SINDH, SIND, or SCINDE. A region in the northwestern part of British India, now form ing a division of the Bombay Presidency. It lies around the lower course of the Indus. and is bounded on the north by Baluchistan and the Punjab. on the east by Rajputana, on the south by the Great Hann and the Arabian Sea. and on the west by llaluchiitan India. A 3). The area under British administration covers 47.006 miles. and the total area. including the native State of Khairpnr, is 5:3.175 square miles. Sindh belong-3 physically., to the Punjah region, and consists in part. like the latter, of very low, flat, doabs, or interdivial regions, here lying be tween the branches of the great Indus delta. These doabs consist mostly of alluvial clay baked hard in the sun, but toward the east they merge into the sandy wastes of Rajputana. The climate is very hot and dry. the rainfall hieing entirely insufficient for agriculture. The arahle cull con sists of the rich alluvium deposited in the pe riodic inundations of the rivers.
Agriculture is dependent almoA wholly upon irrigation. which is secured through a system of canals leading from the Indus River and the annual overflow of that river. The extension of these canals by the Government in recent years has increased the area under cultivation. In 1900 01 the net area cropped amounted to 3,729.433 acres. There are generally two harvests per annum: the first. or rubbf (spring) harvest, con sists of wheat, barley. oil-seeds, millet, durra, opium. hemp. and tobacco; the second. or kurif (autumn) harvest, consists of those crops whose ripening requires much heat, as rice. sngar-cane, cotton, indigo, and maize. The North West Rail road extends from Karachi northward through the region. The navigation of the Indus has, since the construction of this line, been reduced to the traffic of the native boats. Karachi (q.v.) is the principal port for the Punjab and North. west, India region. The population in 1901 was 3,212,808, a gain of 12 per cent. over 1891, con
sisting of a mixture of Juts (a Hindu race) and Balitchis, with a few Afghans in the northwest ; the greater portion of them are Mohammedans. and the remainder profess Hinduism. The capi tal of Sindh is Karachi.
Erom the early part of the eleventh century Sindh was generally under 'Mohammedan domina tion. Among the me01:eva] ruling powers were the dynasties of Ghazni (q.v.) and Ghuri (q.v.). Toward the close of the sixteenth century it passed under the sway of the Great Mogul. (See GREAT.) Amid the convulsions resulting from the invasion of India by Nadir. Shah of Persia, Sindh became in 1748 a feudatory de pendency of the Durani dynasty of Kandahar. A little more than a generation later the Talpur who had immigrated into Sindh, raised their leader, Mir Fath Ali, to supreme power. This chief made large grants of territory to va rious relatives. ieserving most of Lower Sindh for himself and his three brothers; so that there were four ameers at Hyderabad, three at Khair pnr. and one at Mirpur. On the outbreak of the Afghan War in 1838, the British Govern ment intimated its intention to take temporary possession of Shikarpur, and forced the ameers of Hyderabad and Mirpur to agree to a treaty which virtually destroyed their independence. Their expressions of disapproval provoked fresh de mands from the Calcutta Government, to which the Hyderabad rulers agreed. despite the clamors and threats of their followers, who attacked the British residency. War with Great Britain broke out in 1843 and an expedition under Sir Charles James Napier, the British envoy, routed the na tive forces at Miani and soon completed the sub jugation of Sindh. The conquered territory was divided into three collectorates, now the districts of Hyderabad. Karachi. and Shikarpur; the Ameer of Khairpur. by continuing faithful to the British. retained his dominions. Consult: Burton, Sind Rcrisited (London. 189(i) ; Hughes, A rin;.-etteer of the Province of Scindc (2d ed., 1870).