Page:Gazetteer of the province of Oudh ... (IA cu31924024153987).pdf/450

 —

DEW

372

The population of the pargana is 58,834. It fells at the rate of 494 per square mile of total area, and 709 per square mile of cultivated area. It is thus distributed between the different creeds and classes "



Musalmans are Hindus ...

„,

...

...

...

...

...

Agriculturists ... !Non-agriculturists

...

...

...

...

...

...

In point of agriculturists

it

the

13'5 of the wtole.

86-5 60"4 39'6

„ »

„ „

stands far higher than any other pargana in

district.

The

largest

town

is

Dewa, with 3,605 inhabitants.

Next

to

it is

Gadia,

to the south of the pargana, with 2,542; and the only remaining towns with a population of more than 1,000, but less than 2,000, are Babrigaon Basti,

Pind and Kheoli.

Dewa was an old Hindu head-quarters town, and is probably very ancient; but no reliable story of its foundation can be given. The most probable account is that which ascribes it to a Dewal Rikh. At the time of the first Muhammadan invasion under Sayyad Masaiid, in A.D. 1030, it seems to have belonged to the Janwars, who ruled the country from Saindur in Kursi. This tribe of Rajputs has been noticed in the account given of that pargana. The town was then attacked from Satrikh, the Musalmau head-quarters, and taken.

The Musalmans, however, also talk of the Bhars, whom they drove out from Bhitauli, which lies two miles to the west of Dewa. The present Shekh residents of Dewa assert that they are descended from Shah Wesh, the first Musalman conqueror of the village and lieutenant of Sayyad Masaud. But for a long time it formed only their entrenched camp they did not acquire any proprietary rights in the pargana till about the commencement of the sixteenth century. A little previous to this time the Shekhs were rising into power in Lucknow, and Maulana Zia-ud-din, father of the celebrated Shekh Makhdum Bandagi, whose tomb is still shown in Lucknow, was granted Atiamau, a village of this pargana, in jagir by a king of the Jaunpur dynasty. grandson of Makhdum Bandagi was Molvi MuhibbuUa, who married a daughter of Qazi Mahmlid, of Dewa, and it was their son, Maulana Abd-us-SaMm, who first acquired a Mr of Dewa by an aimma grant, and other villages of the pargana in j agir. This was the commencement of the Shekhs' possessions in the pargana.

A

Another Musalman settlement was that of the Sayyads of Kheoli to the west of Dewa, who colonized a tract of thirty-two villages, which was long known as the tappa of Kheoli. They may have come about the commencement of the thirteenth century. They have tombs of their Shahids or martyrs round their villages, and state that they fought against the Bhars, who held a fort in Mitauli close by.

A

third colony to the south was that of the Shekhs of Qidwara, who colonized a tract of fifty-two villages from Juggaur in Lucknow. They

probably came early in the thirteenth century. The taluqdar, Zain-ulabidin of Gadia, :s a member of this family. Other smaller Musalman communities have spread over the pargana.