formerly United Provinces (of Agra and Oudh)
State (pop., 2001 prelim.: 166,052,859), northern India.
It is bordered by Nepal , the states of Bihar , Jharkhand , Madhya Pradesh , Rajasthan , Haryana , and Uttaranchal , and Delhi national capital territory and covers an area of 93,933 sq mi (243,286 sq km); its capital is Lucknow . The state, the most populous in the country, lies largely in the plains formed by the Ganges and {{link=Mahabharata">Mahabharata and Ramayana , and the scene of the rise of Buddhism after the 6th century BC. It was ruled by the Mauryan emperor Ashoka in the mid-3rd century BC, the Gupta dynasty (с AD 320–с 425), and King Harsa (606–647). The Mughals gained control in the 16th century, at which time the city of Agra became a chief centre. The British arrived in the late 18th century; by the 1830s they held sway and eventually formed the North-West Provinces, to which Oudh was later annexed. The area was the main scene of the Indian Mutiny of 1857. The current province was formed in 1902 and became a state of India in 1947. In 2000 the northern portion of it was made into the state of Uttaranchal. Uttar Pradesh is India's largest silica-producing state, yet agriculture is by far its most important economic sector. Its noted tourist meccas are Agra and Varanasi .