Report on the Zoological Survey of 

 India for the years 1917- 

 1918-19 & 1919-20. 



INTRODUCTION. 



MY last report was headed " First Annual Keport on tlie Zoological 

 Survey of India," but three years have passed since its pub- 

 lication. This is because it was decided, shortly after the report was 

 issued, that the reports of the department should in future be 

 triennial. The immediate reason for this decision was the cost of 

 paper and printing, but once in three years is quite sufficiently often 

 in my opinion to estimate the growth of a scientific institution. 



The last three years have been years of difiiculty to all scientific 

 institutions not of a direct and easily understood " practical " im- 

 portance. We have perhaps suffered less in India from the war and 

 its aftermath than our colleagues in other countries, but as more is 

 naturally expected from an Imperial Department than from a section 

 of a museum, I must ask the readers of this report to remember that the 

 funds at the disposal of the Zoological Survey of India for general 

 purposes, have not been materially greater than those formerly expen- 

 ded by the Zoological and Anthropological Section of the Indian 

 Museum,^ and that so far from the permanent scientific stafi having 

 been increased, it is now actually smaller, owing to the automatic 

 abolition of the post of special entomological assistant, than was that 

 in the service of the Trustees of the Indian Museum. A scheme for the 

 reconstruction of the survey has been under the consideration of the 

 Government of India for over a year and is to be submitted to the 

 Board of Scientific Advice for an opinion in May, 1920. In this 

 scheme proposals are put forward whereby the stafi may be enlarged 

 to such an extent as to render continuous survey work possible. At 

 present our work of the kind is inevitably desultory, and can be 

 prevented from becoming superficial only with intense labour. 



There has been nothing sensational in the progress of the department 

 in the last three years. I regard this as a satisfactory feature, for 

 there has been little slackness and no cessation of effort. Perhaps the 

 most noteworthy development has been our co-operation with the 

 medical and sanitary authorities, rendered possible by the liberal views 

 of the present Director General of the Indian Medical Services. 



1 It was calculated when the Zoological Survey of India was instituted that the 

 amount spent annually on the Zoological and Anthropological Section of tho Indian 

 Museum was Rs. 30,400. The annual grant to the Zoological Survey of India for tho 

 fi nancial year 1919- 1920 was approximately Es. 34,CC0. i-alarics of the staff being excluded 

 in both estimates, 



