Miscellaneous, 



4806 



[November, 1908. 



officers. But, obviously, a year at 

 Samalkota would not fit him for charge 

 of a Malabar farm and so forth. The 

 period spent at any one farm should be 

 at least one year so that the student 

 might follow the practices according to 

 the seasons throughout. What seems 

 to be necessary for the scheme is. 



"(i) that the men the Central Agri- 

 cultural Association sends should be 

 already well-grounded in Agriculture, 

 theory and practice, and 



" (ii) that they should be traiued for 

 at least one year on a Government farm 

 with climate and crops similar to that 

 of the district where they will be ex- 

 pected to take charge later on. 



"2. The Central Agricultural Associa- 

 tion has not, I believe, come to any 

 decision as to where the men are to take 

 up their work after training and it 

 seems to me that this is the first point to 

 be settled. To bring a Malayalee from 

 Malabar and train him at Samalkota in 

 Telugu country seems, to say the least, 

 a bit unusual, although this is being 

 actually done. 



"3. But there is yet another side to 

 the question. It is quite impossible to 

 carry on the ordinary farm work pro- 

 perly, if the place is infested with un- 

 licensed and irresponsible on-lookers. 

 The men sent for training must not only 

 be completely under the control of the 

 local manager but should so to speak be 

 seconded to Government and paid by 

 and punished, if necessary, by Govern- 

 ment officials and should not be allowed 

 to leave until they produce a certificate 

 that they have obtained a thorough 

 grasp of the work. 



"4. I submit these opinions to the 

 Board for forwardal to the Central Agri- 

 cultur al Association. It is our sincere 

 desire to help them, for, by doing so, we 

 shall undoubtely help ourselves, but to 

 turn out a set of officers with a smatter 

 ing of inferior knowledge and, indeed, 

 trained to be content with such a 

 smattering, will do no one any good, 

 will in fact retard Agricuitural progress 

 and bring the Department into disgrace. 



(Signed) C. A. Barber, 

 Government Botanist" 



Proceedings of the Director of Agricul- 

 ture, No. 5467, Miscellaneous, dated 



8th September 1906. 

 " With reference to the letter from the 

 Government Botanist read above, the 

 Board observes that the whole question 

 ci the entertainment and training of 



apprentices at Agricultural stations was 

 carefully considered at the third and 

 fourth meetings of the Central Agri- 

 cultural Committee, and the resolution 

 arrived at was to try and get fairly 

 suitable men to be trained, to some 

 small extent at least, at their expense, 

 in order that District Agricultural 

 Associations might have the chance of 

 employing these men, if they chose, 

 after their training, such as it might be, 

 wa e over. The Government Botanist is 

 evidently not aware that these appren- 

 tices are intended to help Agricultural 

 Associations to get somebody— rather 

 than nobody — to work with and among 

 the ryots until a supply of duly qualified 

 Agricultural Inspectors becomes avail- 

 able at the new Agricultural College 

 to be started at Coimbatore, and that 

 there is no question of attaining any- 

 thing like perfection in the matter of 

 training such apprentices. The Board 

 will now proceed to deal with the 

 several enquiries and suggestions made 

 in the Government Botanist's letter 

 seriatim :— 



"It may be advisable to have some information 

 as to what they (the Central Agricultural Asso- 

 ciation) intend to do with these men after the 

 course of probation." 



" (i) When District Agricultural Asso- 

 ciations and their branches sprang up, 

 there was a strong demand for qualified 

 Agricultural Inspectors. The Agricul- 

 tural Department was itself short-handed 

 and could only give occasional aid by 

 deputing one or other of its Agricultural 

 Inspectors to advise Associations and 

 the late Deputy Director of Agriculture 

 also rendered some help in this direc- 

 tion. Agricultural Associations, however, 

 wanted to secure the services of full- 

 time agriculturists to assist them in 

 their agricultural work and as there 

 was no chance of getting regularly 

 trained men from the Agricultural 

 College for some time the Central Agri- 

 cultural Committee decided on adopting 

 the next best course, which was to get 

 the best men they could and let them 

 have as much training as they could 

 obtain at the Government Agricultural 

 stations in six months, with a view to 

 their employment at the end of that 

 period by such Agricultural Associations 

 as might care to have them. It was per- 

 fectly understood that these men, after 

 undergoing so limited a course of train- 

 ing, would not, of course, be in any 

 sense experts or qualified Agricultural 

 Inspectors or Instructors ; but having 

 selected the best men who offered 

 themselves (some of them being men 

 who have had agricultural training 

 either at the Saidapet College or else- 



