Karnal is a city and the headquarters of Karnal District in the Indian state of Haryana. It was also known as Karnaal, Kurnaul or Karnaul during the British Raj.
Karnal is governed by a municipal corporation that comes under the Karnal Metropolitan Region. Karnal was once the site of a cantonment of the British East Indian Company army established in the year 1805 A.D. but later abandoned due to a malaria outbreak. The cantonment was subsequently shifted to Ambala and later came to be known as the famous Ambala Cantonmentestablished in 1843 A.D.
Historically, Karnal is said to have been founded during ancient times by the Kauravas in the Mahabharata era for the king Karna, a mythological hero and a key figure in the epic tale. It is midway between Delhi and Chandigarh, being 123 km (76 mi) north of Delhiand 126 km (78 mi) south of Chandigarh, on the National Highway NH-1, also known as the Grand Trunk Road. Delhi and Chandigarh can be reached from Karnal within 2 hours using a high frequency bus service provided by Haryana Roadways. Karnal is also the headquarters of Karnal Range (including Karnal, Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra and Kaithal districts) under an Inspector General of Police.
Karnal is very famous for its world class research and development institutes, namely Central Soil Salinity Research Institute (CSSRI), National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI), Directorate of Wheat Research (DWR), National Bureau of Animal Genetic Resources (NBAGR), Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), and a regional centre of the Indira Gandhi National Open University. Karnal is widely known for its lush green pastures, and the cultivation and production of very high-quality basmatirice. Karnal is also famous for manufacture of agricultural implements and its spares as more than 40% of country agricultural implements and spares are manufactured here. One of the bigger units involved in the manufacture of spares is
