Betul district

Betul district is a district of Madhya Pradesh state in central India. The city of Betul serves as its administrative headquarters. The district is a part of Narmadapuram Division.

It lies almost wholly on the Satpura range and occupies nearly the whole width of the range between the Narmada Valley on the north and the Berar plains on the south.

Demographics
According to the 2011 census Betul district has a population of 1,575,362, roughly equal to the nation of Gabon or the US state of Idaho. This gives it a ranking of 314th in India (out of a total of 640). The district has a population density of 157 PD/sqkm. Its population growth rate over the decade 2001–2011 was 6.85%. Betul has a sex ratio of 970 females for every 1000 males, and a literacy rate of 70.14%. 19.62% of the population lives in urban areas. Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes made up 10.11% and 42.34% of the population respectively.

The district has an area of 10043 km2.

Religion
Hindus are by far the most numerous with 95.58% and Muslims are 2.39%. Those from tribal religions are 0.83%, while Buddhists who were 9,600 in number.

Languages
At the time of the 2011 Census of India, 44.69% of the population in the district spoke Hindi, 27.69% Gondi, 12.86% Marathi, 11.13% Korku and 1.69% Bengali as their first language. Pawari/Bhoyari is a language exclusively spoken by the people of Kshatriya Pawar (Bhoyar Pawar) caste.

Main tribes inhabiting the district are Gonds and Korkus. The remaining population are castes like Kshatriya Pawar (Bhoyar Pawar), Rajput, Brahmin, Maratha, Chamar, Mali, Pal, Patil and Soni.

Tourist places

 * Balaji Puram
 * Kukru
 * Muktagiri
 * Salbardi
 * Tapti Udgam
 * Balajipuram Temple
 * Satpura Dam
 * Sapna Dam

Transport
Betul railway station is located between Bhopal and Nagpur station.

Economy
In 2006 the Ministry of Panchayati Raj named Betul one of the country's 250 most backward districts (out of a total of 640). It was one of the 24 districts in Madhya Pradesh previously receiving funds from the Backward Regions Grant Fund Programme (BRGF).