Geography//Rural Settlements in India

Any settlement in which most of the people are engaged in agriculture, forestry, mining and fishery is known as rural settlement. 

Most of the world’s settlements are rural and they are stable and permanent. They are of three types:

1. Compact Settlements:

• A compact settlement is based on farming. 
• These are mostly found in highly productive alluvial plains like Indo-Gangetic Plains, brahmaputra basin area. 
• The houses are compact and congested with narrow plains. 
• The size of these settlements depends on nature and resources of surrounding country.
•  Compact settlements are also found in hunting and fishing communities.

2. Semi-Compact Settlement:

• Semi-Compact is a transitional of the difference of semi-arid fertile land phase in the growth of compact settlement. 
• The emergence is because regions from humid regions and marginal productive land to that of Increase in population cause villages to grow in number of houses. 
• These houses occupy open spaces and lead to semi-compact settlement which ultimately acquires a nucleated settlement.

3. Dispersed Settlement:

• These are generally found in hills, plateaus and grasslands. 
• These are found in areas where it is essential that the farmer should live on his own land. 
• Overpopulation is one of the reasons for dispersed settlement. 
• If a part of the population left a village to found a new one they often found dispersed rather than a new village. 

2. Patterns of Rural Settlements:

Pattern of settlement is defined as the relationship between one house or building to another. It can be identified by reading and observing a local scale map. The rural settlements are classified under following patterns:

 Rectangular, Linear, Circular, Semicircular, Star-like, Triangular, and Nebular Pattern. However, some patterns do emerge depending upon the site of the village, layout of streets and arrangement of buildings in the village. 

The most common patterns of rural settlements, found in India are rectangular or square, checker board, elongated, linear, circular or semicircular, L and T shape, triangular pattern, etc. 

The most common is the rectangular or square pattern. This is mainly found in areas of uniform topography. One of the major reasons for this pattern is the rectangular shape of the cultivated fields. This pattern is conspicuously found in proper Malwa Plateau, Nimar upland and in Narmada Valley plain around Maheshwar. In a large rectangular village, two main lanes intersect each other at right angles at the centre. Other small lanes go to interior houses running more or less parallel to the former main lanes. In between these lanes, houses are arranged in sectors or castes. Thus the main and the secondary lanes combined with rectangular sub-blocks present checker board or chess board pattern. The lanes and houses are designed in such a way that most of the houses have easy access to the nearest well. In such villages, high caste Brahmins or Rajputs occupy the central position and lower castes inhabit the marginal areas.

Another important pattern is that of the elongated village where one axis of the village is markedly longer than the other. This pattern is found along the higher ground level in inundated areas,dissected topography from two sides, narrow strip between two streams and at the edge of an alluvial terrace. Sometimes, this pattern may be observed along a road or a water front.

Linear pattern is quite common along roads, railway lines and water front’s etc. The main street of the village runs parallel to the road; railway line or water front and most of the village shops are located on this street. Such pattern is found largely in middle and lower Ganga plain, parts of the Himalayan region and along the coasts, especially in Malabar and Konkan. Sometimes, at the junction of a main road and a minor street or track, two rectangular blocks of houses meet at right angles giving L-shaped pattern. In some villages, a smaller limb extends towards cultivated fields at an angle to give L-shape a new form resembling T-pattern. Such a limb also develops from a main rectangular or elongated form of village into T-shaped following the

terrain.

Semi-circular plan develops along the bend of streams and crescent shaped meanders. On the arcuate bends of river meanders, a special form of settlement known as horse-shoe pattern, develops, Triangular pattern appears under special conditions of topographical barriers characterised by negative land features on three sides.

The other common pattern of Indian villages are fan pattern, oval pattern, polygonal pattern, radial pattern, star-like pattern, terrace or contour pattern, etc.

Some villages do not have any particular shape and are called shapeless or amorphous villages. Such villages are found in south-west of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Malwa Plateau, Chota Nagpur Plateau, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, etc.

3. Classification of village based on Structure 

Structurally villages in India can be divided into the following types:

 The study of the classification of village community assumes significance for several reasons. Its study enables us to understand varied social institutions and cultural patterns operating in the rural context. 

Furthermore, such a classification is instrumental in analysing the development of specific village community. 

•  According to one criterion, villages have been divided into three categories.
• 
  
•  They are migratory agricultural villages, semi permanent agricultural villages and permanent agricultural villages. 
• 
  
• Migratory agricultural villages refer to the villages where the people live in fixed abodes only for few months. 
• 
  
• Semi-permanent agricultural villages are characterized by the people living in a village only for few months. 
• 
  
• Permanent agricultural villages are concerned, the people live for generations.

 According to another criterion, villages have been classified into six groups. 

They are isolated farmstead villages, line villages, circular pattern, market centre settlements and hamlets. 

1. The nucleated village: It is otherwise known as grouped village. In this type of village homes of farmers and artisans are clustered together whereas the land cultivated by them is located outside the village at varying distances. Their livestock are often housed along with them or nearby. Irrespective of the variety of shapes, such villages are characterized by a close-knit social organization fostered by residential proximity, contact, community sentiments and ideas. In the Indian context, nucleated village is the most common pattern of settlement mostly discernible in paddy growing areas. 

2. The linear village: In linear type of settlement the houses are built on parallel rows. There is very little or no physical demarcation to show where one village ends and where another begins. Small streams or mountains separate one village from the other and serve as natural boundaries. Each house is surrounded by a small garden of cocoanuts, plantains, and cashew nuts. The rice fields are at a little distance from the house. This pattern unites the social advantages of residential closeness and economic advantages of living on one’s land. Such villages are found in Kerala, in the delta land of Bengal.

3. Dispersed village: The village in which the dwelling places of the village lay scattered or diffused is called a dispersed village. This type of village is found in hill areas, as in the Himalayan foothills, in the highlands of Gujarat etc. These villages have no definite shape or structure and no village streets. There are only footpaths connecting one cluster with another. Families living on their farms retain all the livestock and other possessions in the farm. 

4. The mixed village: Mixed village is the mixture of nucleated and dispersed pattern of settlement. In this type of village settlement there is a larger compact settlement of houses which is surrounded by a few small hamlets at a distance. Such villages can be seen both in plain as well as hill areas. There is considerable variation in the lay out, distribution and internal structure of village communities. 

Classification of tribes on the basis of geographical location.

 Territorially, tribes in India are divided into three major zones , namely

1. North-North- Eastern zone

2. Central Zone and 

3. Southern Zone. 

1. North-North- Eastern zone : Eastern Kashmir, Eastern Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Northern Uttar Pradesh, Nagalnad, Assam etc constitute this zone. The Aka, the Mishmi, the Chulikata and the Naga are some of the tribes of the zone. 

2. Central Zone : Bihar, Bengal, Southern Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Orissa come under these zone. The Kondh, The Santhal,, the Bhil, the Gonda, The Muria and Baiga are only a few of thelarge number of tribes of this zone. There is a concentration of tribal people in this zone. Over 85 percent of the total tribal population inhabits this zone. 

3. Southern Zone: The southern consists of Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Kerala. The Toda, the Chenchu, The Kadar, and the Koraga are some of the important tribes of this zone. There is another isolated zone constituting the Andaman and Nicobar island. The Jarwa, The Andamanese and Nicobarese are some of the important tribes of this zone.

SOURCE: NDL 

SAYANTANI SINGH 

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