ODISHA DISTRICT GAZETTEERS BOLANGIR GOPABANDHU ACADEMY OF ADMINISTRATION [GAZETTEERS UNIT] GENERAL ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT GOVERNMENT OF ODISHA ODISHA DISTRICT GAZETTEERS BOLANGIR DR. TARADATT, IAS CHIEF EDITOR, GAZETTEERS & DIRECTOR GENERAL, TRAINING COORDINATION GOPABANDHU ACADEMY OF ADMINISTRATION [GAZETTEERS UNIT] GENERAL ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT GOVERNMENT OF ODISHA iii iv PREFACE The Gazetteer is an authoritative document that describes a District in all its hues–the economy, society, political and administrative setup, its history, geography, climate and natural phenomena, biodiversity and natural resource endowments. It highlights key developments over time in all such facets, whilst serving as a placeholder for the timelessness of its unique culture and ethos. It permits viewing a District beyond the prismatic image of a geographical or administrative unit, since the Gazetteer holistically captures its socio-cultural diversity, traditions, and practices, the creative contributions and industriousness of its people and luminaries, and builds on the economic, commercial and social interplay with the rest of the State and the country at large. The document which is a centrepiece of the District, is developed and brought out by the State administration with the cooperation and contributions of all concerned. Its purpose is to generate awareness, public consciousness, spirit of cooperation, pride in contribution to the development of a District, and to serve multifarious interests and address concerns of the people of a District and others in any way concerned. Historically, the “Imperial Gazetteers” were prepared by Colonial administrators for the six Districts of the then Orissa, namely, Angul, Balasore, Cuttack, Koraput, Puri, and Sambalpur. After Independence, the Scheme for compilation of District Gazetteers devolved from the Central Sector to the State Sector in 1957. Within the State, the responsibility for developing the Gazetteers was transferred from the Revenue Department to the Gopabandhu Academy of Administration (GAA) in 1999. In this process, the “District Gazetteers” of all thirteen Districts were published as follows: Koraput/1966 (Supplement/1984), Mayurbhanj/1967, Bolangir/1968, Sambalpur/1971, Dhenkanal/1972, Sundargarh/1975, Puri/1977, Kalahandi/1980, Boudh-Khondmal/1983, Keonjhar/1986, zBalasore/1994, Ganjam/1995 and Cuttack/1996. The Gazetteers of Balasore/1994, Ganjam/1995 and Cuttack/1996, however, could not capture the implications of the reorganisation of these Districts. Though 10 out of 13 Districts had been reorganised into 27 and the total number of Districts in the State had gone up to 30, the reality remained to be captured in the Districts‟ Gazetteers. Be it so, the time is now ripe to build on the rich cache of Gazetteers available across the Districts in Odisha, and to develop updated documents that capture the essence of each District as it exists today. The Districts have evolved over the last couple of decades as a result of various natural phenomena and unforeseen forces, besides a slew of economic and social sector reforms undertaken at the National, State and local levels. The resulting impacts have been more cataclysmic in some Districts than others, which are reflective of the complex dynamics at work which determine a v District‟s state of preparedness and receptivity to change or its absorptive capacity. This diversity in impacts across Districts is now captured both in measurable parameters and non-measurable underlying trends and perceptions in the updated District Gazetteers. Besides catching up with the developments in each of the thirty Districts and the environs, it was felt opportune to capture the major shifts in areas and issues of priority and concern across the districts by suitably restructuring the document, to recount the post-Independence events in brief for their historic value and evolutionary impact on the District, and to bridge an important lacuna, viz. incorporating the role played by freedom fighters from each District in India‟s Independence, which was sparingly mentioned in the Gazetteers initially prepared by colonial administrators.Though the updated Gazetteers draw heavily on the past Gazetteers of thirteen undivided Districts, the documents were also restructured to provide for elimination, modification and insertion of some issues in discussion with the Consulting Editors and District Administration in order to present a comprehensive and contemporaneous picture of the Districts. The task of developing and updating the Gazetteers for the present 30 Districts was initiated in the first week of May 2015. Procedurally, a series of time-bound initiatives taken since then were bed-rocked on the complete and continuous involvement of the District Collector and heads of concerned line departments at the district level in the coverage of issues and developments over time, coupled with specific participation of a number of scholars and experts, including some senior serving and retired civil servants. A standardised synopsis of the District Gazetteer was prepared by GAA to assist in the development of the initial drafts by each District Administration. For this exercise, a Committee was constituted by GAA under the District Collector to steer the development of the initial draft for the respective District. A number of Sub-Committees comprising officials and experts were also constituted, again at District level, for drafting specific and thematic chapters. The initial drafts prepared by the District Administration were received by GAA starting in August 2015. After in-house scrutiny of these drafts, detailed comments and suggestions for bridging information gaps were sent by GAA to enable suitable revisions by the District Administration. A process of continuous monitoring of the development of the next stage of drafts was followed, and the second drafts were received by GAA by the end of October 2015. This revised draft Gazetteer of each District was then placed for scrutiny at two levels– the first by the public at large by hosting the drafts at the website of GAA (gopabandhuacademy.gov.in), and the second by a set of 30 Experts, one for each District, designated as Consulting Editor. vi Simultaneously, Government in General Administration Department (GAD) with the approval of Hon‟ble Chief Minister reconstituted the State Advisory Committee (SAC) and State Working Committee (SWC) on Gazetteers vide Notification No. 23473 dated 26 September, 2015. The SAC continues to be headed by Chief Secretary, Government of Odisha. The SWC hereafter was to be chaired by the Director General, GAA, who had also been notified as the ex-officio Chief Editor of Gazetteers, besides being granted functional freedom to prepare and publish the Gazetteers. A series of meetings were held by DG, GAA with the Consulting Editors appointed for refinement of the drafts prepared at the District level to discuss and to ensure accuracy and coherence, quality and content. The Consulting Editors also visited the respective Districts regularly to interact with senior officials, governmental and non-governmental organisations and persons concerned with the preparation of the initial two drafts. The drafts reviewed by DG, GAA, with the Consulting Editors were forwarded to the District Collectors for authentication of content and further improvements in quality, wherever felt necessary. The final round of discussions with the Consulting Editors was held in GAA in February through till April 2016, and the draft Gazetteers, finalised at this stage again in consultation with the District Collectors, were placed before the SWC. Drafts recommended by it were placed before the SAC for approval. Formerly a part of Patna Estate, the district of Balangir was merged with Odisha on the 1st January 1948. The illustrious Rajendra Narayan Singh Deo, the last ruler of the Princely state of Patna, also became the Chief Minister of Odisha (1967-71). Balangir District Gazetteer was published last in 1968 and the necessity of publishing the district gazetteer afresh arose considering development that has taken place since then including its bifurcation. The district administration headed by Dr. M. Muthukumar along with various officers of line department and local experts have made tremendous efforts to prepare the initial draft. I sincerely thank him and all those involved in the process of preparing the draft. Prof. Gurudev Meher volunteered to accept the challenge of finetuning the draft within a period of four months. The district gazetteer would not have seen the dawn of the day without his commitment. I sincerely thank him. I convey my sincere gratitude to the members of the State Working Committee and State Advisory Committee for their valuable inputs and advice. I will be failing in my duty if I do not acknowledge the contribution of my friends and colleagues in the State Administration and particularly those vii at GAA, namely Sri Shashanka Sekhar Acharya, Joint Director (Accounts), Dr. Rabi Narayan Patra, Deputy Director (Studies), Sri Subrat Kuanr, Research Officer and Dr. Rabindra Kumar Swain, Compiler. Finally, despite optimum efforts to plug the obvious limitations and lacunae in the Gazetteer, factual deficiencies, misspellings and grammatical errors might be found. The responsibility for all its shortcomings doubtless remains mine. With an eye to the future, I urge all readers, including thematic experts, young scholars, and luminaries, to offer their valuable suggestions for improving