II 



SOURCES OF INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY 



EVERY year many lakhs of chank shells are required by the shell-bangle manufac- 

 turers of Dacca. To supply this demand hundreds of fishermen and divers, from Kathia- 

 war in the north to Cape Comorin in the south, search the reefs and scour the sand- 

 flats within the 10-fathom line during the fine weather season ; in some places they wade 

 about in the shallows, in others they bring their catch to the surface in nets, or they may 

 descend themselves to the bottom and hunt it by sight as they swim. 



Six distinct chank fisheries are carried on at the present day in India seas ; ranked 

 in their geographical order they are situated in the following localities : 



(a). Kathiawar ; 



(6). Travancore ; 



(c). The Gulf of Mannar (usually called the Tuticorin Fishery) ; 



(d). Palk Strait (known generally as the Rameswaram and Ceylon Fisheries) ; 



(e). The Coromandel Coast, from Point Calimere to Madras City. 



Without exception the chank fishery in each of these localities is considered as a 

 royal prerogative, the monopoly of Government. In practice this prerogative is vari- 

 ously exercised. In the Gulf of Mannar and on the Indian side of Palk Strait, the 

 Madras Government work the fishery departmentally through an officer of the Fish- 

 eries Department styled the Superintendent of Pearl and Chank Fisheries. On the 

 Coromandel coast the exclusive right to collect is farmed out to a renter for a term of years. 

 The latter administration of the prerogative is also in force in Okhamandal (Kathiawar), 

 where His Highness the Gaekwar of Baroda exercises sovereign rights in the local fishery. 

 In Ceylon the renting system was in force till 1890, when it was abandoned in favour of 

 an export duty, a method of securing Government revenue from this source which has 

 continued ever since. In Travancore the dues of Government are collected in the same 

 manner as now prevails in Ceylon. 



The shells fished off the Kathiawar coast are of good quality, well esteemed in the 

 Bengal trade where they are known as Surti shells an echo of the day when Surat 

 was the great emporium of the Kathiawar and Konkan coasts. To-day the shells 

 are sent to Bombay, whence they are shipped to Calcutta. The quantity yielded is 

 approximately 200 to 250 bags per annum. 



