Apart from the globally recognized measurement units, several local units are also used in India in order to measure land. Bigha is one such unit that is quite popular as a land measurement benchmark, and is widely used across Indian states. The popularity of this unit is evident from the fact that it is also commonly used in several other south Asian countries, including Nepal and Bangladesh.
Within India, the states where this unit is most frequently used are: Assam, Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal
Despite its wide popularity, bigha as a land measurement unit is not used anywhere in the southern part of the country, where more localized land measurement units are in vogue.
It begs mention here that there is no standard value attached to it, and the value of a bigha varies from state to state, as explained in the chart below:
State | 1 Bigha in sqft |
Assam | 14,400 |
Bihar | 27,220 |
Gujarat | 17,424 |
Haryana | 27,225 |
Himachal Pradesh | 8,712 |
Jharkhand | 27,211 |
Madhya Pradesh | 12,000 |
Punjab | 9,070 |
Rajasthan | 27,255 |
UP | 27,000 |
Uttarakhand | 6,804 |
West Bengal | 14,400 |
While conversion is an absolute possibility, there are no equivalents of bigha in English as such. Despite the growing use of the globally accepted terms, bigha continues to be popular in the Indian context, especially the northern states.
Use of bigha in Nepal
In Nepal, bigha and ropani are the two units that are widely used. Even though land measurement is also done using the globally recognized metric system, the usage of these units is much less popular.
In Nepal, 1 bigha is equal to 1.67 acre. On the other hand, a bigha consists of 13.31 ropani.
Use of bigha in Bangladesh
Among the popular units used for land measurement in Bangladesh are katha and bigha. From the metric system, use of acre is also popular. In Bangladesh, 1 acre of land is equal to three bighas of land.
Apart from these two countries, bigha as a land measurement unit is also used in Fiji, where a bigha is equal to one acre of land.