17-2 COTTON 



originally came from Dharwar, but experts agree that 

 the staple and colour have improved since it has been 

 taken into the Punjab. The great drawback is that the 

 ginners who purchase the cotton from the cultivators 

 try to mix the local cotton with this Lyallpur-American 

 cotton in the hope of cheating the buyer. The effect is 

 that this cotton mixture is not sold at the price it would 

 command if it were kept pure and that when the seed is 

 used in the second year for sowing purposes the mixture 

 has already taken place. It is of the utmost importance 

 that the Department of Agriculture of the Punjab should 

 undertake a wide distribution of American seed and 

 confine it to certain villages. The more that cotton of 

 one variety is grown in a district the more difficult 

 becomes the task of mixing it with others. In this con- 

 nection I might say that one of the characteristics of the 

 Indian is a bent for gambling. No one else in the world 

 is so given to speculating and gambling as the Indian, 

 and although he may have been found out nine times in 

 some underhand practice, he will persevere and try the 

 tenth time in the hope that he will not be detected. 



The licensing of ginning factories would undoubtedly 

 be a remedy for this mixing. 



The Punjab Government has undertaken extensive 

 irrigation works, and besides those canals already supply- 

 ing water to the northern part of the Punjab there will 

 be inaugurated at the end of this year the Lower Bari 

 Doab Canal, which will supply water to a large tract of 

 country where the prospects of growing good cotton, 

 Lyallpur-American, are excellent. The land is level and, 

 therefore, most suitable for irrigation, and the clearing 

 will cost comparatively little. 



The International Cotton Federation fias received the 

 offer from the Punjab Government of a free lease of 

 7,500 acres of cotton land in the Lower Bari Doab Canal 

 Colony for the purpose of establishing a model cotton 

 plantation and a buying agency. The special features of 

 this undertaking are : Intensive cultivation will be intro- 

 duced; American cotton, similar to that grown in Sind 

 and the Punjab, will be grown; pure strains of seed will 

 be distributed; and cotton will be bought from the sur- 



