542
GON
from a second son of Achal Narain Singh, vindicated to themselves the zamindari of Guwarich not long after the Pathans under Ali Khan invaded Utraula, and carved out for themselves their present rdj. But the rising power was that of the Bisens of Digsar, who eventually made themselves masters of a territory covering a thousand square miles, and including the present parganas of Gonda, Paharapur, Digsar, Mahadewa, and Nawabganj.
At the time of Akbar the final distribution of the district had not been aiCcomplished, and the great chieftainships of Gonda and Balrampur were not reflected in the pargana divisions. The former had not yet emerged from the wide raj of Khurasa, and the latter was still a dependant of Ikauna, and included in the immense pargana of Kamgarh, which contained the whole of the district north of the Rapti not covered hy the damani-koh or tarai, and a large part of the north-west of Bahraich. Giiwarich and Babhnipair were already separate parganas, so the Kalhans dynasty must have fallen, and the branches which survived established themselves
new and reduced dominions. The Manikapur raj was unknown, and combined with Nawabganj and Mahadewa to make the one pargana Utraula we know had just been erected into a separate dominof Rehli. ion by the Kokar Pathans, and appears as a separate pargana. in their
The immense size of the revenue divisions affords a fair argument of a scanty population, and confirms the chronology which might be deduced from a comparison of the several pedigrees. The calamity which overwhelmed the last of the Kalhans must have occurred late in the fifteenth century. The three untitled generations of Bisens ( vide pargana Gonda) occupied the last few years of that and rather more than half the sixteenth century, while the establishment of the separate raj of Balrampur was rather later than that of Gonda. Early in the reign of Akbar, with the exception of Ikauna and Utraula, there were no powerful chieftains. The Kalhanses of Guwarich and Babhnipair were never of any considerable importance, and the rest of the district was covered with small semi-independent tribes of Bisens and Bandhalgotis, and guasi-proprietary communities of Brahmans. During the reigns of the great Timurides the whole of the centre of the with half the Gogra frontier, consolidated into the leading Bisen r^ of Gonda, the Janwars sent out an independent branch between the Kuwana and the hills, Manikapur becanae a distinct chieftainship, and the territorial distribution assumed, with a few trifling differences, its present features. The steps by which the several boundaries were finally fixed will be found detailed in the pargana articles. district,
For soine time before the acquisition of Oudh by Saadat Khan, the transGogra chiefs had enjoyed a virtual independence, waging wars among themselves for the rectification of boundaries, or the hegemony of the whole confederation, and exempt from any regular calls for the payment of tribute or revenue. The new Muhammadan power was vigorously resisted by the leading raja, Datt Singh of Gonda, who defeated and slew the first of the new nazims, Alawal Khan of Bahraich. A second imperial force cooped him up in his fort at Gonda, and reduced him to the last extremities; but the
