GUJRAT, a town and district of British India, in the Pun jab. The town stands about 5 m. from the right bank of the river Chenab, 7o m. N. of Lahore by rail. Pop. (1931) 26,511. It is built upon an ancient site, formerly occupied, according to tradition, by two successive cities, the second of which is sup posed to have been destroyed in 1303, the year of a Mongol invasion. More than 200 years later either Sher Shah or Akbar founded the existing town. Though standing in the midst of a Jat neighbourhood, the fort was first garrisoned by Gujars, and took the name of Gujrat. The fort stands in the centre of the town. The neighbouring shrine of the saint Shah Daula serves as a kind of asylum for lunatics. The town has manufactures of furniture, brass-ware, boots, cotton goods and shawls.
The DISTRICT OF GUJRAT comprises a narrow wedge of sub Himalayan plain country, possessing few natural advantages. A range of low hills, known as the Pabbi, traverses the northern angle. They are composed of a friable Tertiary sandstone and conglomerate, destitute of vegetation, and presenting a mere barren chaos of naked rock, deeply scored with ravines.
Numerous relics of antiquity stud the surface of the district. A mound now occupied by the village of Moga or Mong has been identified by some as the site of Nicaea, the city built by Alexander the Great on the field of his victory over Porus. In 1846 Gujrat first came under the supervision of British officials. Two years later the district became the theatre for the important engagements which decided the event of the second Sikh war. After several bloody battles in which the British were unsuc cessful, the Sikh power was irretrievably broken at the battle of Gujrat in February 1849. The Punjab then passed by annexation under British rule.
The district comprises an area of 2,25o sq.m. In 1931 the population was 922,427. The district has a large export trade in wheat and other grains, oil, wool, cotton and hides. The main line and the Sind-Sagar branch of the North-Western railway traverse it.
The southern part of the district has since 1915 received irri gation for the Upper Jhelam Canal and it contains the headworks of the Lower Jhelam Canal.