INDIA. 



303 



when famine comes money can be borrowed to the 

 extent of the amount by which debt has been re- 

 duced or prevented. Fresh taxes were imposed in 

 1878 to secure a surplus revenue, known as the 

 famine insurance fund, to the amount of Rx 1,500,- 

 000 a year. In 1881 the plan was modified by 

 applying half the annual fund to special works 

 for protection against famine, such as irrigation 

 canals and reservoirs and railroads for the con- 

 veyance of supplies in time of scarcity and for 

 the development in normal years of the districts 

 liable to famine. Between 1880 and 1898 the 

 Government spent Rx 7,791,989 on direct famine 

 relief, for which, when occasion demands, the in- 

 surance fund is always available; on protective 

 irrigation works, Rx 1,883,071; on protective rail- 

 roads, Rx 6,550,931; for guaranteed interest on 

 the Midland Railroad bonds, Rx 4,438,507, a ques- 

 tionable application of the fund; for reduction or 

 avoidance of debt, Rx 25,991,797. This makes a 

 total of Rx 25,991,797 and an annual average of 

 about Rx 1,530,000. Down to 1890 the average 

 was but Rx 1,176,279, and it was only brought 

 up to the normal figure by the expenditure on 

 relief during the severe famine of 1897 and 1898. 

 The Government diverted the fund, although a 

 great part of it is raised by a supplementary tax 

 on salt, to the great military defensive works car- ' 

 ried out on the northwestern frontier as the result 

 of the Russian war scare. Until the great famine 

 came in 1898 the authorities fell into the belief 

 that a crore and a half of rupees was too much to 

 reserve every year for famine insurance. 



In 1897 the rainfall was generally sufficient to 

 produce fair crops, and in 1898 the rains were 

 profuse and harvests of 1899 were consequently 

 abundant. In 1899 the monsoon failed again, this 

 time more completely than in any previous re- 

 srded year. The deficiency was 11 inches, 27 per 

 ent. of the average rainfall. The drought came 

 irlier in the year than was ever before known. 

 It fell upon provinces not yet fully recovered from 

 "ic famine of 1896-'97 and upon others where 

 imine was till then unknown. It brought un- 

 precedented mortality among cattle in central and 

 western India, impoverishing classes superior to 

 lose ordinarily coming to relief works, and ren- 

 lering the task of recuperation much more ardu- 

 is because years must elapse before the live stock 

 in be renewed. The autumn and spring harvests 

 3th failed utterly. In February, 1900, there were 

 1,000,000 persons in the relief camps, twice the 

 number relieved at that part of the season of 

 1897. The scale of wages at first adopted was 

 aon reduced. The Government would promise 

 mly to stave off absolute starvation, not to pre- 

 sent suffering. The affected areas had an extent 

 af 417,000 square miles, nearly a quarter of the 

 "idian Empire, and the population affected 

 eached 54,000,000 in May, 1900. The number 

 eceiving Government relief in that month was 

 5,607,000, compared with 3,811,000 in the corre- 

 ending part of 1897. The southwest monsoon, 

 breaks in June on the Malabar coast and 

 loods the central parts of India with 100 inches 

 if rain in good years before the end of September, 

 from a half to a total failure in 1899, but it 

 ras still hoped that the autumnal crops of south- 

 ern India might be saved by a good northeast 

 lonsoon and in central and upper India by 

 abundant winter rains. The northeast monsoons, 

 lowever, which break on the eastern coast in No- 

 vember and December, failed to a great extent like- 

 wise, injuring or destroying the autumn crops 

 ind cutting off the spring harvest in a vastly 

 larger extent of country than that previously 

 affected, and intensifying the distress there also. 



The autumn harvest was the worst for many 

 years, and the spring harvest was little more than 

 half a crop for India as a whole. Peasants sold 

 their bullocks worth 60 rupees for a single rupee 

 and great numbers died on their hands for want 

 of fodder, so that it will take twenty years to re- 

 stock the country with farm animals. In many 

 places no drinking water could be had. 



The benevolence of the public of Great Britain 

 and India enabled the Relief Committee in 1897 to 

 supplement the Government expenditure of Rx 

 7,272,123 by Rx 1,549,901 of private contributions. 

 This charitable fund was spent: (1) in supplying 

 clothing and blankets to the destitute, special 

 food and medical comforts for the aged and infirm 

 and for hospital patients and children, and in add- 

 ing to the Government dole in the case of respecta- 

 ble persons and secluded women who were di iven to 

 accept gratuitous relief; (2) in supporting orphans 

 during and after the famine; (3) in selling grain 

 at a cheap price to such as would not apply for 

 relief and relieving respectable people, especially 

 women, who shrank from the public inquiry in- 

 separable from state relief, also craftsmen and arti- 

 sans who could not go to the works; (4) in giving 

 relief in districts not officially recognized as af- 

 fected; and (5) in furnishing seed and imple- 

 ments and giving a fresh start in life to such per- 

 sons as would otherwise lapse into pauperism. 

 The number of persons in the first category who 

 were relieved by the charitable fund in 1897 was 

 1,342,802; in the second, 26,957; in the third, 832,- 

 949; in the fifth, 1,540,464. Although the need 

 was much greater, the charitable fund raised in 

 Great Britain up to the middle of May, 1900, was 

 only 370,000, little more than half as much as 

 was contributed in 1897. When drought occurs in 

 India, where 80 per cent, of the people are en- 

 gaged in agriculture, afflicted localities not only 

 suffer from the curtailment of their food supplies, 

 but all means of earning wages cease. It is possible 

 during the worst famine years to supply food, 

 of which there is always a sufficiency in India, 

 and with the improvements made in railroad com- 

 munications it can be carried into the famine 

 districts. It can not, however, be distributed to 

 the villages when the cattle die, for they are the 

 sole means of transport in rural India. Hence it 

 is necessary to take the people from their villages 

 and gather them into immense famine relief camps, 

 where their wants can be supplied under the su- 

 pervision of the officials, who are far too few for 

 the work. The labor of the people crowded in these 

 places is utilized, rather for the purpose of keep- 

 ing them from idleness and pauperism than with 

 an intelligent purpose, though it is chiefly em- 

 ployed on protective works for the prevention of 

 future famines. The European officials carry out 

 the directions of the famine code to ignore caste 

 and social distinctions, but when native officials 

 have charge of the camps their prejudices and 

 weaknesses interfere with the efficient discharge of 

 their duties. 



The famine of 1900 embraced most of central 

 and southern India. The northern tier of prov- 

 inces, including Burmah, Assam, Bengal, the North- 

 west Provinces and Oudh, the Punjab, and Sind, 

 were generally free from famine, although the crop 

 deficiencies in many districts of this territory make 

 an enormous total. The wheat crop of Bengal 

 was equal to the average of 16,376,000 bushels, 

 but in the Northwest Provinces and Oudh, where 

 the average for nine years has been 52,344,000 

 bushels, it fell 25 per cent, below this figure, 

 although a third of the land is irrigated, and in 

 the Punjab, where 55 per cent, of the land is irri- 

 gated and an average crop of 70,341,000 bushels 



