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Imperial Gazetteer of India, v. 21, p. 159.

RffJSHAHI DIVISION 159 lying between 23° 49' and 27' o' N. and 87° 46' anal 89° 53' E. It is bounded on the east by Assam and the Dacca Division, and on the west by the sub-province of Bihar. The Division was formerly part of Bengal and then included the District of Darjeeling ; but in 1905 it was transferred to Eastern Bengal and Assam with the addition of Malda District, while Darjeeling was transferred to the Bhagalpur Division of Bengal. The head-quarters of the Commissioner are at JALPAIGURI. The Division includes seven Districts with area, popu- lation, and revenue as shown below :- District. Current demand in 1903-4 for land revenue and cesses, in thousands of rupees. Rajsh4hi 2,593 12,22 Dinajpur 2,9646 11567,080 16,87 Jalpaiguri '962 787,380 9,08 Malda 1,899 884,030 5,03 Rangpur 3,493 2,154,181 13,16 Bogra 1359 854533 6,05 Pabna 1,839 r,420,46r 5,2 r Total 18,091 9,130,072 67,62 The population increased from 7,955,087 in 1872 to 8,280,893 in 1881, and to 8,609,007 ill 1891. The density of population is Soy persons per square mile, as compared with 474 for the whole of Bengal. Of the total, 62•4 per cent. are Muhammadans and 36•3 per cent. Hindus. The small remainder consists of Animists (103,633), Buddhists (6,352), and Christians (4,448, including 3,494 natives), About half the Hindus are the aboriginal Rajbansis and Kochs, and the great majority of the local Muhammadans are the descendants of converts from these tribes. The northern part of the Division consists of a strip of submontane country, in Jalpaiguri, running along the foot of the Himalayas. This tract contains large and valuable forests, and the conditions are also very favourable to the growth of tea; the area under this crop in Jalpaiguri was 121 square miles in 1903, and the out-turn in that year amounted to nearly 37 million pounds. The remainder of the Division forms part of the great Gangetic plain. The surface con- sists of recent alluvium, except in portions of Malda, Rajshahi, Dinaj- pur, and Bogra, which belong to an older and more elevated alluvial formation known as the BARIND. More than half of the tobacco crop of Bengal is produced in Jalpaiguri and Rangpur, and jute is exten- sively cultivated in the south-east of the Division, while the rice of Dinajpur is well-known. The Division contains 18 towns and 31,303 villages. The largest towns are SIRAJGANJ (population, 23,114) and