Sirsa district

Sirsa district () is one of the districts of Haryana state, India. Sirsa is the district headquarters, and is located on National Highway 10 and 250 km away from Delhi.

Origin of name

The district is named after its headquarters, Sirsa. The name, Sirsa is derived from its ancient Sanskrit name Sairishaka, which is mentioned in the Mahabharata, the Ashtadhyayi and the Divyavadana. In Mahabharata, Sairishaka is described as being taken by Nakula in his conquest of the western quarter. It must have been a flourishing city in the 5th century B.C. as it has been mentioned by Panini.

There are a number of legends about the origin of the name of the town. Its ancient name was Sairishaka and from that it seems to have been corrupted to Sirsa. According to local tradition, an unknown king named Saras founded the town in 7th century A.D. and built a fort. The material remains of an ancient fort can still be seen in the south-east of the present town. It is about 5 km in circumference. According to another tradition, the name has its origin from the sacred river Sarasvati which one flowed near it. During the medieval period, the town was known as Sarsuti. It has been mentioned as Sarsuti by a number of medieval historians. The derivation of name Sirsa, is also attributed to the abundance of siris trees (Albizia lebbeck (Benth)) in the neighborhood of Sirsa which seems quite plausible for it finds some corroboration also in Panini and his commentator. In the ancient...
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