JHANSI, a city, the headquarters of a district and a division of the United Provinces in British India. The city is the centre of what used to be the Indian Midland railway system, now ab sorbed in the G.I.P. railway. Pop. (1931) of city and canton ment, 76,712. Formerly the capital of a Mahratta principality, which lapsed to the British in 1853, it was during the Mutiny the scene of disaffection and massacre. It was then made over to Gwalior, but has been taken back in exchange for other territory. Even when the city was within Gwalior, the civil headquarters and the cantonment were at Jhansi Naoabad, under its walls. Jhansi is the principal centre for the agricultural trade of the district, but its manufactures are small.
The DISTRICT OF JHANSI was enlarged in 1891 by the incor poration of the former district of Lalitpur, which extends farther into the hill country, almost entirely surrounded by Indian states. Combined area, 3,619 sq.m. Pop. (1931), 690,413. The district forms a portion of the hill country of Bundelkhand, sloping down from the outliers of the Vindhyan range on the south to the trib utaries of the Jumna on the north. The extreme south is com posed of parallel rows of long and narrow-ridged hills. Through the intervening valleys the rivers flow down impetuously over ledges of granite or quartz. North of the hilly region, there is a considerable expanse of black cotton soil. The district is inter sected or bounded by three principal rivers—the Pahuj, Betwa and Dhasan. Its principal crops are millet, cotton, oil-seeds, pulses, wheat, gram and barley. The destructive leans grass has proved as great a pest here as elsewhere in Bundelkhand. Jhansi is especially exposed to blights, droughts, epidemics, and famine.
The Jhansi Division is composed of the four districts of Jhansi, Jalaun, Hamirpur and Banda. Area 10,470 sq.m. and pop. (1931) Nothing is known with certainty as to the history of this tract before the period of Chandel rule, about the 11 th cen tury. To that epoch must be referred the artificial reservoirs and ruined fortresses of the hilly region ; though the division is not lacking in far more ancient monuments such as the famous Gupta temple at Deogarh. The Chandels were succeeded by their serv ants the Khangars, who built the fort of Karar, lying just out side the British border. About the 14th century the Bundelas poured down upon the plains, and gradually spread themselves over the whole region which now bears their name. The Moham medan governors were frequently making irruptions into the Bundela country; and in 1732 Chhatar Sal, the Bundela chieftain, called in the aid of the Mahrattas, who were rewarded by the bequest of one-third of his dominions. Their general founded the city of Jhansi, and peopled it with inhabitants from Orchha state. In 1806 British protection was promised to the Mahratta chief, and in 1817 the peshwa ceded to the East India Company all his rights over Bundelkhand. In 1853 the raja died childless, and his territories lapsed to the British. The widow of the raja consid ered herself aggrieved because she was not allowed to adopt an heir, and because the slaughter of cattle was permitted in the Jhansi territory; and when the Mutiny broke out in 1857, she put herself at the head of the rebels, and died bravely in battle.