Forestry in India 627 



The Forest Service in India is spared one of the most difficult 

 problems in Eastern America, the bringing of non-agricultural 

 lands, now divided amongst hundreds or thousands of small 

 owners, vmder one control for forest management. There is no 

 doubt, however, that if the Indian Forest Service had been faced 

 with this problem in such a country, say, as Southern Ontario, 

 they would have solved it quickly. Though the average Indian 

 forester will not admit it, being progressive in spirit, ambitious 

 for his profession, and having much larger schemes yet in hand, 

 which he maintains will pay the State 10 or 20 per cent on the 

 investment, the various Indian governments have in 50 years 

 been trained by the foresters to consider their forests as estates, 

 and to vote money for expenditiu-e on improvements where it is 

 shown by the Forest Service that such expenditure will be returned 

 with interest. It is possible that there is a tendency, under the 

 growing influence of democracy in India, to assent to forest 

 investments a little more readily when they are sugared by being 

 hitched to schemes of development than when they are purely 

 for forest improvement, but the fact remains that the forests are 

 to the Indian governments assets upon which each year the finan- 

 cial powers are being educated, by business arguments only, to 

 spend an increasing proportion of the revenue. Further reference 

 will be made to this point. 



Organization 



The public forests in India are in nearly all provinces divided 

 into three classes, reserved, protected and unclassed. The 

 division, which in some ways gives confusion to outsiders, arises 

 from the system of civil government. Throughout British India 

 the country is divided into administrative units, known as civil 

 divisions. Each division is in charge of a member of the famous 

 Indian Civil Service, who as Commissioner or Collector governs 

 the district and is head of the local organization. The Commis- 

 sioners, who in early days were active heads of forest work in 

 their districts as well as of aU other work, now occupy themselves 

 chiefly with magistrative duties and are concerned only with 

 forest administration when the latter affects the rights or daily 

 life of the population. The administration of the country may 

 now be said to be divided, the land in use is administered by the 

 Collector ; the land not used, or not capable of being used at the 



