GAUHATI, a town of British India, headquarters of the Kamrup district of Assam, mainly on the left or south, but partly on the right bank of the Brahmaputra. Pop. (1931) 21,797. Gau hati is the headquarters of the district and of the Brahmaputra Valley division. It is beautifully situated, with an amphitheatre of wooded hills to the south. During the 17th century it was taken and retaken by Mohammedans and Ahoms eight times in fifty years, but in 1681 it became the residence of the Ahom governor of lower Assam, and in 1786 the capital of the Ahom raja. On the cession of Assam to the British in 1826 it was made the seat of the British administration of Assam, and so continued till 1874, when the headquarters were removed to Shillong in the Khasi hills, 67 m. distant, with which Gauhati is connected by an excellent motor road. Two much-frequented places of Hindu pil grimage are situated in the immediate vicinity, the temple of Kamakhya on a hill 2 m. west of the town, and the rocky island of Umananda in the Brahmaputra. Gauhati is an important centre of river trade, and the largest seat of commerce in Assam. The chief educational institutions are the Cotton Arts college and a law college.