The Northern Circars (also spelt Sarkars) was a division of British India's Madras Presidency. It consisted of a narrow slip of territory lying along the western side of the Bay of Bengal from 15° 40′ to 20° 17′ north latitude, in the present-day Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha. The Subah of Deccan (Hyderabad/Golconda) consisted of 22 circars. These northern circars were five in number and the most prominent ones in the Subah.
They became British in a protracted piecemeal process lasting from 1758 to 1823, involving diplomacy and financial settlements rather than military conquest. The annexation by the British of the Northern Circars deprived Hyderabad State, the Nizam's dominion, of the considerable coastline it formerly had, assuming the shape it is now remembered for - that of a landlocked princely state with territories in Central Deccan, bounded on all sides by British India.
Etymology
Circar was an English spelling of sarkar, a Mughal term for district (a subdivision of a subah or province), which had been in use since the time of Sher Shah Suri (1486–1545). "Northern Circars" meant the northern districts of the Nizam's dominion.
Eventually "Circar" also acquired the meaning of "British Sarkar", i.e., the British government. Hence, "Sarkar districts" could also be understood as the districts under the administration of the British government. In British maps, the area might just be labelled "Circars".
Geography
The Northern Circars were five in number: Chicacole (Srikakulam), Rajmandri (Rajahmundry), Ellore (Eluru), Mustaphanagar (Kondapalli) and Murtuzanagar (Guntur). These covered a total area of about
The region at various points of time corresponded to the northern and the central parts of Coastal Andhra region of Andhra Pradesh, including the whole of present-day districts of Guntur, Bapatla, Palnadu, NTR district, Krishna, Eluru, East Godavari, West Godavari, Konaseema, Kakinada, Alluri Sitharama Raju, Anakapalli, Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram, Parvathipuram Manyam and Srikakulam. It also included parts of the present day Prakasam district of Andhra Pradesh, Ganjam, Gajapati, Rayagada, Koraput, Nabarangapur and Malkangiri districts of Odisha and parts of the Mulugu and Kothagudem districts of Telangana.
History
The region was invaded by the Bahmani Sultanate in 1471; in 1541 the Qutb Shahi conquered and extended their conquests over the Guntur and Masulipatnam districts. They appear to have acquired only an imperfect possession of the country, as it was again wrested from Balram Dev I, the ruling Jeypore king and his several feudal lords. The conquest was finally completed in 1571, during the reign of Ibrahim Quli Qutb Shah of Golconda and Hyderabad. Aurangzeb conquered Golconda in 1687 and the Circars along with the Qutb Shahi Sultanate were annexed to the extensive empire of Aurangzeb. The successor of Raghunath Krishna proved to be an inefficient ruler and as a result lost a vast territory of the Circars. However, the kings of Jeypore continued to rule their decreased kingdom independently until the advent of the British in 1777. The British destroyed the fort of Jeypore and granted them a demoted status of a Zamindari.
thumb|266x266px|The Geohydrographic Draught of North Circars
The Northern Circars were governed as part of Madras Presidency until India's independence in 1947, after which the presidency became India's Madras State. The northern, Telugu-speaking portion of Madras state, including the Northern Circars, was detached in 1953 to form a new 'Andhra State'. The Andhra State was merged with the Telugu-speaking parts of Hyderabad State in 1956 to form a united Andhra Pradesh. The two were bifurcated again in 2014 as Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
See also
- Rajamundry Sarkar