Lanja

Lanja is a census town in Ratnagiri district in the Western Indian state of Maharashtra. About 50 km from the district headquarters Lanja is well known for its climatic variability as it has ample rains as well as good enough winters followed by heating summers. Lanja is also well known for cashewnut processing as number of small as well as medium scale processing factories are located in and nearby the town. Also Ratnagiri Alphonso, which is famous for its taste all over the world is produced in certain nearby villages in Lanja tahsil.GeographyLanja is located at. It has an average elevation of 166 metres (544 feet). It's a Taluka head in Ratnagiri district. National highway popularly known as Mumbai-Goa Highway passes through it. Nearest rail head is Adivali on konkan railway which is around 15 km away.HistoryFrom the time of the Peshva up to 1 August 1879, when Vengurle was made a sub-division, Lanja was the headquarters of a petty division of Rajapur.In the village is the grave of a Muhammedan saint named Syed Chand Bukhari Ali Faqir, said to have lived about five hundred years ago. Yearly at the Magh (January–February) full moon an Urus is held, when the tomb is, with ceremonies and prayers, covered with a cloth and sprinkled with powdered sandalwood. The fair is still largely attended (1960), by people of different communities from Lanja and the neighbouring villages. Shopkeepers come from Rajapur and open temporary booths at which for about a month coarse country and imported cloth and miscellaneous articles are sold. There is also a domed tomb near the village with no more definite history than that it marks the grave of a princess who died on a journey.