A ROLE OF MARKET CENTRES IN POPULATION DISTRIBUTION IN SOLAPUR DISTRICT: A GEOGRAPHICAL APROACH

Abstract

Market centres are an important indicator of regional development as they enable agricultural producers, traders and consumers to interact for the exchange of goods, services and ideas. Apart from being local trade centres, market centres act as socio-economic hubs that balance the rural economy and influence the spatial organisation of settlements. Their growth and importance depend on factors such as road accessibility, transport connectivity, agricultural surplus, industrial linkages and population concentration. In India, which is a predominantly rural country, thousands of market centres support agricultural communities and guide regional development. Maharashtra, with Mumbai as the national financial capital, highlights the hierarchical importance of market centres, while in western Maharashtra, Solapur district stands out as a key region where market centres play a crucial role in shaping the distribution of settlements. The present study focuses on Solapur district, which has 316 market centres unevenly distributed across eleven tehsils. The objective is to examine the relationship between the distribution of market centres and the human population of the district. Using secondary data from the District Census Handbook (2011) and the Socio-Economic Summary of Solapur (2019-20), the analysis was carried out with the help of cartographic techniques and statistical methods. In particular, Spearman’s rank order correlation method was applied to assess the relationship between market centers and human population. The correlation value of r = 0.22 indicates a moderate positive relationship, which indicates that tehsils with more market centers generally correspond to higher population concentrations, although urban and industrial factors also influence the settlement distribution. This study highlights that the hierarchy and distribution of market centers are important determinants of population distribution, as well as interacting with broader geographical and socio-economic forces to shape the regional development of Solapur district.