Arthur Thomas Cotton

“ When the Government are obliged to feed one Million and a half of our fellow subjects—when these have been perishing in spite of us, at the rate of 930 per thousand in the Relief Camps—when nearly half the Population of Villages have died of Famine Cholera—when men were not put on the Relief Works till they were too far reduced by starvation to do any real work—when their bullocks were all dead, so that their very means for raising the next crop were all gone—we are fain to ask what has Irrigation done for the Madras Presidency? ”

“ The consequence is almost the whole of the money expended on the works is lost. Whereas a Famine is in fact the opportunity of executing in a single season, important works to raise India out of its present poverty for ever. Hitherto without exception, not a finger has been moved till the people were actually dying, and then it was too late to organize works effectually. What might not the millions that the last 2 Famines have cost have done to make Famines impossible. ”

“ When the Country is called upon to contribute funds from private sources, what can be more legitimate than that they should have a voice in the application of it, and that it should not be left still in the hands of those who, whatever other things are questionable, have certainly failed to preserve India from all the horrors of Famine. ”

“ Only omit the fact that in the midst of this desert there are several districts in the very highest state of prosperity, revelling in abundance of food, and in wealth, by far the most prosperous districts in all India, paying enormous revenue, £600,000 a year each, three times what the other districts throughout India are paying, only omit these things and the public are completely deceived. ”

“ If it is said, But our present question is what must be done to save the people’s lives now, I answer, We are spending Millions! How are we to spend them? We are employing a Million of people! How should we employ them? If in consideration of this question we are to exclude the word Water, if this is a sine qua non in the matter, we must lose all the money and leave the Country in the same state of exposure to the horrors of another Famine. The main point of all is this, that we have the most indisputable proof that the Country must not leave the Famine in the hands of the India Office. ”

“ So the question in England about the deaths from Railways, is not how many are killed, but how many are saved from death by this mode of moving in comparison with the use of horses. Nothing can be more certain than that for one death caused by fever from Irrigation, a hundred are prevented by all the sanitary effects of regulated water. And what shall we say to the deaths caused by Famine? Do they not exceed all those that have ever been imagined to proceed from Irrigation ? ”

“ There is not the slightest necessity for our investing our capital on American or Spanish or Turkish Works of War or Peace; there is the safest possible field for Investment in our own Empire, not to speak of the absolute necessity for it, if it were only to preserve the lives of our People. Think for instance of a single line of communication of 130 miles, on the carriage on which there is, at this present moment, an expenditure of at least a Million and a quarter per annum, of which upwards of a Million could be saved by an effective work of transit. ”

“ Why is food at its normal cost over the greater part of India, while it is at three or four times that price in Madras? The sole reason is the want of cheap carriage. There is no approach to an equalization of the price of food. It could be conveyed 2000 miles by water for 5-ru. a ton, which is only one-twentieth of a penny a pound, quite a nominal difference, so that nothing is wanted to place every distressed district as it were along side of a prosperous one, in respect of supply, but a complete system of Steamboat Canals, which could be constructed throughout India without any difficulty. ”

“ Compare such an employment of capital with a Railway costing £20,000 a mile, and requiring a large subsidy from Government. I only give these as specimens of the works that might and ought to be undertaken without a moments loss of time. There is in fact an unbounded field for the employment of people and capital throughout the districts now suffering, and this great calamity can certainly be turned into as great a blessing. ”

“ Whether wheat is carried at 40 miles an hour, or at two, is a matter of no importance whatever, but whether it is carried at a cost of a penny a mile, or 20 miles for a penny, makes the whole difference, whether in ordinary years there is any possibility of its reaching the markets of England at all or not. And the second answer is, that there is nothing in the world to prevent any speed on water. There is a boat on the Lake of Geneva at this moment running at a higher speed than most of the mails are carried at on the Railways in India, 24 miles an hour. ”

“ But where the people are as stupid as some people in England, who would not have Factory laws, there is nothing for it but to make them have them. We see what the Famine has done in making the people take the Water under the Toombudra, compelling the people to benefit themselves. Why should we wait for a Famine to do this? It is estimated that the lands in Orissa have actually increased in value three or four fold since the Irrigation Works, without the Water being used: the Zemindars thus receiving the whole of the benefit of the Works while the Government have had the whole of the expense. ”

“ And further, if we are such clumsy administrators, that we can’t get over so absurd a difficulty, why should we be as obstinate and stupid as the poor ignorant ryots of that one tract? Why don’t we rather give them the water for nothing, than allow it to run still to waste? ”

“ There is no longer any question there about food to eat, water to drink or wash, provinder for their cattle, building materials, or other things brought to their doors by the Canals at a nominal price for carriage, or any thing else requisite to their material well being, and Miss Nightingale is set free so far as that district is concerned to turn her attention to other tracts, and to discover ways by which the population may be kept in life and health, without the regulation of the water, a problem which will try even her amazing powers to the utmost. ”

“ Wherever, in India, agriculture is entirely dependent on the sky for its supply of Water, any very sensible failure of the periodical rain is inevitably followed by a corresponding failure of the crops, and the Government, besides having to make large remissions of Land Revenue, has to incur a large and often immense expenditure in order to prevent the defaulting Cultivators from dying of starvation. In such cases, if Irrigation has been provided, the value of such Works becomes strikingly evident. ”

“ I don’t however deny that there have been localities and times, when Irrigation has produced fever, but I believe this is generally out of the tropics. And it is quite certain that it is the exception, and against this we must set the enormous increase of health, arising from the people being well fed, clothed and housed. The most dreadful fever we have ever had in India, is that which has desolated the country round Calcutta, solely from want of water. ”

“ The fact is that it is nothing in the world but unaccountable mismanagement that prevents the water being used. There was one other case of this, but the Famine has swept away all obstacles there, and now the Water is in high demand, and no wonder, when they are actually selling the produce for 140-ru. an acre, where the water-rate is 6-ru. an acre, so that in a Famine year one crop will pay 24 years’ water-rate. ”

“ If people could only see the life put into Godavery by the Canals, though without steam, the multitudes of both goods and passenger boats, that swarm on them, they might form some idea of what would be the state of things, if the same district were put in communication with all India by the same means. ”

“ The answer to this is that all the great Irrigation works already executed by our Government, Irrigating about six millions of acres, or rather capable of Irrigating that quantity, for they are not all in operation, have cost about £2 an acre on an average, and the value of an average acre in increase of produce is about £3, and that cost includes Navigation. There remains, therefore, no question about expense. The cost of Irrigation and Navigation bears no proportion to the value of produce and carriage. ”

“ If such a Committee were appointed, who were free from all other duties, so that they could give undivided attention to that particular work, and have before them all the different kinds of Works, so that they could compare the results of each, there would be some possibility of a fair examination of the subject, and not as now, the most desperate efforts to bolster up a false system rather than confess that they had made a mistake, which men are in danger of doing when they are committed to one particular line. ”

“ No quantity of rain will prevent a Famine, if it is not tolerably distributed. The fact is, water from Irrigation is required in almost every part of India even to prevent Famine. But further, there is never a season when at some time or other, additional water would not improve the crop. ”

“ No answer was conceded to this letter, and this vital question has been left to drift into the present awful state of things, and the only certainty in the whole matter now is that millions will perish. Wherever Water is led over the land, there is life, abundance, prosperity, contentment with our rule, ample revenue; wherever the country has been left in its natural state there is want of revenue, heavy expenditure, disgrace to our rule, poverty, misery, and death. If it is still said what are you to do if the people will not take the water ”

“ As the inevitable loss of the cattle from want of grass or straw is the worst feature of the Famine, that which we save below the Canal will be a very great boon to the country. It is probable that the ryots under the Canal will save most of their cattle, and thus be able to resume work on the first appearance of rain; elsewhere in the district it is probable that much land will lie idle, as nearly all the cattle will be dead.” Again; “there is little doubt that the Canal water affects the health of the people considerably. ”

“ Can it be supposed for a moment that those who have thus failed will be free to bring into clear light their own failure. It is quite impossible but that they will be under a most powerful bias to say nothing that shall incriminate themselves, and we must confidently expect that if we leave the matter still to them, the word Water, upon which all hangs, will still be excluded. ”

“ In the case of the Inflexible and the Navy this has been seen and acknowledged, and a Commission, independent of the Officials and free from the bias that their peculiar position brings them under as essential to the effectual investigation of the subject, has been granted, and the case of the Indian Famine is exactly the same. The India Office are so committed against Irrigation and cheap transit that it is perfectly hopeless to attempt a solution of the question by leaving the matter in their hands. ”

“ Troops might be conveyed by Canals any distance, with their usual sleep and food, and landed perfectly fresh at any spot at any moment, without any confusion from other traffic, and the Canals could be patrolled by armed steamers day and night. The Canals that have been made already have cost £1000 to £6000 a mile, and are from 25 to 60 yards wide. What country in the world could compete with India with her immense, and industrious population, if she had such a complete system of effective internal transit. ”

“ The actual saving to government by the provision in the least accessible parts of the district, of such a food supply, which would otherwise have had to be bought, is about £500,000. The government are now feeding at imperial expense, a third of the population of the Kurnool district. This could scarcely have happened, had the ryots not sacrificed the whole of the first crop, which the Canal might have matured by irrigating their fields and filling their tanks. ”

“ Leslie, who constructed the extension of the Eastern Bengal Railway, as soon as he had finished it, wrote a letter to the Calcutta merchants on the construction of a Canal by the side of it, in which he says, “with respect to revenue, when a Canal of sufficient capacity is once available, there can be no doubt that it would command the entire goods traffic provided the tolls are not too high. The present Eastern traffic is 1,900,000 Tons per annum, and it is rapidly increasing; a toll of 11⁄4-ru. a ton on this traffic alone would yield a return of £237,000, sufficient to pay 11 per cent. ”

“ That we have abundant proof now before us, in spite of the clumsy way in which these matters have hitherto been conducted, that India offers an unbounded field for the capital, energy, and philanthropy of England in the way of material improvement. ”