164 THE HUMAN FACTOK 



Indian agricultural labourers. The case referred to 

 is the case of the indentured Indian labourers work- 

 ing in Trinidad, Jamaica, British Guiana and Fiji. 



The condition of the Indians in these colonies was 

 inquired into in 1913 by special commissioners who 

 submitted a detailed * report on the subject. As 

 regards the material change in the welfare of the 

 Indian emigrants the following statement from the 

 report may be quoted as follows : " The great 

 majority of emigrants exchanged grinding poverty 

 with practically no hope of betterment for a condi- 

 tion varying from simple but secure comfort to solid 

 prosperity. Emigrants live under very much better 

 conditions than their relations in India, and have had 

 opportunities for prospering which exceeded their 

 wildest dreams." The evidence of the material 

 prosperity of these Indians is clear from the figures 

 quoted for Trinidad, where in ten years Indians had 

 bought land worth £72,000, where the annual deposits 

 of Indians in the Government savings bank were 

 £80,000, and the annual remittances of Indians to 

 India £3000. It is further recorded that after the 

 period of indentured labour is finished the majority 

 of these emigrants acquire from 10 to 20 acres of rice 

 land and live in considerable comfort, while some 

 become rich and acquire incomes of £500, £1000 and 

 even £2000 a year. This constitutes a somewhat 



* " Report on the Condition of Indian Immigrants," etc., by 

 J. McNeill and Chimman Lai (Government Central Press, Simla, 

 1914). 



