Doab
Natural region
A map showing the different doabs in the northern subcontinent
Region	Indian subcontinent

Doab (English: /ˈdoʊɑːb/) is a term used in South Asia^[1] for the tract^[2][1] of land lying between two confluent rivers. It is similar to an interfluve.^[3] In the Oxford Hindi-English Dictionary, R. S. McGregor refers to its Persian origin in defining it as do-āb (دوآب, literally "two [bodies of] water") "a region lying between and reaching to the confluence of two rivers." As per J. S. Grewal, a doab is "the inter-fluvial area between any two rivers".^[4]

Khadir, bangar, barani, nali and bagar

Since North India and Pakistan are coursed by a multiplicity of Himalayan rivers that divide the plains into doabs (i.e. regions between two rivers), the Indo-Gangetic plains consist of alternating regions of river, khadir and bangar. The regions of the doabs near the rivers consist of low-lying, floodplains, but usually, very fertile khadir and the higher-lying land away from the rivers consist of bangar, less prone to flooding but also less fertile on average.^[5][6]

Khadir may also be called nali or naili in northern Haryana, where it refers to the fertile prairie tract between the Ghaggar river and the southern limits of the Saraswati channel depression, which gets flooded during the rainy season.^[7]

Within bangar area, the barani is any low rain area where the rain-fed dry farming is practiced, which nowadays are dependent on the tubewells for irrigation.^[8] Bagar tract, an example of barani land, is the dry sandy tract of land on the border of Rajasthan state adjoining the states of Haryana and Punjab.^[8] Nahri is any canal-irrigated land,^[7] for example, the Rangoi tract which is an area irrigated by the Rangoi channel/canal made for the purpose of carrying flood waters of Ghagghar river to dry areas.^[9][10]

Historically, villages in the doabs have been officially classified as khadir, khadir-bangar (i.e. mixed) or bangar for many centuries, and different agricultural tax rates applied based on a tiered land-productivity scale.^[11][12]

Ganga-Yamuna Doab

The Doab

Area depicting the Ganges-Yamuna Doab.

A 1908 map of the Doab, United Provinces

The Ganga-Yamuna Doab,^[13][14][15] also known simply as The Doab, designates the flat alluvial tract between the Ganges and Yamuna rivers extending from the Sivalik Hills to the two rivers' confluence at Prayagraj. It is also called as Ganges-Yamuna Doab or Ganga Doab. The region has an area of about 23,360 square miles (60,500 square km); it is approximately 500 miles (805 km) in length and 60 miles (97 km) in width.^[16] In ancient times, it was known as Antarvedi.^[17][18][15] It is the most populated and largest of the doabs of India and can be divided into three sections: Upper (Haridwar to Aligarh), Middle, and Lower.^[13]

The British Raj divided the Doab into three administrative districts, viz., Upper Doab (Meerut), Middle Doab (Agra) and Lower Doab (Allahabad).^{[16][failed verification]}

Currently the following states and districts form part of The Doab:^[16]

Punjab Doabs

Each of the tracts of land lying between the confluent rivers of the Punjab region of Pakistan and India has a distinct name, said to have been coined by Raja Todar Mal, a minister of the Mughal emperor Akbar. The names (except for "Sindh Sagar") are a combination of the first letters, in the Persian alphabet, of the names of the rivers that bound the Doab. For example, "Chaj" (چج) = Chanāb (چناب, "Chenab") + Jehlam (جہلم, "Jhelum"). The names are from east to west.^{[citation needed]} The practice of dividing regions of Punjab into doabs dates to the reign of Akbar.^[4] The doabs of Punjab are not to be confused with its bārs, which according to Grewal (1999) refers to the upland section between two river valleys in the Punjab plains.^[20] The introduction of artificial irrigation by well (Saqiyah) in the 11th century in Punjab after the Turkic conquest of the area allowed for an increased population in the northern sections of the region's doabs.^[21]

Another way of dividing up the regions of Punjab (which is not well demarcated and often confusing) is based upon bet (area prone to flooding and comes into the flow of rivers), dhaha (old-bed of a river which are high and sandy but still at risk of flooding), and dakar (far-away from river-banks and usually safe from flooding).^[22]

Other doabs

See also

• Ap (water)
• Interamnia, an ancient Latin placename, meaning "between rivers"
• Mesopotamia, in Ancient Greek: Μεσοποταμία '[land] between rivers'.

Notes

References

• McGregor, Ronald Stuart (1993), The Oxford Hindi-English Dictionary, Oxford University Press, p. 513, ISBN 978-0-19-864339-5, retrieved 11 September 2013