History of Tehsil Chichawatni City

Nobody lives in present times who could tell the reason of calling this city Chichawatni.

By: Arshad Farooq Butt

Chichawatni was once situated on the bank of the Ravi which changed its course with the passage of time and shifted several miles away from this town. It was known as Chichawatni after the name of an elderly person – CHICHA – whose descendants established this settlement and named it after him as
the residence of ‘Chicha’.

He was in fact a Sandhu Jatt of a village in Amritsar district of Punjab. His son, Natha Sarpanch, and other members of his family turned Sikhs in the early decades of 18th century. A son of Natha Sarpanch, Sewa Singh, came to this place and founded Chichawatni. And it was he who gave this name to the new settlement as ‘Chich di Watni’, which later became Chichawatni. It now lies in Sahiwal district of West Punjab in Pakistan. (Dr Sewak)

Some historians say, the name was given by Maharaja Dahir. Since the name was given 3 centuries ago, no one is present to testify why this city is called Chichawatni and whom Chichawatni is on the name of.

Chichawatni city is the tehsil of sahiwal district and is located about 45.3 km from sahwail at multan bypass road. History of Chichawatni refers back to the British Raj. There are two references why this city is called Chichawatni.

First, this name was given by Maharaja Dahir. Secondly, a hindu family lived there whose names were Chicha (man) and Watni (his wife) name.

Nobody lives in present times who could exactly tell the reason of calling this city Chichawatni. Its postal code is 57200 and its map shows it as a small city having a number of villages.

Chichawatni to Multan distance is about 132.8 km and Harappa, a historical place, is about 23.9 km from Chichawatni. Lahore to Chichawatni travel is about 214 km and it takes 3 hours drive.

Chichawatni weather is extremely hot in summer and usually it goes up to 46 degree centigrade. It’s big stations are Kassowal, Iqbal Nagar, Farid Nagar (90 Morr),  Okanwala Bangla, Gaziabad and Harappa.

Chichawatni tehsil is famous for its second largest jungle (chichawatni forest) after Changa Manga. It was planted by the prisoners of the British Raj in 19th century. There used to be a central jail in Chichawatni near kotla adeeb shahid forest.

Rai Murtaza Iqbal is the present Chichawatni MNA and he belongs to Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI). He defeated his PMLN rivals Ch Tufail Jutt and Ch Hanif Jutt with the heavy lead of 26000 votes in chichawatni election 2018.

There are 3 provincial assembly constituencies in the city:

PP200

PP201

PP202

There is only one National assembly seat named NA-149 in Chichawatni. PMLN could only win one provincial seat in 2018 election from this city and that was in PP200.

Other renowned Chichawatni politicians are X-MNA Ch Munir Azhar, Ch Zahid Iqbal, Rai Hassan Nawaz, Ch Saeed Ahmad Gujjar (Late), Malik Nauman Ahmad Langrial, Ch Arshad Jutt, Ali Javed, Rana Riaz Ahmad, Ch Waheed Asghar Dogar and Rai Azizullah.

In Chichawatni Rahmani, Rajput, Jatt , Arain , Butt, Sheikh , Malik , Ansari , Khokhar and other castes live with religious and social harmony.

Government Degree College Chichawatni was established in 1967 with the efforts of Sheikh Zaman, the father of X-MNA Begum Shahnaz Javed.

Government M.C Model High School Chichawatni was established in 1916. DPS Chichawatni is the best private educational institure in Chichawatni. There are several other old institutions i.e. Punjab Group of Colleges, The Educators, Mission High School, Allama Iqbal College and the Dawn High School.

Many Sikh temples are now working as primary and secondary schools in Chichawatni. Government Crescent Girls College Chichawatni was also established with the efforts of Sheikh Zaman family and they paid for its land.

Chichawatni railway station was established in 1918. It was expanded with the passage of time. Especially in 2007 when its new building was built.

There are some interesting historical references about Chichawatni. Its major colony Gaoshala was a grassland for the cows before the division of India. Gao means “the cow”. Shala is called to any place. So the Gaoshala means the place where the cows graze.

Halqa Arbab e Zauq Chichawatni is a famous literary society of Chichawatni which holds its meeting on every sunday at Government M.C Model High School Chichawatni.

Taj Mahal Chichawatni, greenland hotel chichawatni, Fresco Hotel Chichawatni and Gujjar hotel are its famous food points.

Chichawatni Buffalo Mandi (also known as Chichawatni Cattle mandi or Chichawatni cow mandi) is the second largest cattle market in Pakistan. Since 2014 it is given to the chichawatni cattle market management company. It is now become model mandi in gaushala chichawatni at chichawatni bypass.

For the latest chichawatni news you can visit its local websites. One is CHICHAWATNI NEWS in which you are reading this article. There is a documentary program in this website named Chichawatni Zero Km in which the history of chichawatni and its problems are covered.

There are a lot of historical buildings in Chichawatni. One of them is ‘Marri Building” which was the home of a Sikh family.

Chichawatni local singers have a great talent but devoid of National level media attention.

Chichawatni by election 2018 :

Rai Murtaza Iqbal vacaned the MPA seat as he could only keep either MNA or MPA seat. So he decided to keep MNA seat and took oath. His vacaned MPA seat in PP 201 became a battle field between two political families i.e Ch Tufail Jutt vs Syed Samsam Bukhari. Chichawatni by election held on Oct 14 and Syed Samsam Bukhari won the seat.

THQ Hospital Chichawatni

Tehsil Head Quarters Hospital Chichawatni is located near 45 Adda, Okanawala Road, Chichawatni. It’s old building is now TMA Chichawatni. It is upgraded yet lack of facilities and the staff is a common complain.

A strange fact is that there used to be a brothel in the midst of the city chichawatni punjab. Hindu and Sikh culture in chichawatni pakistan was replaced by the Muslims after the division of the sub-continent. Keep visiting this article as we’ll keep updating it with more and more information about Chichawatni.

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