Place:Mysore, Mysore, Mysore, Karnataka, India

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Mysore, officially Mysuru, is a city in the southern part of the state of Karnataka, India. Mysore city is geographically located between 12° 18′ 26″ north latitude and 76° 38′ 59″ east longitude. It is located at an altitude of above mean sea level.

Mysore is situated at the foothills of Chamundi Hills about towards the southwest of Bangalore and spread across an area of . Mysore City Corporation is responsible for the civic administration of the city, which is also the headquarters of Mysore district and Mysore division.

It served as the capital city of the Kingdom of Mysore for nearly six centuries from 1399 until 1956. The Kingdom was ruled by the Wadiyar dynasty, with a brief period of interregnum in the late 18th century when Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan were in power. The Wadiyars were patrons of art and culture. Tipu Sultan and Hyder Ali also contributed significantly to the cultural and economic growth of the city and the state by planting mulberry trees introducing silk in the region and fighting four wars against the British. The cultural ambience and achievements of Mysore earned it the sobriquet of Cultural Capital of Karnataka.

Mysore is noted for its heritage structures and palaces, including the Mysore Palace, and for the festivities that take place during the Dasara festival when the city receives hundreds of thousands of tourists from around the world. It lends its name to various art forms and culture, such as Mysore Dasara, Mysore painting; the sweet dish Mysore Pak, Mysore Masala Dosa; brands such as Mysore Sandal Soap, Mysore Paints and Varnish Limited; and styles and cosmetics such as Mysore Peta (a traditional silk turban) and the Mysore silk saris. Mysore is also known for betel leaves and own its special variety of jasmine flower fondly referred as "Mysore Mallige". Tourism is the major industry alongside the traditional industries. Mysore's inter-city public transportation includes rail, bus and air.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

The site where Mysore Palace now stands was occupied by a village named Puragere at the beginning of the 16th century.^[1] The Mahishūru Fort was constructed in 1524 by Chamaraja Wodeyar III (1513–1553), who passed on the dominion of Puragere to his son Chamaraja Wodeyar IV (1572–1576). Since the 16th century, the name of Mahishūru has commonly been used to denote the city. The Kingdom of Mysore, governed by the Wodeyar family, initially served as a vassal state of the Vijayanagara Empire. With the decline of that empire after the Battle of Talikota in 1565, the Mysore Kingdom gradually achieved independence, and by the time of King Narasaraja Wodeyar (1637), it had become a sovereign state. Seringapatam, near Mysore, the present-day Srirangapatna, was the capital of the kingdom beginning in 1610.^[1] The 17th century saw a steady expansion of its territory and, under Narasaraja Wodeyar I and Chikka Devaraja Wodeyar, the kingdom annexed large areas of what is now southern Karnataka and parts of Tamil Nadu, to become a powerful state in the southern Deccan.

The kingdom reached the height of its military power and dominion in the latter half of the 18th century, under the de facto rulers Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan. The latter demolished parts of Mysore to remove legacies of the Wodeyar dynasty.^[1] During this time, the kingdom of Mysore came into conflict with the Marathas, the British, and the Nizam of Hyderabad, leading to the four Anglo-Mysore wars, success in the first two of which was followed by defeat in the third and fourth. After Tipu Sultan's death in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War in 1799, the capital of the kingdom was moved back to Mysore from Seringapatam,^[2] and the kingdom was distributed by the British to their allies of the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War. Part of the kingdom was annexed into the Madras Presidency, another to the Nizam of Hyderabad. The landlocked interior of the defeated kingdom of Mysore was turned into a princely state under the suzerainty of the British Crown,^[2] with the five-year-old Wodeyar Krishnaraja III as titular ruler and with Purnaiah, who had served under Tipu, as chief minister or Diwan and Lt. Col. Barry Close as Resident. The British took control of Mysore's foreign policy and insisted on an annual tribute for maintaining a standing British army at Mysore. Purnaiah is credited with improving Mysore's public works.^[2] In 1831, claiming there was maladministration, the British took direct control of the princely state. For the next fifty years, the kingdom of Mysore was under the direct rule of British Commissioners, and in 1831 the city of Mysore lost its status as the administrative centre, when the British Commissioner moved the capital to Bangalore.^[2]

In 1876–77, towards the end of the period of direct British rule, Mysore suffered from the Great Famine of 1876–1878, in which nearly a fifth of the population died. In 1881, Maharaja Chamaraja Wadiyar X was given control of Mysore, in a process called rendition, but with a resident British officer and a diwan to handle the Maharaja's administration, and the city of Mysore regained its status as the capital.^[2] The Mysore municipality was established in 1888 and the city was divided into eight wards.^[3] In 1897 an outbreak of bubonic plague killed nearly half of the population of the city. With the establishment of the City Improvement Trust Board (CITB) in 1903, Mysore became one of the first cities in Asia to undertake planned urban development. Public demonstrations and meetings were held there during the Quit India movement and other phases of the Indian independence movement.

Until the independence of British India (which did not include Mysore) in 1947, Mysore remained a Princely State within the British Indian Empire, with the Wodeyars continuing their rule.^[4] After Indian Independence, Mysore city remained as part of the Mysore State, now known as Karnataka. Jayachamarajendra Wodeyar, then king of Mysore, was allowed to retain his titles and was nominated as the Rajapramukh (appointed governor) of the state. He died in September 1974 and was cremated in Mysore. Over the years, Mysore became well known as a centre for tourism; the city remained largely peaceful, except for occasional riots related to the Kaveri River Water Dispute.^[5] Among the events that took place in Mysore and made national headlines were a fire at a television studio that claimed 62 lives in 1989, and the sudden deaths of many animals at the Mysore Zoo.

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