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that the Indian people should have some voice and some share in that administration which concerns them more than any other class of people. In the absence of this popular element in the Indian administration, all the influences at work make for increased taxation and increased expenditure, and for the sacrifice of Indian revenues on objects which are not purely Indian; no influences are at work which make directly for reduction in expenditure and taxes, and for relieving the burdens of our unrepresented population. The evidence of distinguished Englishmen, given before the Expenditure Commission, and quoted in a previous chapter, proves how Indian money is often spent. The facts which we shall lay before our readers in the next chapter will show how such expenditure affects the material condition of the Indian people.

CHAPTER XIV

INDIA IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

We propose in this concluding chapter to place before our readers some figures relating to India at the commencement of a new century. The figures have been compiled from the last published number of the Statistical Abstract, issued in the present year, 1903.

The Area and Population of India, according to the Census of 1901, are shown in the following tables.

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Revenues and Expenditure.-The gross revenues of British India in 1901-2 amounted to £76,344,526. Deducting Railway and Irrigation Receipts, the nett revenues of British India were £53,580,985, or in round numbers 53 millions sterling. The population of British

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India being under 232 milions, the taxation per head of population is very nearly 4s. 8d. per head.

The income of the people of India, per head, was estimated by Lord Cromer and Sir David Barbour in 1882 to be 27 rupees. Their present income is estimated by Lord Curzon at 30 rupees. Exception has been taken to both these estimates as being too high; but we shall accept them for our present calculation. 30 rupees are equivalent to 40 shillings; and the economic condition of the country can be judged from the fact that the average income of the people of all classes, including the richest, is 40 shillings a year against £42 a year in the United Kingdom. A tax of 4s. 8d. on 40 shillings is a tax of 2s. 4d. on the pound. This is a crushing burden on a nation which earns very little more than its food. In the United Kingdom, with its heavy taxation of £144,000,000 (excluding the cost of the late war), the incidence of the tax per head of a population of 42 millions is less than £3 10S. The proportion of this tax on the earnings of each individual inhabitant (£42) is only is. 8d. in the pound. The Indian taxpayer, who

earns little more than his food, is taxed 40 per cent. more than the taxpayer of Great Britain and Ireland.

The total expenditure for 1901-2 charged against Revenue was £71,394,282. Deducting Railway and Irrigation expenses, the nett expenditure was £49,650,229. Out of this total the Civil Departments and charges, in India and in England, cost £15,286,181; and the Army services cost £15,763,931.

Home Charges.-Returning once more to the Gross Expenditure of £71,394,282, we find that, out of this total, a sum of £17,368,655 was spent in England as Home Charges not including the pay of European officers in India, saved and remitted to England. The Home Charges may be conveniently divided into the following heads:

1. Interest on Debt and Management of Debt

2. Cost of Mail Service, Telegraph Lines, &c., charged to India
3. Railways, State and Guaranteed (Interest and Annuities).
4. Public Works (Absentee Allowances, &c.)

.

5. Marine Charges (including H. M. Ships in Indian Seas)
6. Military Charges (including Pensions)

7. Civil Charges (including Secretary of State's Establish-
ment, Cooper's Hill College, Pensions, &c.).
8. Stores (including those for Defence Works)

Total

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51,214 173,502

2,945,614

2,435,370

2,057,934

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The largest items are Interest on Debt, Railways, and Civil and Military Charges. How the Indian debt was first created by the East India Company by an unjust demand of Tribute, and how it was increased by charging to India the cost of the Afghan and Chinese Wars, the Mutiny Wars, and the Abyssinian and Soudan Wars, has been shown in previous chapters. To what extent this debt is justly and morally due from India, and how far it is entitled to an Imperial Guarantee which would reduce the Interest, are questions which we do not wish to discuss again in this chapter.

Of Railways, too, we have said enough in previous chapters. For half a century the Indian railways did

not pay, but were nevertheless continuously extended. The working expenses, the interest on capital spent, and the profits guaranteed to private companies, exceeded the earnings by over 50 millions sterling-a clear loss to the Indian taxpayer. In recent years the lines have paid; but how long this state of things will continue we do not know. And it is an additional loss to India that the interest on capital and the annuities are withdrawn from the earnings of the lines in India, and paid in England to the extent of 6 millions a year. The money does not flow back to India, is not spent among the people of India, and cannot in any way fructify the trades and industries of India.

Lastly, the Civil and Military charges include payments to the Imperial Exchequer, salaries of the Secretary of State's establishment, and also pensions of retired civil and military officers. The people of India can justly call upon their British fellow-subjects to bear a portion of the cost of an empire beneficial alike to England and to India. It is a mean policy to make India alone pay for a concern from which India alone is not the gainer, and a readjustment of the Civil and Military Charges, on the lines indicated by Sir George Wingate more than forty years ago, is urgently needed.

Wages and Prices.-The average monthly wages of able-bodied agricultural labourers in different parts of India during the last half of 1902 are shown below from official figures. (See table on next page.)

Leaving out exceptionally rich districts like Backergunj, Delhi, and Ahmedabad, and exceptionally poor districts like Fyzabad, the wages of the able-bodied agricultural labourer range from 4s. 8d. to 6s. 8d. a month. Except in very rich districts, therefore, the agricultural labourer does not get even 3d. a day; his average earnings scarcely come to 2d. per day. Some deduction. should be made from this, as he does not get employment all through the year; and 2d. a day therefore is

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