Behat is an ancient town, near

Saharanpur Saharanpur is a city and a Municipal corporation (India), municipal corporation in Uttar Pradesh, India. It is also the public administration, administrative headquarters of Saharanpur district. Saharanpur city's name was given after the Sain ...

and

nagar panchayat A nagar panchayat () or town panchayat or Notified Area Council (NAC) in India is a settlement in transition from rural to urban and therefore a form of an urban political unit comparable to a municipality. An urban centre with more than 12,00 ...

Saharanpur district Saharanpur district is the northernmost of the districts of Uttar Pradesh state, India. Bordering the states of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, and close to the foothills of Shivalik range, it lies in the northern part of the Doab ...

on the northernmost tip of northwestern

Uttar Pradesh Uttar Pradesh ( ; UP) is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. With over 241 million inhabitants, it is the List of states and union territories of India by population, most populated state in In ...

, India. It is located on NH-709B on the banks of Eastern Yamuna Canal, about 30 km (18 miles) north of Saharanpur, 190 km (118 miles) from

New Delhi New Delhi (; ) is the Capital city, capital of India and a part of the Delhi, National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the Government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Parliament ...

, and 77 km (48 miles) from

Haridwar Haridwar (; ; formerly Mayapuri) is a city and municipal corporation in the Haridwar district of Uttarakhand, India. With a population of 228,832 in 2011, it is the second-largest city in the state and the largest in the district. The city is s ...

. It has an average elevation of 345 m above sea level. It is famous for the production of fruits such as

mangoes A mango is an edible stone fruit produced by the tropical tree ''Mangifera indica''. It originated from the region between northwestern Myanmar, Bangladesh, and northeastern India. ''M. indica'' has been cultivated in South and Southeast Asi ...

, guavas, ''moorhas'' (

reed Reed or Reeds may refer to: Science, technology, biology, and medicine * Reed bird (disambiguation) * Reed pen, writing implement in use since ancient times * Reed (plant), one of several tall, grass-like wetland plants of the order Poales * Re ...

stools),

brass Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc, in proportions which can be varied to achieve different colours and mechanical, electrical, acoustic and chemical properties, but copper typically has the larger proportion, generally copper and zinc. I ...

bells, and

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.05%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4.5%), or 0.25 for low carbon "mild" steel. Wrought iron is manufactured by heating and melting high carbon cast iron in an ...

handicraft A handicraft is a traditional main sector of craft making and applies to a wide range of creative and design activities that are related to making things with one's hands and skill, including work with textiles, moldable and rigid material ...

s. It is home to the Mata Shakumbari Devi Temple.

History

Archaeological excavations and surveys provided evidence of the existence of many ancient settlements in and around Behat. Based on the artifacts discovered during these excavations, human habitation in and around this area is traced back to 2000 BCE. It is conjectured that Behat was known as Brihat-vat during the reign of the

Nanda Dynasty The Nanda Empire was a vast empire that governed in Magadha and Gangetic plains with an enormous geographical reach in 4th-century BCE northeastern India, with some accounts suggesting existence as far back as the 5th century BCE. The Nandas ...

(circa 501 BCE). An

Ashoka Ashoka, also known as Asoka or Aśoka ( ; , ; – 232 BCE), and popularly known as Ashoka the Great, was List of Mauryan emperors, Emperor of Magadha from until #Death, his death in 232 BCE, and the third ruler from the Mauryan dynast ...

pillar excavated from Topari (Khiderabād), near

, was taken to Delhi by Sultan

Firoz Shah Tughluq Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1309 – 20 September 1388), also known as Firuz III, was Sultan of Delhi from 1351 until his death in 1388. He succeeded his cousin Muhammad bin Tughlaq following the latter's death at Thatta, Sindh. His father was Sipa ...

, and still resides in Feroze Shah Kotla.

Mayapur Mayapur () is a human settlement and pilgrimage town in the Nabadwip CD block in the Krishnanagar Sadar subdivision of the Nadia district, West Bengal, India. It is situated at the confluence of the Jalangi River and the Bhagirathi, a dist ...

and Behat were well-known cities in the

Mauryan The Maurya Empire was a geographically extensive Iron Age historical power in South Asia with its power base in Magadha. Founded by Chandragupta Maurya around c. 320 BCE, it existed in loose-knit fashion until 185 BCE. The primary sourc ...

Dynasty (circa 180 BCE). Behat was next to Mayapur in importance, because it was an important

Buddhist Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...

centre.A Gazetteer of Saharanpur District District Volume XIV: Gazetteers of the United Provinces edited by H. R Neville

Xuanzang Xuanzang (; ; 6 April 6025 February 664), born Chen Hui or Chen Yi (), also known by his Sanskrit Dharma name Mokṣadeva, was a 7th-century Chinese Bhikkhu, Buddhist monk, scholar, traveller, and translator. He is known for the epoch-making ...

traveled through Behat and had come across important Buddhist monasteries in Behat (circa 630 CE) while searching sacred

texts and scriptures. During the reign of

Bahlul Khan Lodi Bahlul Khan Lodi (; died 12 July 1489) was the chief of the Afghan Lodi tribe. He was the founder of the Lodi dynasty from the Delhi Sultanate, upon the abdication of the last claimant from the previous Sayyid rule. Bahlul became Sultan of th ...

(1451-1489), a

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

colony was founded in Behat by Shah Abdullah, who was a descendant of Saint Sheikh

Baha-ud-din Zakariya Bahauddin Zakariya (c.1170 – 1262), also known as Baha-ul-Haq, was a Sunni Muslim scholar, saint and poet who established the ''Suhrawardiyya'' order of Baghdad in medieval South Asia, later becoming one of the most influential spiritual ...

Suhrawardi. The western part of Behat along the Naugaon Rau is named Abdullah Mazra after him. Behat remained the headquarters of a

Paragana Pargana or parganah, also spelt pergunnah, equivalent to Mahallah, Mohallah as a subunit of Subah (province), Subah (Suba), was a type of former administrative division in the Indian subcontinent during the time of the Sultanate of Delhi, Delhi S ...

during the time of

Akbar Akbar (Jalal-ud-din Muhammad Akbar, – ), popularly known as Akbar the Great, was the third Mughal emperor, who reigned from 1556 to 1605. Akbar succeeded his father, Humayun, under a regent, Bairam Khan, who helped the young emperor expa ...

and was known as Behat Kanjawar. Around 1710 CE, Behat was called Jagir. It was famous for cow slaughtering, and Pirzadas normally only treated Jagir Muslims well. Around this time, the Sikh Army of Banda Bahadur Singh attacked, plundered, and razed the area. In 1834, Captain Proby Thomas Cautley discovered a buried town 5.18 m (17 ft) below the surrounding country and 7.62 m (25 ft) under the preexisting site while supervising the redesign of the Eastern

Yamuna The Yamuna (; ) is the second-largest tributary river of the Ganges by discharge and the longest tributary in India. Originating from the Yamunotri Glacier at a height of about on the southwestern slopes of Bandarpunch peaks of the Low ...

Canal (then known as the

Doab ''Doab'' () is a term used in South Asia Quote: "Originally and chiefly in South Asia: (the name of) a strip or narrow tract of land between two rivers; spec. (with) the area between the rivers Ganges and Jumna in northern India." for the tract ...

Canal). The township was from pre- Indo Scythian times according to

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

evidence found there. Cautley also found a large number of Indo Scythian coins and other pieces of evidence about the existence of a large Buddhist settlement. After the

Indian Rebellion of 1857 The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was a major uprising in India in 1857–58 against Company rule in India, the rule of the East India Company, British East India Company, which functioned as a sovereign power on behalf of the The Crown, British ...

, a police station was established in Behat. Towards the end of the 19th century, the town had a post office and an upper primary school. An annual fair organised by Pirzadas was held in honor of Shah Abdullah until the end of the 19th century, chiefly organized by the local Pirzadas who then fell into difficult times due to their extravagance. After India became independent in 1947, the government has neglected the area; as a result, Behat has made little progress in last 70 years.

Geography

*The city is located 30.1°N and 77°E, north of Saharanpur. The city sits on the same latitude as Jagadhri and Rishikesh. *The district is at the northernmost limit of the Uttar Pradesh where the border with the city of Paonta Sahib is in the north at 30.4°N latitude almost coinciding with latitude north of Ambala and Dehradun. It is located near the city of Badshahibagh and Kalesar, with all four states having borders nearby. *The average elevation is about 345 meters above the mean sea level. *The entire place slightly slopes from north-east to south-west though unevenly.

Demographics

The 2011 India census reports that Behat had a population of 20,474, 53.16% of which were males and 46.83% were females. Behat has an average literacy rate of 70.03%, lower than the national average of 74.04%, with 75.95% of the males and 63.28% of females literate. 15.12% of the population is under six years of age.

Economy

Behat's economy has been focused on agriculture for the last 200 years. The

Western Yamuna Canal Western Yamuna Canal is canal in river Yamuna that was dug out and renovated in 1335 CE by Firoz Shah Tughlaq. In 1750 CE, excessive silting caused it to stop flowing. The British raj undertook a three-year renovation in 1817 by Captain GR Bla ...

irrigates most of the arable land in Behat and crops have been good dueto rich soils. Behat is also one of the most suitable areas for growing fruits and mango orchards slowly took over as mainstay of the economy.

References

{{Saharanpur district Cities and towns in Saharanpur district

History

Geography

Demographics

Economy

See also

References