1904-5.] THE CAUSES OF FAMINES IN INDIA. 215 
constructed in earlier times have been permitted, in not a few cases, to fall 
into decay. Within recent years there has been a change for the better. 
Some extensive irrigation schemes have been carried out, as the Chenab 
Canal in the Punjab, which irrigates 2,000,000 acres, the Jhelum canal 
which irrigates 300,000, and the great Ganges canals. According to the 
Scott-Moncrieff Commission (Report of 1903) the government has irrigated 
in all some 21,500,000 acres.* But very large areas capable of irrigation 
still remain neglected. One wonders all the more at the slowness with 
which the government moves, when one bears in mind that most of the 
money which it has spent on its irrigation works pays an interest of fully 
seven per cent., besides accomplishing untold good in saving human life. 
It is difficult to avoid asking, why should so many other things be allowed 
to take precedence over irrigation? The amount of water going to waste 
every year which might be saved is enormous. Great numbers of new 
canals ought to be dug; old canals ought to be re-opened; canals now in 
use ought to be deepened and widened. In regions where water cannot 
be obtained for the supply of canals, thousands of new wells ought to be 
sunk, and many old wells ought to be deepened. Hundreds of new tanks 
and reservoirs and small lakes ought to be constructed, and hundreds of 
old ones enlarged, so as to store for use the vast quantities of surface water 
which now run to waste. It is generally supposed that famine years in 
India are always years of very light rain-fall. This is a great mistake; 
they are often years of very heavy rain-fall. The only trouble is the rain 
comes too early, too late, or too much at a time, and 7s not stored. Com- 
pare India with England. The greater part of England has an average 
annual rain-fall of under 40 inches. A large area in England, and all the 
more important agricultural districts in Scotland, have an average rain- 
fall not exceeding thirty inches. It is calculated that in any country 
an average of twenty inches properly distributed throughout the year, 
insures reliable agriculture without irrigation. But the rain-fall in India 
in many years when famine is severest, rises far above these figures. The 
trouble is, the water is allowed to go to waste for want of proper storage; 
hence there is disaster. The year of the great Madras famine of 1877 was 
one with the enormous rain-fall of sixty-six inches. In the year of the 
Orissa famine (1865-66) the rain fall was sixty inches. In the Bombay 
famine of 1876 the rain-fall of the year was fifty inches. In the famine of 
1896-97 in the Central Provinces, the record of the two years was fifty- 
two inches and forty-two inches. In the great famine year, 1900, the 
average rain-fall record in the parts of India where the famine was most 
severe was (I omit fractions) North-Western Provinces, thirty-two inches ; 
Punjab, eighteen inches; Central Provinces, fifty-two inches; Central 
* The total irrigated area in India in 1900 was 31,544.000 acres. 
