Leninabad

Leninabad: see Khudjand, Tajikistan.

---

Leninabad 

(up to 1936, Khodzhent), a city, the center of Leninabad Oblast, Tadzhik SSR, at the entrance to the Fergana Valley, between spurs of the Turkestan Range and the Mogoltau Mountains. It is situated on the banks of the Syr Darya River, 11 km from the Khavast-Kokand railroad line, to which it is connnected by a branch line. Population, 113,000 (1973; 30,000 in 1897, 37,000 in 1926, and 77,000 in 1959).

Leninabad is one of the oldest cities of Middle Asia. The name Khodzhent is first encountered in written sources of the second half of the seventh century (a great silk route from China to Europe passed through it). The city was repeatedly attacked by foreigners and destroyed and flooded by the waters of the Syr Darya. In the 13th century it heroically resisted the hordes of Genghis Khan. On May 24, 1866, it was occupied by Russian troops and became part of Russia. The uprising against the colonial policies of tsarism which broke out in Khodzhent on July 4, 1916, spread throughout Middle Asia.

Sericulture and handicraft silk-weaving trades have been at a high level of development in the city since antiquity. Soviet power was established in the city in early 1918. On Oct. 2, 1929, the city became part of the Tadzhik SSR. During the prewar five-year plans, the city became a major industrial center for the republic (second in importance to Dushanbe) as a result of socialist transformations.

KH. G. ACHILOV

Leninabad has one of the largest silk combines in the USSR, processing locally produced cocoons and cocoons from Uzbekistan, Turkmenia, and Kazakhstan. It has silkworm-egg and cotton ginning plants and footwear and garment factories. There is food industry (canning and dairy combines and a confectionery plant). The city has a glassware container plant, the Torgmash Plant (producing electric lamps, electric coffee-makers, and thermostats), and a furniture factory. There is a pedagogical institute, an evening textile technicum, construction and accounting-planning technicums, and schools of pedagogy, medicine, and music. There is a musical comedy theater and a museum of history and local lore. A botanical garden of the Academy of Sciences of the Tadzhik SSR is located in Leninabad.