1310 



INDIA. 



nouncing in the budget statement that it intended 

 applying for a loan of 1,000,000 in England and 

 one of 2 crores of rupees in India, decided in July 

 to go to the London market for 3,000.000. The 

 loan was offered, but found no takers, and was 

 withdrawn. Of the proposed loan the Govern- 

 ment required 1,730,000 to balance a credit taken 

 for current expenses in 1001. A loan of 1 crore 

 offered in India in August was subscribed several 

 times over at a price exceeding 1)7, compared with 

 94 rupees given for the loan of 3 crores in 1900. 



Defense. The military forces in India in 1900 

 numbered, according to the estimates, 219,309 men 

 of all ranks, comprising 17,890 artillery, 28,975 

 cavalry. 4.402 engineers, 107,248 infantry, and 788 

 miscellaneous oflicers. There were 50,889 troops 

 in Bengal. 68.800 in the Punjab, 47,022 in Bombay, 

 and 40.052 in Madras. The European army num- 

 bered 73.49," of all ranks, and for 1901 the number 

 was fixed at 73,484, of whom 60,581 were effective 

 in the spring of 1901. The volunteer corps in 

 India had 31,083 men enrolled, of whom 29,371 

 were counted as effective. The imperial service 

 troops maintained by feudatory princes numbered 

 17,004. A program for the improvement of the 

 army, adopted in 1900, to be completed in 1903, 

 includes a new transport and the registration of 

 camels and other animals, Maxim guns for the 

 cavalry and a part of the infantry, the manufac- 

 ture of cordite and other munitions as well as 

 army clothing in India, an increase of staff and 

 other officers, and the rearmament of the native 

 troops and the volunteers with 0.303 Lee-Enfield 

 rifles and carbines. A rifle factory will be estab- 

 lished in India. To fill the gaps caused by the ab- 

 sence of native troops garrisoned in Mauritius, 

 Singapore, and Ceylon, 5 new regiments have been 

 raised. In 1901 there were 1,500 native troops in 

 Mauritius, 800 native and 2,100 British troops in 

 Ceylon, 800 native troops in Singapore, 600 in 

 .hibaland. 5.200 British troops of the Indian estab- 

 lishment in South Africa, and 16,300 native and 

 300 British troops in China, making a total of 

 7,600 British and 20,000 native troops. There are 

 about 3,000 native commissioned officers in the 

 native army. The Government has decided to 

 open a military career for the sons of Indian 

 princes and nobles by training a limited number 

 in an imperial cadet corps and providing positions 

 on the staff for such as are not called to duties in 

 1 heir own states and have the desire, perseverance, 

 and aptitude to become British officers. 



Commerce and Production. The agricultural 

 returns for 1899 deal with 545,301,175 acres in 

 British India out of 732,238,346 acres surveyed in 

 British and native territory. Of the area covered 

 by the returns 64,753,597 acres were forest, 136,- 

 566,917 acres uncultivable waste, 106,292,719 acres 

 waste fit for cultivation, 41,200,284 acres current 

 fallows, and 196,487,658 acres under crops. Rice 

 occupied 74,784.045 acres; wheat, 20,225,111 acres; 

 other grains, 87,011,350 acres; sugar-cane, 2,755,- 

 887 acres; tea, 482,959 acres; cotton, 9,178,060 

 acres; oil-seeds, 12,167,001 acres; indigo, 1,013,627 

 acres; tobacco, 1,092.903 acres; jute, 1,690,739 

 acres; other fibers, 687,703 acres; coffee, 148,389 

 acres; various food crops, 6,164,086 acres. The 

 area on which two crops were grown was 27,166,- 

 439 acres. There were 30.414,499 acres irrigated 

 by canals, tanks, wells, etc., counting twice over 

 land irrigated for two crops in the year. The 

 total area under cultivation in India has grown 

 from 194.000.000 acres in 1880 to 217,000,000 acres 

 in 1901, the average income of the people from 18 

 to 20 rupees per capita, the income of the agri- 

 culturist being now 30 rupees, against 27 rupees 

 in 1880. The area of reserved forests has been 



extended from 17,705 square miles in 1877 to 84,- 

 666 square miles in 1899, of w T hich 18,930 square 

 miles were in the Central Provinces, 15,667 square 

 miles in Burma, 14,888 square miles in Madras, 

 13,435 square miles in Bombay, 5,881 square miles 

 in Bengal, 4,175 square miles in Berar, 4,005 

 square miles in the Northwest Provinces and 

 Oudh, 3,537 square miles in Assam, 2,892 square 

 miles in the Punjab, 238 square miles in Coorg, 

 205 square miles in Baluchistan, 156 square miles 

 in the Andaman Islands, and 139 square miles in 

 Ajmere. 



There were 176 cotton-mills, with 37,540 looms 

 and 4,456,177 spindles in 1899, having 149,895,850 

 rupees invested and employing 156,056 persons; 

 33 jute-mills and 1 hemp-mill, with 13,469 looms 

 and 280,942 spindles, having 49,550,000 rupees in- 

 vested and employing 95,351 persons; and 4 

 woolen-mills, with 578 looms and 22,506 spindles. 

 The paper-mills, 8 in .number, had 6,772,000 rupees 

 of capital. The quantity of beer brewed in 1899 

 was 5,570,313 gallons. The quantity of coal ob- 

 tained in 1899 from 221 mines, in which 72,267 

 persons were employed, was 4,932,808 tons, valued 

 at 15,515,950 rupees. The imports of coal were 

 422,376 tons in 1900, and there were 287 coal- 

 mines in operation which produced over 6,000,000 

 tons, valued at 1,339,700, twice the output of 

 1894. Nearly five-sixths of the total was pro- 

 duced in Bengal, where mining activity has been 

 greatest in recent years. The number of people 

 employed in the mines was 89,000, including 25,000 

 w r omen. The production was sufficient for the 

 railroads, mills, and steamers of India, and for the 

 exportation of 541,000 tons to Ceylon and other 

 countries. The high price of English coal, five 

 times as high as that of the native, and the de- 

 pression in cotton manufacturing caused the im- 

 ports to fall to 127,000 tons in 1901. More than 

 20,000,000 hundredweight of salt was produced in 

 British India in 1901. Over a third of the quan- 

 tity was made by the Government and sold to the 

 public. Rock salt is obtained in the Punjab and 

 saline deposits are evaporated in Rajputana and 

 Central India, but three-fourths of the salt is 

 produced by solar evaporation on the coasts of 

 Bombay and Madras. Bengal and Burma im- 

 ported about 7,000,000 hundredweight. The total 

 consumption was 26,250,000 hundredweight, a 

 little more than was consumed in any previous 

 year, yielding a revenue to the Government of 

 5,822,000, about Gd. per head of population. 



Coffee is grown mainly in southern India, half 

 the crop, in Mysore and the rest in Coorg and 

 .other British territory. In 1900 the total area 

 planted was 245,400 acres. The fall in prices 

 since 1897 and disease and bad seasons have put 

 a stop to fresh plantings. The quantity produced 

 in 1900 was only half the crop of 1890. All the 

 Indian coffee is exported, chiefly to Great Britain 

 and France. Sugar became a fiscal problem in 

 1898 when a large importation of refined sugar 

 began to come in from the glutted markets of 

 Europe. Formerly Mauritius supplied all the for- 

 eign sugar that India required. In the year end- 

 ing March 31. 1898, out of a total importation of 

 4,235,000 hundredweight, Germany sent 1,203,000, 

 Austria-Hungary 946,000 hundredweight, Mauri- 

 tius 1,406,000 hundredweight, China, Java, and 

 the Straits Settlements 506,000 hundredweight, 

 and other countries 174,000 hundredweight. In 

 the following year imports fell to 3,765,000 hun- 

 dredweight, of which quantity Germany sent 414.- 

 000 hundredweight, Austria-Hungary 1,064,000 

 hundredweight, Mauritius 1,794,000 hundred- 

 weight, China, Java, and the Straits Settlements 

 424,000 hundredweight, and other countries 69,000 



