Page:Gazetteer of the province of Oudh ... (IA cu31924073057352).pdf/342

 334 SIK 11,599 acres. 20 92 to Rs. 60,876, and the assessment falls at Re. 1-10-3 per acre. The landed property is held under the following tenures :- Taluqdari Pukhtadari 48R acres, Pattidari 15,394 Zamindari 9,643 The population amounts to 34,544. This pargama was formed in the reign of Akbar (A.D. 1565). The original name of it was Burhanpur, but in A.D. 1297 Sikandar Khan, an agent of Alá-ud-dín. altered the name to Sikandarpur. In 1535 A.D. this pargana was held by Harju Mal Dhobi (washerman, but in the reign of Shắr Shah in 1540 he was killed by Medni Mal, Parihár Thákur of Jigni, froin whom the present taluqdar, Gopal Singh, descends. The Parihár Thákurs of this pargana are thus described by Mr. Elliott :- “The present Purihars in the Unao district inbabit the pargana of Suro- see, or as it has recently become habitual to call it Secunderpore, and possess the mystic number of 84 villages-- a tract of land which is called a Chowrassie. According to their local traditions they came from a place called Jiginie (which is not to be found on the map), or Sarinagur, ie., Cashmere. "From that high hill country they were driven, weknow not by what cause to inhabit the sandy plains of Marwar; expelled thence, they were broken into innumerable little principalities, which found no abiding place, and have undergone continual changes, till we meet with a small portion of the clan who settled comparatively a short time ago in a little corner of Oudh, and even here the name of the beautiful valley from which they came ten centuries ago is still common in the mouths of men. "The story of the settling of the ancestors of the clan in Surosee is thus told. About three hundred years ago, in the time of Humáyun, king of Delhi, a Dikhit girl from Purenda was married to the son of the Purihar Raja, who lived in Jiginie across the Jumna. The bridegroom came with a large escort of his friends and brotherhood to celebrate the marriage, and the party on their journey passed through Surosee. "As they sat down around a well (the localty of which is still shown though the well has fallen in), they asked who were the lords of the fort which stood not far off. They were told that the fort was beld by Dhobies (washermen) and other Soodurs who owned the neighbouring country. The procession then went on to Purenda, and returning conducted the bride to her home. Just before the Holie festival a party headed by Bhage Singh returned, waited for the evening of that riotous feast, and then, when the guards of the fort were heavy with wine, and no danger was looked for, suddenly attacked and slaughtered them, and made themselves masters of the fort and the surrounding country. “Bhage Singh had four sous, and they divided the eighty-four villages he had conquered at his death. Asees and Salhu, the two eldest sons, took the largest portion of the estate; twenty villages falling to the former and to the latter forty-two.