Raichur Town
This article has been extracted from THE IMPERIAL GAZETTEER OF INDIA , 1908. OXFORD, AT THE CLARENDON PRESS. |
Note: National, provincial and district boundaries have changed considerably since 1908. Typically, old states, ‘divisions’ and districts have been broken into smaller units, and many tahsils upgraded to districts. Some units have since been renamed. Therefore, this article is being posted mainly for its historical value.
Raichur Town
Head-quarters of the District and taluk of the same name in Hyderabad State, situated in 16 12' N. and 77 21' E. Population (1901), 22,165, of whom 16,249 were Hindus, 5,664 Musal- rnans, and 186 Christians. According to an inscription in the fort on a huge stone 42 by 3 feet, it was built by Gore Gangaya Ruddivam in 1294. The country round Raichur was the battle-ground of the ancient Hindu and Jain dynasties, as well as of the Mu&alman and Hindu kingdoms of Gulbarga and Vijayanagar, After the decline of the Bahmani power towards the close of the fifteenth century, it formed part of the Bijapur kingdom. Upon the subjugation of Bijapur and Golconda by Aurangzeb, Raichui was garrisoned by the Mughals. A short distance from the west gate of the fortress are the remains of a strongly built palace, now utilized as a jail. The town is the junction of the Madras and the Great Indian Peninsula Railways, 351 miles from Madras and 444 miles from Bombay. The fortifications form a square of large stones 12 feet long by 3 feet thick, laid on one another without any cementing material.
They consist of two walls, an inner and an outer, and are surrounded on three sides by a deep ditch, while on the fourth or southern side there is a hill. The outer fortifications and the gateways were constructed by Ibrahim Adil Shah about 1549. The inner fort has two gateways and the outer three. Outside the eastern gate i& an old mosque having a single minaret So yards high and 10 yards in circumference, with a winding staircase, which was built in 1503 during the reign of Mahmud Shah Bahmani. A good view of the surrounding country is obtained from the top of this minaret. The Jama Masjid in the town was built in 1618. The fort also contains an old gun over 20 feet long. Raichur has three cotton-presses, a tannery, and a distillery, and is a rising commercial centre.
