1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Sitapur

SITAPUR, a town and district of British India in the Lucknow division of the United Provinces. The town is on the river Sarayan, half-way between Lucknow and Shahjahanpur, and on the Lucknow-Bareilly railway, 55 m. N.W. from Lucknow. Pop. (1901) 22,557. It is a cantonment, garrisoned by a portion of a British regiment. It has a considerable trade, principally in grain.

The District of Sitapur has an area of 2250 sq. m. It presents the appearance of a vast plain, sloping imperceptibly from an elevation of 505 ft. above sea-level in the north-west to 400 ft. in the south-east. The country is well-wooded with numerous groves, and well cultivated, except in those parts where the soil is barren and cut up by ravines. It is intersected by numerous streams, and contains many shallow ponds and natural reservoirs, which overflow during the rains, but become dry in the hot season. Except in the eastern portion, which lies in the doabs between the Kewani and Chauka and the Gogra and Chauka rivers, the soil is as a rule dry, but even this moist tract is interspersed with patches of land covered with saline efflorescence called reh. The principal rivers are the Gogra, which is navigable by boats of large tonnage throughout the year, and the Chauka. The climate is considered healthy, and the cantonments of Sitapur are famous for the low mortality of the British troops stationed there. The annual rainfall averages about 38 in.

In 1901 the population was 1,175,473, showing an increase of 9% in the decade. The principal crops are wheat, rice, pulses, millets, barley, sugar-cane and poppy. The district is traversed by the Lucknow-Bareilly section of the Rohilkhand and Kumaon railway. The history of Sitapur is closely associated with that of the rest of Oudh. The district figured prominently in the Mutiny of 1857, when the native troops quartered in the cantonments fired on their officers, many of whom were killed, as were also several military and civil officers, with their families, in attempting to escape.

See Sitapur District Gazetteer (Allahabad, 1905).