Gumla district is one of the twenty-four districts 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 . ...

state State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * '' Our ...

, India, and Gumla town is the administrative headquarters of this district.

Etymology

For centuries, the place was a meeting center for people from the hinterland who flocked here to exchange goods using the barter system, and the place was called ''Gaw-Mela''. Gumla is believed to derive its name from ''Gaw-Mela'', which consists of two words of

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of North India, northern, Central India, centr ...

(also used in several local

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety of a language that ...

s), namely, ''Gaw'' (cows and the cattle) and'' Mela'', that is, a fair. The place became known as ''Gaw-mela'', and then the word transformed itself into Gumla.

Politics

Administration

District Commissioner Shri Shashi Ranjan (IAS Batch :2013 – Jharkhand)

Blocks/Mandals

Gumla district consists of 12 Blocks. The following are the list of the Blocks in Gumla district:

Villages

# Dumardih

History

During regin of the

Nagvanshi dynasty The Nagvanshis of Chotanagpur (also known as the Khokhra chieftaincy), was an ancient Indian dynasty which ruled the parts of Chota Nagpur plateau region (modern-day Jharkhand) during much of ancient, medieval and modern period. Phani Mukut Rai ...

Navratangarh Navratangarh (Doisagarh) was one of the capitals of the Nagvanshi dynasty, who ruled parts of what is now the state of Jharkhand, India. It is located in Sisai block of Gumla district. It is said that king Durjan Shah shifted his capital from ...

was one of the capital of Nagvanshi. Nawratan gadh

During British rule Gumla was under Lohardaga district. In 1843 it was brought under Bishunpur province that was further named

Ranchi Ranchi (, ) is the capital of the Indian state of Jharkhand. Ranchi was the centre of the Jharkhand movement, which called for a separate state for the tribal regions of South Bihar, northern Odisha, western West Bengal and the eastern area ...

. In fact Ranchi district came into existence in 1899. In 1902 Gumla became Sub-division under Ranchi district. On 18 May 1983 Gumla District came into existence. Sri Jagannath Mishra then ruling

Chief Minister A chief minister is an elected or appointed head of government of – in most instances – a sub-national entity, for instance an administrative subdivision or federal constituent entity. Examples include a state (and sometimes a union terri ...

Bihar Bihar (; ) is a state in eastern India. It is the 2nd largest state by population in 2019, 12th largest by area of , and 14th largest by GDP in 2021. Bihar borders Uttar Pradesh to its west, Nepal to the north, the northern part of West ...

inaugurated it and Sri Dwarika Nath Sinha acquired the post of first deputy commissioner of the newly created district. Gumla is considered to be the birthplace of the Hindu God

Hanuman Hanuman (; sa, हनुमान, ), also called Anjaneya (), is a Hindu god and a divine '' vanara'' companion of the god Rama. Hanuman is one of the central characters of the Hindu epic ''Ramayana''. He is an ardent devotee of Rama and ...

. A temple a few kilometers away from the city off the Gumla- Ghaghra road is dedicated to him and his mother. The district contains mountains named Risyamook, which are mentioned in the

Ramayana The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th to 4th centuries BCE, and later stages e ...

. The district is currently a part of the

Red Corridor The red corridor, also called the red zone, is the region in the eastern, central and the southern parts of India where the Naxalite–Maoist insurgency has the strongest presence. It has been steadily diminishing in terms of geographical cove ...

Geography

Gumla is located at . Geographically, Gumla is located on southern part of the

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 b ...

which forms the eastern edge of the Deccan plateau system. There are three major rivers, which flow through the Gumla district viz. the South Koel, the North Koel and the Sankh. There are various streams/ tributaries to the main rivers on which there are some picturesque waterfalls, as for example Sadni Falls. The terrain is highly undulating and there are existence of many rivers and streams. The forest cover of the district is 1.35 lakh hectares out of the total 5.21 lakh hectares of land i.e. round 27% of the total area of the district.

Climate

Gumla district enjoys a good climate characterized by a pleasant cold and temperate weather conditions. Gumla has a

sub-tropical The subtropical zones or subtropics are geographical and climate zones to the north and south of the tropics. Geographically part of the temperate zones of both hemispheres, they cover the middle latitudes from to approximately 35° north an ...

climate. Temperature ranges from maximum 40 to 20 °C during summer, and minimum 21 to 3 °C during winter. The annual rainfall is about 1450 mm. From June to September the rainfall level is about 1,150 mm.

Economy

Gumla district has rich

natural Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...

and

mineral In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. ...

resources. There are 23

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 ...

mines and 68 stone mines in Gumla district. Besides these there is good number of brick makers. In Gumla District the important minerals like bauxite and

laterite Laterite is both a soil and a rock type rich in iron and aluminium and is commonly considered to have formed in hot and wet tropical areas. Nearly all laterites are of rusty-red coloration, because of high iron oxide content. They develop by ...

(

aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in AmE, American and CanE, Canadian English) is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately o ...

ore) are found in villages of Amkipani, Langdatanr, Chirodih, Jalim, Narma, Bahagara and Gurdari of Bishunpur block, Langatanr, Lupungpat and Chota-Agiatu in Chainpur block and Harup, Serengdag and Jalim in Ghaghra block. Beside these china clay is also found in some part of the district. Other mining activities like stone crusher, Brick kiln and stone chip mining lease are also available in different part of the district. In 2006 the Indian government named Gumla one of the country's 250 most backward districts (out of a total of

640 Year 640 (Roman numerals, DCXL) was a leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. The denomination 640 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar er ...

). It is one of the 21 districts in Jharkhand currently receiving funds from the Backward Regions Grant Fund Programme (BRGF).

Demographics

According to the 2011 census Gumla district has a

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using ...

of 1,025,213, roughly equal to the nation of

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is ...

or the US state of

Montana Montana () is a U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West List of regions of the United States#Census Bureau-designated regions and divisions, division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North ...

. This gives it a ranking of 439rd in India (out of a total of

). The district has a population density of . Its

population growth rate Population growth is the increase in the number of people in a population or dispersed group. Actual global human population growth amounts to around 83 million annually, or 1.1% per year. The global population has grown from 1 billion in 1800 to ...

over the decade 2001-2011 was 23.21%. Gumla has a

sex ratio The sex ratio (or gender ratio) is usually defined as the ratio of males to females in a population. As explained by Fisher's principle, for evolutionary reasons this is typically about 1:1 in species which reproduce sexually. Many species de ...

of 993

females Female (symbol: ♀) is the sex of an organism that produces the large non-motile ova (egg cells), the type of gamete (sex cell) that fuses with the male gamete during sexual reproduction. A female has larger gametes than a male. Females a ...

for every 1000 males, and a

literacy rate Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in written form in some specific context of use. In other words, hum ...

of 66.92%. As of the 2011 Census of India, Gumla had a population of 1,025,213 which is 3.11% of total Jharkhand population. Out of total 1,025,656: 514,730 are males and 510,926 are female; this makes the sex ratio of Gumla 993, which better than India's sex ratio. Gumla has an average literacy rate of 66.92%. In Gumla, 15% of the population is under 6 years of age. 3.2% of the population are from Scheduled Castes, 68.9% are from Scheduled Tribes. 44.62% were followers of Sarna, 30.19% were Hindus, 19.75% Christians and 5.02% Muslims.

Languages

At the time of the 2011 Census of India, 50.75% of the population in the district spoke Sadri, 29.61% Kurukh, 7%

, 4.69% Mundari, 3.73% Kharia and 2.31%

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

as their first language.

Education

In 1986, Rakesh Popli and his wife, Rama (an expert in childhood education), founded the first Ekal Vidyalaya (one-teacher) schools to bring education to the tribes of the region. From 2018, Deptt. of Higher and Technical Education, Govt. of Jharkhand is going to start Polytechnic College "Gumla Polytechnic".The Polytechnic college will be run and manage under "PPP" Mode by Gumla Educational Foundation. Three colleges under Ranchi University: * Kartik Oraon College * Karunavati Devi Memorial College * Women's College Technical Institute * Gumla Polytechnic * IIST Computer Institute * Media INFOTECH * Wings IT Schools in Gumla: * Adarsh Vidya Mandir School, Pugu * Chanchal Cygnus School, Dumerdih * D.A.V. Public School, Neemtoli * Don Bosco School, Bhamni * Kendriya Vidyalaya Gumla * Notre Dame School * Oxford Public School * S.S. High School * Saraswati Shishu-Vidya Mandir * Solitaire Educational Academy * St. Ignatius School * St. Patrick School * St. Stephen's School * Ursuline Convent School * Wescott Public School * Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya, Masaria Dam St. Ignatius School, founded in 1935 and administered by the Jesuits, has produced international-level

hockey Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...

players.

Culture

Gumla has a rich culture. The majority of people speak Nagpuri and

. *

Karma Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptively ...

- A holy festival celebrated by the people in almost all places of this district. *Sarhul - A festival celebrated by the people and Jhankis and Rallies were organised around the main town Gumla. Ladies put flowers (Gulaichi Flower) on their hair and gents put it on their ears. *Ramnavami - A holy festival celebrated with huge sound, and Jhankies and Rallies.

Tourist attractions

*Palkot Fort- Palkot Fort is a historic place which was one of the capital of the

. It is located in Palkot block of the district. * Palkot Wildlife Sanctuary *Anjan - Small village about away from Gumla. The name of the village has been derived from the name of goddess Anjani, mother of

. Many objects of archeological importance obtained from this place has been placed at Patna Museum. It is believed to be the birthplace of Lord

. *Hapamuni - The ancient village Mahamaya

temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called church (building), churches), Hindui ...

that is the identity of this village. Hapamuni Mahamaya temple traces its origin to 11th century. It also has some ancient rock sculpture in front of temple dating to that period. Moreover, with the arrival of Hapamuni agro tech, the village economy has reached new dimensions. *

Nagfeni Nagfeni is a village in the Sisai CD block in the Gumla subdivision of the Gumla district in the Indian state of Jharkhand. Geography Location Nagfeni is located at Area overview The map alongside presents a ...

- It is known for the

Jagannath Jagannath ( or, ଜଗନ୍ନାଥ, lit=Lord of the Universe, Jagannātha; formerly en, Juggernaut) is a deity worshipped in regional Hindu traditions in India and Bangladesh as part of a triad along with his brother Balabhadra, and siste ...

temple and there is a big rock in the shape of snake 'Nag'. *

- It was the seat of old Nagvanshi kings located in Sisai block of the district. *Tanginath - Tanginath Dham is located in Gumla's Dumri block. Several devotees during the month of Shravan come to shrine which goes back to seventh or ninth Century AD.

References

External links

Official district government website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gumla District Districts of Jharkhand Minority Concentrated Districts in India 1983 establishments in Bihar