Presenting the details of the popular folk songs in the 'Purvanchal region' of Uttar Pradesh. Mention their salient features.

The song map of Purvanchal

• Kajri (kajali) is the monsoon song of clouds, viraha, and Krishna–Radha play, sung especially in Mirzapur–Banaras and the Vindhyan fringe; it is Purvanchal’s best-known concert form.
• Birha is the long narrative of separation and of Ahir/Yadav pastoral life, often with a khanjari or dholak, stretching into all-night performances.
• Chaiti belongs to the Chait month after Holi: boat, river, and longing songs along the Ganga–Ghaghara belt.
• Sohar (birth), vivah geet, and funeral laments (dirge, nirgun in some Kabir-panthi settings) mark the life cycle; women lead sohar in the angan.
• Alha–Udal martial ballads, Lorikayan, and Poorvi/Purvi lyric forms travel with wandering singers; Phaag and Holi songs colour the spring.

Salient features

• Language is Bhojpuri (with Awadhi tinge on the western edge of the region); repetition, refrain, and call-and-response fit collective farm and courtyard work.
• The agricultural calendar is the true raga-mala: sowing, rain, flood, harvest, and lean months each have a genre, so ecology is written into metre.
• Viraha (separation of lover or migrant labourer) is the dominant rasa; Purvanchal’s long history of out-migration to Calcutta, Bombay, and the Gulf keeps this feature alive.
• Caste-occupational colour remains: Kahar, Ahir, Mallah, and Dusadh repertoires differ even when they share a village; this is feature, not impurity.
• Performance is oral and situational—no fixed composer—yet modern cassettes and YouTube have turned kajri and birha into a culture industry without fully killing the angan version.
• Instruments stay light: dholak, manjira, harmonium in later stages, and the human chorus; dance may join (jhijhiya, kajri groups) but song can stand alone.

What to keep distinct

• Awadhi birha and Braj hori are neighbours, not the same as Purvanchal kajri–chaiti; the question asks the eastern belt.
• Nirgun Kabir and Gorakhnath panth verses in Gorakhpur–Basti add a philosophical folk layer beside the seasonal love song.
• State tourism labels should not replace the work-song origin: these were first tools of labour and ritual, then stage items.