries Ltd has 7 mining leases out of 9 active mines in Lohardaga district which supplies bauxite to Hindalco’s aluminium plants at Muri and

Renukoot Renukoot is a city and a nagar panchayat in Sonbhadra district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Renukoot is 68 km south from the district headquarters Robertsgan Renukoot is an industrial town. It is well known for the Hindalco alumi ...

.A ropeway connecting Bagru mines and Lohardaga has been a popular tourist attraction.

Backward Regions Grant Fund

Lohardaga district is listed as a backward region and receives financial support from the

Backward Regions Grant Fund Backward or Backwards is a relative direction. Backwards or Sdrawkcab (the word "backwards" with its letters reversed) may also refer to: * "Backwards" (''Red Dwarf''), episode of sci-fi TV sitcom ''Red Dwarf'' ** ''Backwards'' (novel), a nov ...

. The fund, created by the Government of India, is designed to redress regional imbalances in development. As of 2012, 272 districts across the country were listed under this scheme. The list includes 21 districts of Jharkhand.

Education

Bhandra CD block had 8 villages with pre-primary schools, 43 villages with primary schools, 21 villages with middle schools, 2 villages with secondary schools, 2 villages had no educational facility.
.*Senior secondary schools are also known as Inter colleges in Jharkhand

Healthcare

Bhandra CD block had 7 villages with primary health centres, 20 villages with primary health subcentres, 15 villages with maternity and child welfare centres, 7 villages with allopathic hospitals, 4 villages with dispensaries, 11 villages with veterinary hospitals, 15 villages with family welfare centres, 1 village with medicine shop.
.*Private medical practitioners, alternative medicine etc. not included

References

Community development blocks in Lohardaga district {{Jharkhand-geo-stub