Aliyar Reservoir
Aliyar Reservoir is a 6.48 km2 reservoir located in Aliyar village near Pollachi town in Coimbatore District, Tamil Nadu, South India. The dam is located in the Anaimalai Hills of the Western Ghats, it is about 65 kilometres from Coimbatore. The dam offers some ideal getaways including a park, aquarium, play area and a mini Theme-Park maintained by Tamil Nadu Fisheries Corporation for visitors enjoyment; the scenery is beautiful, with mountains surrounding three quarters of the reservoir. Boating is available; the Aliyar Dam was constructed during 1959-1969 across the Aliyar river for irrigation purposes. Aliyar Dam was inaugurated on 2nd october, 1962 by Prime minister of India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, K Kamaraj, the CM of TN state presided over the function; the project was commissioned in September 2002 to generate Hydro Electric Power. Aliyar lake receives water from Upper Aliyar Reservoir through the hydroelectric power station in Navamali and the Parambikulam reservoir through a contour canal.
Aliyar dam, built as a part of Parambikulam aliyar project, retains a large reservoir. The dam is around 2 kilometres in length; the lowest level outlet of the reservoir is 930 feet above Mean Sea Level and the canal intake is 980 feet above MSL. The spillway is 1,040 feet above MSL and the FRL is 1,050 feet above MSL; the maximum surface area is 48 hectares. The volume of water at FRL is 3.864 Tmcft. The maximum depth is the mean depth 16.8 metres. The volume development is 1.2 m. The highest inflow occurs during July and August; the shoreline is poorly indented, the shore development is poor and shallow and the Aquatic plants and limnology of the littoral zone is very limited. Ailyar reservoir was studied by the Central Inland Fisheries Research Institute for eleven years from 1982 to 1992; the rate of energy conversion at primary producer level and at the fish production level at Aliyar is considered higher than in any other Indian reservoir. The indigenous fish of the reservoir includes 40 species belonging to 13 families, plus seven stocked species This project consists of a series of dams interconnected by tunnels and canals for harnessing the waters of the Parambikulam, Sholiyar, Thunakadavu and Palar rivers, flowing at various elevations, for irrigation and power generation.
The scheme is an outstanding example of engineering skill. At present, the discharges are being let down through three sets of sluices/ canals, viz. Pollachi Canal, Vettaikaranpudur Canal and the river sluices. Under this scheme, the irrigation discharges let down through river sluices of the Aliyar Dam utilized for power generation in a power house at the toe of the dam. Being a micro hydel scheme, this project is subsidized by the Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources, Government of India. Aliyar dam is a popular tourist destination. Near Aliyar dam are some visitor attractions including a park, aquarium, play area and a mini Theme-Park maintained by Tamil Nadu Fisheries Corporation for visitors enjoyment. Temple of Consciousness is situated near Aliyar dam entrance at Arutperunjothi Nagar, where Vethathiri Maharishi resides; the scenery is beautiful, with mountains surrounding three quarters of the reservoir. Boating is available. Monkey Falls is located at 6 km from the dam next to Arutperunjothi Nagar and Forest Department Checkpost.
Overnight stay is possible in the forest rest house. A treetop house provides accommodation for the adventurous; the Dam and Park and the overall surroundings of the dam are poorly maintained as of 2017. List of dams and reservoirs in India Valparai
Kongu Nadu
Kongu Nadu is a region and aspirant state of India comprising the western part of Tamil Nadu. In the ancient Tamilakam, it was the seat of the Chera kings, bounded on the east by Tondai Nadu, on the south-east by Chola Nadu and on the south by Pandya Nadu regions; the region was ruled by the Cheras during Sangam period between c. 1st and the 4th centuries CE and it served as the eastern entrance to the Palakkad Gap, the principal trade route between the west coast and Tamil Nadu. The Kosar people mentioned in the second century CE Tamil epic Silappathikaram and other poems in Sangam literature is associated with the Coimbatore region; the region was located along an ancient Roman trade route. The Gangas of Thalakkad ruled it for over 5 centuries; the medieval Cholas conquered the region in the 10th century CE. It came under the rule of the Vijayanagara Empire by the 15th century. After the Vijayanagara Empire fell in the 17th century, the Madurai Nayaks, who were the military governors of the Vijayanagara Empire established their state as an independent kingdom.
In the latter part of the 18th century, the region came under the Kingdom of Mysore, following a series of wars with the Madurai Nayak dynasty. After the defeat of Tipu Sultan in the Anglo-Mysore Wars, the British East India Company annexed Kongunadu to the Madras Presidency in 1799; the region was hard hit during the Great Famine of 1876–78 resulting in nearly 200,000 famine related fatalities. The first three decades of the 20th century saw nearly 20,000 plague-related deaths and acute water shortage; the region played a significant role in the Indian independence movement. Palani is the important religious centre in Kongu nadu region. Kongu Nadu is believed to have come from "Kongadesam", "Konga" a variant of the term "Ganga", meaning "land of the Gangas". Kongu Nadu was one of the earliest territorial divisions and home of the ancient Tamil people; the river Kaveri flows in southeastern direction through the region. Archaeological data from Kodumanal, a village on the banks of the Noyyal River, suggests the beginning of civilization around 4th century BCE.
Kodumanal was situated on the ancient trade route between across the Palghat gap in the Western Ghats and yielded remains belonging to the Sangam age. Tamil-Brahmi writings were found on coins and rings obtained from Amaravathi river bed near Karur, the erstwhile capital of the Cheras. A musical inscription in Tamil Brahimi was found in a cave in Arachalur, dating from the 4th Century CE and Iravatham Mahadevan writes that these are syllables used in dance; the region was ruled by the Cheras during Sangam period between c. 1st and the 4th centuries CE. The western part of the region was under the Cheras and the eastern regions were ruled by Pandyas; the medieval Cholas conquered the region in 10th century CE. After brief period under the Hoysalas and the Delhi sultanate, the region was captured by the Vijayanagara Empire in the 15th century. In the 1550s, Madurai Nayaks, who were the military governors of the Vijayanagara Empire, took control of the region. After the Vijayanagara Empire fell in the 17th century, the Nayaks established their state as an independent kingdom and they introduced the Palayakkarar system.
In the latter part of the 18th century, the region came under the Kingdom of Mysore, following a series of wars with the Madurai Nayak dynasty. After the defeat of Tipu Sultan in the Anglo-Mysore Wars, the British East India Company annexed the region to the Madras Presidency in 1799; the region played a prominent role in the Second Poligar War, when it was the area of operations of Dheeran Chinnamalai. Dheeran Chinnamalai was one of the freedom fighters who fought against the rule of British East India Company Kongunadu comprises the modern day districts of Coimbatore district, Nilgiris district, Tirupur district, Erode district, Namakkal district, Karur district, Salem district, Dharmapuri district, Krishnagiri district and Dindigul district in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu and parts of South-western India including parts of Palakkad District in the Kerala state and parts of Chamarajanagar District in Karnataka state; the Western Ghats mountain range passes through the region with major rives Kaveri, Bhavani and Noyyal flowing through the region.
Palghat Gap, a mountain pass connects the neighbouring state of Kerala to the region. The Eastern Ghats mountain range, which consists of the hills Kollimalai of Namakkal district and Mettur Hills of Salem district and Palamalai of Coimbatore district passes through the region; the Biligiriranga Hills of Chamarajanagar District is located at the confluence of Eastern and Western Ghats belongs to the region. The Kaveri river flows into Tamil Nadu from Karnataka through Dharmapuri, Erode and Karur districts; the table below lists geographic and demographic parameters for districts that constitute the'Kongu region' of Tamil Nadu. Kongu Tamil is the dialect of Tamil language, spoken in Kongu Nadu, the western region of Tamil Nadu, it is known as "Kangee"` or "Kongalam" or "Kongappechu". Kongu Nadu had trade contacts with foreign nations. Kodumanal was a 2,500-year-old industrial colony discovered by archaeologists; the region was located along an ancient Roman trade route. A Chola highway called. Kongu Nadu is amongst the most industrialised regions in the country.
Agriculture and textile industries contribute majorly to the economy of the region. It is one of the major producers of textiles including cotton and knit wear, hosieries and allied products including milk, turmeric, sugar-cane, white silk, coc
Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation
Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation Limited is a public transport bus operator in Tamil Nadu, India. It operates Intercity bus services to cities within Tamil Nadu, from Tamil Nadu to its neighbouring states with a combined fleet strength of 22203 buses as of 2016-17, it operates Public transport bus service in many cities of Tamil Nadu, with the exception of Chennai, where the public bus service is operated by MTC, a subsidiary of TNSTC. TNSTC is owned and operated by the Government of Tamil Nadu. TNSTC has started online booking facilities TNSTC Online Booking to book bus tickets between major cities served by TNSTC, it caters to all the districts within Tamil Nadu and operates services to neighboring states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and union territory of Puduchery. Until 1997, transport corporation was bifurcated into 21 divisions, merged to form 8 divisions. TNSTC owns five workshops. TNSTC offers contract and tourist services; every bus owned by the corporation displays a portrait of Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar along with a two line verse from Thirukkural inside the bus.
TNSTC is the largest government bus transport corporation in India biggest corporation in the world after bifurcation of APSRTC. TNSTC operates buses of various classes to cater to different sections of public: Town buses and low floor buses, operated on inter city routes. Moffussil buses, largest in its stable, ply on inter town routes and cater to a majority of the traffic Deluxe buses operated between major Cities. Ultra deluxe coaches with recliner seats, operated between important commercial centers to major cities. Air conditioned buses operated in intra city routes operated by MTC. SETC operates Air conditioned buses from all district headquarters to Chennai. TNSTC and SETC use custom made buses built on Ashok TATA supplied chassis. Air conditioned buses for intra city routes in Chennai are supplied by Volvo. All divisions have individual own coach building units. In 1984, Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation Limited established Institute of Road and Transport Technology at Chithode, Erode and IRT Perundurai Medical College at Perundurai near Erode.
In 2013, Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation Limited established Amma Kudineer which involves in production and packaging of mineral water in one litre plastic bottles, selling them in long-distance running state-owned buses and in bus stations. The price has been fixed at ₹10 per bottle, the production plant is set up in Gummidipoondi in Thiruvallur district. State Transport Undertakings
Coconut
The coconut tree is a member of the palm tree family and the only living species of the genus Cocos. The term "coconut" can refer to the whole coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which botanically is a drupe, not a nut; the term is derived from the 16th-century Portuguese and Spanish word coco meaning "head" or "skull" after the three indentations on the coconut shell that resemble facial features. Coconuts are known for their versatility of uses; the inner flesh of the mature seed forms a regular part of the diets of many people in the tropics and subtropics. Coconuts are distinct from other fruits because their endosperm contains a large quantity of clear liquid, called "coconut milk" in the literature, when immature, may be harvested for their potable "coconut water" called "coconut juice". Mature, ripe coconuts can be used as edible seeds, or processed for oil and plant milk from the flesh, charcoal from the hard shell, coir from the fibrous husk. Dried coconut flesh is called copra, the oil and milk derived from it are used in cooking – frying in particular – as well as in soaps and cosmetics.
The hard shells, fibrous husks and long pinnate leaves can be used as material to make a variety of products for furnishing and decorating. The coconut has cultural and religious significance in certain societies in India, where it is used in Hindu rituals; the name coconut derives from seafarers during the 16th and 17th century for its resemblance to a head.'Coco' and'coconut' came from 1521 encounters by Portuguese and Spanish explorers with Pacific islanders, with the coconut shell reminding them of a ghost or witch in Portuguese folklore called coco. The specific name nucifera is Latin for "nut-bearing". Literary evidence from the Ramayana and Sri Lankan chronicles indicates that the coconut was present in South Asia before the 1st century BCE. Another early mention of the coconut dates back to the "One Thousand and One Nights" story of Sinbad the Sailor. Thenga, its Tamil name, was used in the detailed description of coconut found in Itinerario by Ludovico di Varthema published in 1510 and in the Hortus Indicus Malabaricus.
Earlier, it was called nux indica, a name used by Marco Polo in 1280 while in Sumatra, taken from the Arabs who called it jawz hindī, translating to "Indian nut". In the earliest description of the coconut palm known, given by Cosmos of Alexandria in his Topographia Christiana written around 545, there is a reference to the argell tree and its drupe. In March 1521, a description of the coconut was given by Antonio Pigafetta writing in Italian and using the words "cocho"/"cochi", as recorded in his journal after the first European crossing of the Pacific Ocean during the Magellan circumnavigation and meeting the inhabitants of what would become known as Guam and the Philippines, he explained how at Guam "they eat coconuts" and that the natives there "anoint the body and the hair with coconut and beniseed oil". The American botanist Orator F. Cook was one of the earliest modern researchers to propose a hypothesis in 1901 on the location of the origin of Cocos nucifera based on its current worldwide distribution.
He hypothesized that the coconut originated in the Americas, based on his belief that American coconut populations predated European contact and because he considered pan-tropical distribution by ocean currents improbable. Thor Heyerdahl used this as one part of his 1950 hypothesis to support his theory that the Pacific Islanders originated as two migration streams from the Canadian Pacific coast to Hawaii, on to Tahiti and New Zealand in a series of hops, another migration of a bearded and more advanced "white race" from South America via sailing balsa-wood rafts. Physical and genetic evidence, have overwhelmingly proven that Pacific Islanders originated from the eastward branch of the expansion of Austronesian peoples from Island Southeast Asia and Taiwan using more sophisticated outrigger canoe technology, not from the Americas. Genetic studies have identified the center of origin of coconuts as being the region between Southwest Asia and Melanesia, where it shows greatest genetic diversity.
Their cultivation and spread was tied to the early migrations of the Austronesian peoples who carried coconuts as canoe plants to islands they settled. The similarities of the local names in the Austronesian region is cited as evidence that the plant originated in the region. For example, the Polynesian and Melanesian term niu. A study in 2011 identified two genetically differentiated subpopulations of coconuts, one originating from Island Southeast Asia and the other from the southern margins of the Indian subcontinent; the Pacific group is the only one to display clear genetic and phenotypic indications that they were domesticated. The distribution of the Pacific coconuts correspond to the regions settled by Austronesian voyagers indicating that its spread was the result of human introductions, it is most strikingly displayed in Madagascar, an island settled by Austronesian sailors at around 2000 to 1500 BP. The coconut populations in the island show genetic admixture between the two subpopulations indicating that Pacific coconuts were brought by the Austronesian settlers
India
India known as the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh largest country by area and with more than 1.3 billion people, it is the second most populous country as well as the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, the Bay of Bengal on the southeast, it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives, while its Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia; the Indian subcontinent was home to the urban Indus Valley Civilisation of the 3rd millennium BCE. In the following millennium, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism began to be composed. Social stratification, based on caste, emerged in the first millennium BCE, Buddhism and Jainism arose. Early political consolidations took place under the Gupta empires. In the medieval era, Zoroastrianism and Islam arrived, Sikhism emerged, all adding to the region's diverse culture.
Much of the north fell to the Delhi Sultanate. The economy expanded in the 17th century in the Mughal Empire. In the mid-18th century, the subcontinent came under British East India Company rule, in the mid-19th under British Crown rule. A nationalist movement emerged in the late 19th century, which under Mahatma Gandhi, was noted for nonviolent resistance and led to India's independence in 1947. In 2017, the Indian economy was the world's sixth largest by nominal GDP and third largest by purchasing power parity. Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India became one of the fastest-growing major economies and is considered a newly industrialised country. However, it continues to face the challenges of poverty, corruption and inadequate public healthcare. A nuclear weapons state and regional power, it has the second largest standing army in the world and ranks fifth in military expenditure among nations. India is a federal republic governed under a parliamentary system and consists of 29 states and 7 union territories.
A pluralistic and multi-ethnic society, it is home to a diversity of wildlife in a variety of protected habitats. The name India is derived from Indus, which originates from the Old Persian word Hindush, equivalent to the Sanskrit word Sindhu, the historical local appellation for the Indus River; the ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi, which translates as "The people of the Indus". The geographical term Bharat, recognised by the Constitution of India as an official name for the country, is used by many Indian languages in its variations, it is a modernisation of the historical name Bharatavarsha, which traditionally referred to the Indian subcontinent and gained increasing currency from the mid-19th century as a native name for India. Hindustan is a Middle Persian name for India, it was introduced into India by the Mughals and used since then. Its meaning varied, referring to a region that encompassed northern India and Pakistan or India in its entirety; the name may refer to either the northern part of India or the entire country.
The earliest known human remains in South Asia date to about 30,000 years ago. Nearly contemporaneous human rock art sites have been found in many parts of the Indian subcontinent, including at the Bhimbetka rock shelters in Madhya Pradesh. After 6500 BCE, evidence for domestication of food crops and animals, construction of permanent structures, storage of agricultural surplus, appeared in Mehrgarh and other sites in what is now Balochistan; these developed into the Indus Valley Civilisation, the first urban culture in South Asia, which flourished during 2500–1900 BCE in what is now Pakistan and western India. Centred around cities such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa and Kalibangan, relying on varied forms of subsistence, the civilization engaged robustly in crafts production and wide-ranging trade. During the period 2000–500 BCE, many regions of the subcontinent transitioned from the Chalcolithic cultures to the Iron Age ones; the Vedas, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism, were composed during this period, historians have analysed these to posit a Vedic culture in the Punjab region and the upper Gangetic Plain.
Most historians consider this period to have encompassed several waves of Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent from the north-west. The caste system, which created a hierarchy of priests and free peasants, but which excluded indigenous peoples by labeling their occupations impure, arose during this period. On the Deccan Plateau, archaeological evidence from this period suggests the existence of a chiefdom stage of political organisation. In South India, a progression to sedentary life is indicated by the large number of megalithic monuments dating from this period, as well as by nearby traces of agriculture, irrigation tanks, craft traditions. In the late Vedic period, around the 6th century BCE, the small states and chiefdoms of the Ganges Plain and the north-western regions had consolidated into 16 major oligarchies and monarchies that were known as the mahajanapadas; the emerging urbanisation gave rise to non-Vedic religious movements, two of which became independent religions. Jainism came into prominence during the life of Mahavira.
Buddhism, based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha, attracted followers from all social classes excepting the middle
States and union territories of India
India is a federal union comprising 29 states and 7 union territories, for a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and smaller administrative divisions; the Constitution of India distributes the sovereign executive and legislative powers exercisable with respect to the territory of any State between the Union and that State. The Indian subcontinent has been ruled by many different ethnic groups throughout its history, each instituting their own policies of administrative division in the region. During the British Raj, the original administrative structure was kept, India was divided into provinces that were directly governed by the British and princely states which were nominally controlled by a local prince or raja loyal to the British Empire, which held de facto sovereignty over the princely states. Between 1947 and 1950 the territories of the princely states were politically integrated into the Indian Union. Most were merged into existing provinces.
The new Constitution of India, which came into force on 26 January 1950, made India a sovereign democratic republic. The new republic was declared to be a "Union of States"; the constitution of 1950 distinguished between three main types of states: Part A states, which were the former governors' provinces of British India, were ruled by an elected governor and state legislature. The nine Part A states were Assam, Bombay, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal; the eight Part B states were former princely states or groups of princely states, governed by a rajpramukh, the ruler of a constituent state, an elected legislature. The rajpramukh was appointed by the President of India; the Part B states were Hyderabad and Kashmir, Madhya Bharat, Mysore and East Punjab States Union, Rajasthan and Travancore-Cochin. The ten Part C states included both the former chief commissioners' provinces and some princely states, each was governed by a chief commissioner appointed by the President of India.
The Part C states were Ajmer, Bilaspur, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur and Vindhya Pradesh. The only Part D state was the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were administered by a lieutenant governor appointed by the central government; the Union Territory of Puducherry was created in 1954 comprising the previous French enclaves of Pondichéry, Karaikal and Mahé. Andhra State was created on 1 October 1953 from the Telugu-speaking northern districts of Madras State; the States Reorganisation Act of 1956 reorganised the states based on linguistic lines resulting in the creation of the new states. As a result of this act, Madras State retained its name with Kanyakumari district added to form Travancore-Cochin. Andhra Pradesh was created with the merger of Andhra State with the Telugu-speaking districts of Hyderabad State in 1956. Kerala was created with the merger of Malabar district and the Kasaragod taluk of South Canara districts of Madras State with Travancore-Cochin. Mysore State was re-organized with the addition of districts of Bellary and South Canara and the Kollegal taluk of Coimbatore district from the Madras State, the districts of Belgaum, North Canara and Dharwad from Bombay State, the Kannada-majority districts of Bidar and Gulbarga from Hyderabad State and the province of Coorg.
The Laccadive Islands which were divided between South Canara and Malabar districts of Madras State were united and organised into the union territory of Lakshadweep. Bombay State was enlarged by the addition of Saurashtra State and Kutch State, the Marathi-speaking districts of Nagpur Division of Madhya Pradesh and Marathwada region of Hyderabad State. Rajasthan and Punjab gained territories from Ajmer and Patiala and East Punjab States Union and certain territories of Bihar was transferred to West Bengal. Bombay State was split into the linguistic states of Gujarat and Maharashtra on 1 May 1960 by the Bombay Reorganisation Act. Nagaland was formed on 1 December 1963; the Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 resulted in the creation of Haryana on 1 November and the transfer of the northern districts of Punjab to Himachal Pradesh. The act designated Chandigarh as a union territory and the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana. Madras state was renamed Tamil Nadu in 1968. North-eastern states of Manipur and Tripura were formed on 21 January 1972.
Mysore State was renamed as Karnataka in 1973. On 16 May 1975, Sikkim became the 22nd state of the Indian Union and the state's monarchy was abolished. In 1987, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram became states on 20 February, followed by Goa on 30 May, while Goa's northern exclaves of Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli became separate union territories. In November 2000, three new states were created. Orissa was renamed as Odisha in 2011. Telangana was created on 2 June 2014 as ten former districts of north-western Andhra Pradesh. ^Note 1 Andhra Pradesh was divided into two states, Telangana and a residual Andhra Pradesh on 2 June 2014. Hyderabad, located within the borders of Telangana, is to serve as the capital for both states for a period of time not exceeding ten years; the Go
Jaggery
Jaggery is a traditional non-centrifugal cane sugar consumed in some countries in Asia and the Americas. It is a concentrated product of cane juice and date or palm sap without separation of the molasses and crystals, can vary from golden brown to dark brown in colour, it contains up to 50% sucrose, up to 20% invert sugars, up to 20% moisture, with the remainder made up of other insoluble matter, such as wood ash and bagasse fibres. Ancient scriptures on Ayurveda mention various medicinal uses based on method of preparation and age. Unrefined, it is known by various names, including "panela", in other parts of the world; the word "jaggery" comes from Portuguese from the Sanskrit शर्करा, the root of the word "sugar" itself. Jaggery is made of the products of sugarcane and the toddy palm tree; the sugar made from the sap of the date palm is more prized and less available outside of the regions where it is made. The toddy palm is tapped for producing jaggery in India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. In Sri Lanka, syrup extracts from kithul trees are used for jaggery production.
This is considered the best jaggery available on the local market and is more valued than that from other sources. All types of the sugar come in blocks or pastes of solidified concentrated sugar syrup heated to 200 °C. Traditionally, the syrup is made by boiling raw sugarcane juice or palm sap in large, round-bottomed vessels; the sugarcane cultivators used crushers that were powered by oxen, but all modern crushers are power-driven. These crushers are placed in fields near the sugarcane plants; the cut and cleaned sugarcane is crushed and the extracted cane juice is collected in a large vessel. A certain quantity of the juice is transferred to a smaller vessel for heating on a furnace; the vessel is heated for about an hour. Dried wood pulp from the crushed sugarcane is traditionally used as fuel for the furnace. While boiling the juice, lime is added to it so that all the wood particles rise to the top of the juice in a froth, skimmed off; the juice is thickened. The resulting thick liquid is about one-third of the original volume.
This hot liquid is golden. It is stirred continuously and lifted with a spatula to observe whether it forms a thread or drips while falling. If it forms many threads, it has thickened, it is poured into a shallow flat-bottomed pan to cool and solidify. The pan is large to allow only a thin coat of this hot liquid to form at its bottom, so as to increase the surface area for quick evaporation and cooling. After cooling, the jaggery becomes a soft solid, molded into the desired shape; the quality of jaggery is judged by its colour. Due to this grading scale, coloured adulterants are sometimes added to jaggery to simulate the golden hue. Jaggery is used as an ingredient in sweet and savoury dishes in the cuisines of India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Iran. For example, a pinch of it is sometimes added to sambar and other staples. Jaggery is added to lentil soups to add sweetness to balance the spicy and sour components in Gujarati cuisine. Maharashtra in India is the largest producer and consumer of jaggery.
Kolhapur is one of the largest producers of jaggery in India and has a GI Tag for Jaggery. Most vegetable dishes and dals, many desserts contain it. Jaggery is used during Makar Sankranti for making a dessert called tilgul. In Gujarat, jaggery is known as gôḷ. In rural Maharashtra and Karnataka, water and a piece of jaggery are given to a person arriving home from working under a hot sun. Molasses, a byproduct of the production of jaggery, is used in rural Maharashtra and Karnataka as a sweetener, it contains many minerals not found in ordinary sugar and is considered beneficial to health in traditional Ayurvedic medicine. It is an ingredient of many sweet delicacies, such as gur ke chawal / chol, a traditional Rajasthani or Punjabi dish. In Gujarat, laddus are made from wheat flour and jaggery. A well-known Maharashtrian recipe, puran poli, uses it as a sweetener apart from sugar. Jaggery is considered an available sweet, shared on any good occasion. In engagement ceremonies, small particles of it are mixed with coriander seeds.
Hence, in many Gujarati communities, engagement is known as gol-dhana "jaggery and coriander seeds". In Sri Lanka, jaggery is made using the treacle of the kithul tree. Jaggery is used extensively in South India to balance the pungency of spicy foods. In Andhra Pradesh, it is used for sweets like chakkara pongal, milk pongal. During Sankranti they prepare'Arisalu', an authentic Andhra Pradesh dish. In Kerala, it is considered auspicious and is used in cooking, it is a vital ingredient in many varieties of payasam, a sweet dish. In Tamil Nadu, jaggery used as the sweetener, it is used in a dish called chakkarai pongal. It is prepared during the festival of Pongal, held when the harvesting season begins, it is used to make kalhi, to sweeten fruit salads and payasam that are offered to the Gods. Jaggery is used in religious rituals. In rural areas, cane jaggery and palm jaggery are used to sweeten beverages, whereas refined sugar has replaced it in urban areas. In Odia cuisine, cakes or piṭhas contain jaggery.
Pithas like Arisa pitha ar
Pollachi travel guide from Wikivoyage
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