

01 US 



CANDLES AND SOAP Trade 



us. The suburbs of Calcutta literally teem with private cantor-oil c*arou. 

 mills. As in; i infesting their importance, it maybe explained that while 

 Calcutta exports a large amount of castor oil, pnn ti< ally no castor-seed 

 leaves Bengal to foreign ronntne>. Kxporta of castor-oil seed are made 

 mainly from Bombay. 



^tailed enumeration of the oil mills of India would di.spel the errone- 

 ous opinion that India is doin^ nothing in the direction of meeting it home 

 markets for oils. A diMim-t advance has been made and is being main- 

 tained in every corner of the Empire. 



CANDLE AND SOAP MAKING. Thc&o are modern industries that 

 are rapidly becoming of considerable importance. A striking evidence of 

 the prosperity of the Burma candle trade may be had from the existence 

 of an export trade in candles. 



Candle- making in India. Except in the new industry of manufacture Candles, 

 of candles from the mineral wax and paraffin that has recently assumed Paraffin. 

 considerable proportions both in Rangoon and Calcutta, India cannot be 

 said to possess candle works of any great importance. Here and there 

 all over the country the baUi-saz still plies his craft of " tallow dip " making, 

 but very few of these workers form candles by moulding. In Lahore and 

 Bombay, candles are crudely moulded, and from time immemorial the art 

 of rolling wax candles has been known and practised. One or two soap w*x. 

 works have given attention to candle-making, but, as a rule, they employ 

 mineral wax, and their candles have accordingly to be considered along 

 with petroleum. (See Lime, p. 712.) 



While India, as a whole, is very far behind other countries in the pro- 

 duction of candles, the demand for these articles is very considerable. Indian 

 IMPORTS : The United Kingdom and Belgium are the sources of supply, import* 

 and the provinces that receive these are, in sequence of demand first 

 Madras, next Bombay, then Bengal, and lastly Burma. The imports have 

 fluctuated between 8 and 12 lakhs of rupees in value each year during the past 

 twenty-five to thirty years. It may be here added that Burma has, however, 

 begun recently to export candles, and these are of course entirely mineral. 

 The EXPORTS were in 1900-1 valued at Rs. 15,157 ; in 1901-2, at Rs. 49,703 ; Export., 

 m 1902-3, at Rs. 4,41,863; in 1903-4, at Rs. 9,05,521; in 1904-5, at 

 Rs. 9,48,156 ; in 1905-6 at Rs. 16,53,646 (in which year the share of Burma 

 was Rs. 16,37,755) ; and in 1906-7, Rs. 14,20,943. This traffic is mainly 

 with China, the Straits Settlements, Ceylon, Australia and New Zealand, 

 and is thus a new feature of India's manufacturing enterprise. (See Cocos, 

 p. 359 ; B-hus, p. 914.) 



Soap. As already observed, to the Natives of India as a whole, soap is Soap. 

 not of much importance, and soap substitutes (natural earths or vegetable 

 materials), as a rule, take its place. Still, the art of soap-making has been 

 known and practised from a remote antiquity, the impure article produced 

 being used by the washermen and dyers. Trade statistics show, however, 

 that India's demands on foreign countries for soap are very considerable 

 and yearly expanding. In 1876-7 the IMPORTS were valued at Rs. 3,32,791 ; import* 

 in 1901-2 at Rs. 17,61,427, or an annual average expansion of 17 per 

 cent. ; in 1902-3 a still greater expansion, the imports having been then 

 valued at Rs. 22,67,801 ; in 1903-4 they became Rs. 26,56,673 ; in 1904-5, 

 Rs. 27,23,705 ; in 1905-6, Rs. 31,90,890 ; and in 1906-7, Rs. 32,28,156. Distribution. 

 Almost one-half the total imports are, as a rule, taken by Bombay, one- 

 quarter by Bengal, and of the remaining quarter about one-half goes to 



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