Cluster of dwellings of any type or size where human beings live is called human settlement. It involves grouping of people and apportioning of territory as a resource base. Settlements vary in size and type. Types of settlements are determined by the extent of built up area, inter house distance. There are four types of rural settlements in India:
The clustered rural settlement is a compact or closely built up area of houses. Here, the general living area is distinct and separated from the surrounding farms, barns and pastures. The closely built-up area and streets form recognizable pattern or geometric shape, such as rectangular, radial, linear, etc. These are found in fertile alluvial plains and in the northeastern states. People live in compact village for security or region of central India and in Nagaland. In Rajasthan, scarcity of water has necessitated compact settlement for maximum utilisation of available water resources.
Semi-Clustered Settlements: Semi- clustered or fragmented settlements may result from tendency of clustering in a restricted area of dispersed settlement. Sometimes one or more sections of the village society choose or is forced to live a little away from the main cluster or village. Generally, the land-owning and dominant community occupies the central part of the main village.
Hamleted Settlements: Sometimes settlement is divided into several units physically separated from each other bearing a common name motivated by social and ethnic factors. These units are locally called panna, para, palli, nagla, dhani, etc. in various parts of the country.
Dispersed Settlements: Dispersed or isolated settlement pattern in India appears in the form of isolated huts or hamlets of few huts in remote jungles, or on small hills with farms or pasture on the slopes. Extreme dispersion of settlement is caused by fragmented nature of the terrain and land resource base of habitable areas.