THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT IN INDIA 85 



This is of very great importance when we remember that 

 most of the coal used in Bombay is mined in Bengal and 

 all during the war had to take an eleven hundred mile 

 railway haul from the pit to Bombay at a charge of five 

 dollars a ton freight. 



The British have been accused of taxing India so 

 heavily as to be the cause of India's poverty. Investiga- 

 tion shows that India is one of the least taxed countries 

 on earth whether measured on percentages or by actual 

 figures. The statement was recently made in the United 

 States that the British took one-half of the produce of 

 the soil in taxation. This is not the case. Such a 

 statement arises out of a misunderstanding, a confusion 

 between land revenue and produce of the soil. The dif- 

 ferent provinces of India have different systems of land 

 tenure. A good many of these systems, like Topsy, have 

 just grown. Bengal for instance has what is known 

 as the ''Permanent Settlement'' where the landlords 

 of Bengal and the government came to an agreement by 

 which the amount of land revenue to be paid by the 

 land-owner to the government was fixed for all time. 

 The great omission in this agreement was that the amount 

 of rent to be paid by the tenant to the land-owner was 

 not fixed for all time. Whatever else the British have 

 done or have not done for India, they certainly have 

 brought peace. They have prevented the intertribal, 

 internecine warfare. They have guaranteed to every man 

 safety and protection. With the incoming of roads, 

 railroads, water transportation, irrigation facilities, with 

 the opening of Calcutta, so that to-day it is the largest 

 port in Asia, great demand for the products of Bengal, 

 its jute, rice, tea, indigo and pulses, have caused the 



