642 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HTSTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XVII \ 



annually invaded by some scores of netsmen from the Kangra valley until the 

 taking over of the waters in question by a private concern compelled these 

 men to return to their homes. These are but a few instances of what has 

 been going on for years in many parts of India, especially Northern India. 

 From almost everywhere the same reports come regarding the marked decrease 

 in the stock of fish and the very much increased activity of the professional 

 fish slaughterer. 



II. — Protective Agencies. 

 Many years ago the Government of India deliberately recorded its opinion 

 " that the importance of maintaining to the fullest extent one of th-~ most 

 considerable food supplies of the country was so great as to justify legislation." 

 After long years that pronouncement has been followed up by the promised 

 legislation. Is it sufficient ? and has " one of the most considerable food 

 supplies of the country" been " maintained to the fullest exient ?" These are 

 questions which deserve to be fully and carefully considered, and to which 

 unfortunately, only one answer is possible, and that most decidedly in the 

 negative. The legislation has mainly been ineffective because it has never 

 really been given a fair chance. When salmon laws came first into operation 

 in this country they were found to be ineffective because there was no machi- 

 nery to work tbem and put them into force. And it was not until the Govern- 

 ment of the day had at last recognised that legislation alone, without machi- 

 nery to put into force, was perfectly useless, that tt>e salmon laws afforded 

 any protection whatever to the fish. It ought to be obvious enough that any 

 legislation so handicapped must altogether fail in its object. Of what use, for 

 instance, would elaborate laws regulating factories, steam generators, and 

 explosives be if there existed no machinery whatever to enforce them. Or, to 

 adopt an Indian parallel, what sort of an inc< me would the Government 

 . monopoly of salt and opium bring in if there were no preventive service? 

 The matter is surely plain enough. The good, though belated, intentions 

 of the Government of India, as indicated in the Fisheries Act of 1897, 

 have almost entirely failed to be rea'ised simply because it has been 

 nobody's business to set that Act in motion. The already overworked district 

 officers have no time to study fishery questions. Local administrations have 

 been apathetic because to a large extent ignorant of the evils which have been 

 going on, and because, too, they have had at hand no one competent to give 

 them expert advice on the subject. In a word, what is necessary is the 

 appointment of a fisheries inspector, whose business it will be to carefully 

 examine into the causes of the very marked depletion in the fresh water fish 

 supply, and advise Government as to the remedial methods to be adopted. 



Now, this proposition, simple and obvious though it appears, is one which has 

 not as yet been received with much enthusiasm in official quarters. It is true 

 that inspectors of fisheries have been found to be necessary by practically every 

 civilised country in the world. But in India, no doubt rightly enorgh, there is 

 always somewhat of a disinclination to create any new agency which may 



