BJNJ GANAPALLI. Banaganapalli. sidency.
Lat. r5°
— Estate
in
30" to 15°
2'
43
Karnul (Kurnool) District, Madras Pre28' 50" N., long. 78° i' 45" to 78° 25'
30" E. ; present area, 255 square miles, though formerly nearly 500 population (1881) 30,745, being 5952 Muhammadans (chiefly Sunni's) and 24,793 Hindus, of whom more than half belong to the cultivating
and shepherd
castes.
tikonda taluks
Bounded by
the Koilkantla, Nandial, and Pat-
the estate comprises the western half of the basin of the
Kunder, and is also watered by the Jareru river. It contains 64 towns and villages, of which Banaganapalli, the capital, has a population of Of the whole area, only 62 square 2822, and nine others over 1000. miles (39,413 acres) are waste, the rest of the estate being under cereals, cotton (of which the cultivation is annually increasing), and indigo.
There are no
forests,
The
and the waste lands supply pasturage.
trade
consists almost entirely of the interchange of local produce, but at the
markets, cotton and silk cloths, chintz, and lacquered wares of local industry
— are sometimes collected
for exportation.
— products
Eighty years
copper mines were worked, and near Banaganapalli there are pits, yielding annually stones to the value of a few pounds.
ago,
diamond
The
estate has no railway or first-class road the few schools are of the most primitive type, and endowed charities do not exist. The annual revenue amounts nominally to ^,((^22,464; but of this sum two-thirds are drawn by 18 minor jdgirdars, relatives of the Nawab, and the remainder, after deducting ;^534i for expenses of the palace and administration, does not suffice to meet the interest accruing on the Owing to the debts inherited from his father by the present chief.
leading jdg'irddrs, the Nawab is unable to More than half of the by increased taxation. whole estate has passed from his hands to other members of his family; but out of the 18 alienations thus existing, 9 might be resumed, if the Nawab exercised his privilege of refusing the right
unruly character
restore
his
of the
finances
of adoption to the females at present holding the estates.
Of
the
4 are held by courtiers of the Nizam, who consider themselves so far independent, that they refuse to pay the road cess, and resent others,
any interference villages
farmer sub-lets holds rent,
at
in
their affairs.
being assigned by auction will
the only,
The to
land revenue highest
the
lands to the cultivators.
and
is
liable
at
all
The
little interest.
It
was granted
farmed, the
and the
tenant therefore
times to enhancement of
without the option of relinquishing his holding.
estate has but
is
bidder,
in the
Historically, the
17th century by the
to Muhammad Beg Khan, eldest son of whose family it remained for three generations. The chief dying without male heirs, the estate was given by the Nizam (1764) to the ancestor of the present owner. In 1800, the suzerainty was transferred by the Nizam to the British Government; and, in consequence
Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb his Wazi'r, in
