1904-5.] THE CAUSES OF FAMINES IN INDIA. 213 
fHE CAUSES OF FAMINES IN: INDIA. 
By REv. J. T. SUNDERLAND, M.A. 
(Read 3rd December, 1904). 
THE famines of India are among the most startling phenomena of 
our time. They seem to be steadily increasing both in frequency and 
severity. During the last forty years of the nineteenth century—from 
1860 to 1900—India was smitten by not fewer than ten famines of great 
magnitude, causing a loss of life that has been conservatively estimated 
at 15,000,000.* These figures are appalling. Such a condition of things 
naturally awakens the sympathy of the world. But it ought to do more. 
It ought to compel a far more careful inquiry than has yet been made 
into the causes of these famines, with a view to ascertaining whether the 
causes can be removed or not, and thus whether such scourges as now 
visit India with ever growing frequency are not preventable. 
It is perhaps generally believed that famines in India are unavoid- 
able, and that the causes which produce them are two, namely, failure 
of the periodic rains, and over-population. Let us see whether this belief 
is well founded. 
RAIN-FAILURE. 
How serious is the failure of rains in India? Need it bring famine? 
India is a large country. Out of its vast area (if we include Burmah) 
thirty-six states as large as the great state of New York might be carved. 
Within this area there is a great variety of climate, of soil, of amount of 
rain-fall, and therefore of productivity. The great monsoon rains which 
supply most of the moisture for India vary greatly from year to year. 
These rains of course man cannot control. If they are abundant over the 
whole land, the whole land has abundant crops. If they fail in parts, 
those parts have agricultural scarcity. 
Three things, however, should be remembered. One is, there is 
never failure of water everywhere. When drought is severest in certain 
* This is the very careful and moderate estimate of Mr. R. C. Dutt, C.I.E., author of the ‘‘ Eco- 
nomic History of India,’”’ based on the most exact records obtainable, official and other. (See his 
“Indian Famines; Their Causes and Cure’’) London, P. S. King & Co., 1901 pages 1-3. Also see his 
larger work, ‘‘ Famines in India,” Kegan Paul & Co., 1900. Other estimates are much higher than 
this of Mr. Dutt, rising to 25,000,000 and even to 30,000,000. 
The Bombay correspondent of the London Lancet, the leading medical journal in Great Britain, 
estimates the number of deaths from famine in the last ten years of the century at 10,000,000 
(The Lancet, June 1901). 
