Page:A Statistical Account of Bengal Vol 1 GoogleBooksID 9WEOAAAAQAAJ.pdf/33

18 Headquarters of the District are at Alípur, a southern suburb of Calcutta.

.—The District as at present constituted is bounded on the north by the Districts of Nadiyá and Jessor; on the east by Jessor, from which it is separated by the Kabadak River, which, after receiving various streams and deltaic branches of the Ganges, takes the following names in its lower course through the Sundarbans, viz. the Arpángásí, Bara Pángá, Namgad Samudra, and finally, near the sea, the Málanchá. On the south, the District is bounded by the Bay of Bengal, and on the west by the Húglí River. With the exception of the northern boundary, therefore, the District limits follow the natural ones laid down by watercourses and the sea. In the north-west, the boundary passes for a short distance along the Bágher Khál, the mouth of which lies opposite to Bánsbáriá, a place between the town of Húglí and Tribení Ghát, on the west bank of the Húglí River. After this, the northern boundary passes eastward along old village boundaries, crosses the Jamuná River at Baliání, and passes on to the bend of the Betná River, whence the boundary extends along the south of Jessor District as far as the Kabadak. Although the southern geographical boundary of the District is the Bay of Bengal, the area in miles given above does not include the Sundarbans, a great part of which is unsurveyed waste land, covered with swamp and forest, and almost uninhabited. I shall give an account of the Sundarbans at the end of this volume, as they are under a special administration. They form the seaboard of the three Districts of the 24 Parganás, Jessor, and Bákarganj.

.—On the 20th December 1757 (corresponding to Paush 1164, Bengal era, or the 5th Rabí-us-Sání, in the fourth year of the reign of the Mughul Emperor, Alamgir II.), a tract of country containing about 882 square miles, known as the ‘Zamíndárí of Calcutta,’ or the ‘24 Parganás Zamíndárí,’ from the number of Fiscal Divisions (Parganás) it comprised, was ceded by the Nawáb Názim of Bengal, Mír Jafar, to the East India Company. The territory thus conferred lay chiefly to the south of Fort-William, on the east bank of the Húglí River, and was within the Administrative Circle (Chaklah) of Húglí. Mír Jafar only intended to give to the Company the jurisdiction of a landholder, and the grant was a mere Parwáná, of a somewhat informal character. In the following year the Company, with a view to securing the full proprietary right, obtained a Diwáni Sanad, under the seal and signature of the