Modern India by William Eleroy Curtis

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The value of the crop produced in 1902 upon 1,830,525 acres of
irrigated land in this colony was $16,845,000, irrigated by canals
that cost $8,628,380, and the government enjoyed a net profit of
14.01 per cent that year upon its benevolent enterprise. Aside
from the money value of the scheme, there is another very important
consideration. More than half of the canals and ditches were
constructed by "famine labor"--that is, by men and women (for
women do manual labor in india the same as men) who were unable
to obtain other employment and would have died of starvation
but for the intervention of the government. Instead of being
supplied with food at relief stations, these starving people
were shipped to the Rechan Doab besert and put to work at minimum
wages.

You will agree with me that the government has a right to feel
proud of its new colony, and its success has stimulated interest
in similar enterprises in other parts of the empire. It has not
only furnished employment to thousands of starving people, but
by bringing under cultivation a large tract of barren land with a
positive certainty of regular harvests it has practically insured
that section of the country against future famines.

The following figures will show the rapid development of the colony
from the first season of 1892-93 to the end of the season 1901,
which is the latest date for which statistics can be obtained:

CAPITAL OUTLAY TO END OF YEAR

1892-93 L721,233 1897-98 L1,512,916
1893-94 878,034 1898-99 1,616,676
1894-95 995,932 1899-1900 1,677,982
1895-96 1,174,781 1900-01 1,725,676
1896-97 1,362,075

ACRES IRRIGATED DURING THE YEAR

1892-93 157,197 1897-98 810,000
1893-94 270,405 1898-99 957,705
1894-95 269,357 1899-1900 1,353,223
1895-96 369,935 1900-01 1,830,525
1896-97 520,279

NET REVENUE DURING THE YEAR

1892-93 L4,084 1897-98 L111,041
1893-94 3,552 1898-99 131,566
1894-95 9,511 1899-1900 155,302
1895-96 51,632 1900-01 421,812
1896-97 92,629

RETURN ON CAPITAL OUTLAY, PER CENT

1892-93 0.57 1897-98 7.34
1893-94 0.40 1898-99 8.14
1894-95 0.96 1899-1900 9.26
1895-96 4.40 1900-01 14.01
1896-97 6.75

The system of allotment of land may be interesting. As the area
under irrigation was entirely open and unoccupied, few difficulties
were met with, and the engineers were perfectly free in plotting
the land. The entire area was divided into squares of 1,000 feet
boundary on each side, and these squares were each divided into
twenty-five fields which measure about one acre and are the unit
of calculation in sales and in measuring water. Sixty squares,
or 1,500 fields, compose a village, and between the villages,
surrounding them on all four sides, are canals. Between the squares
are ditches, and between the fields are smaller ditches, so that the
water can be measured and the allowance made without difficulty.
The government sells no smaller piece than a field of twenty-five
acres, but purchasers can buy in partnership and afterwards subdivide
it.

Each village is under the charge of a superintendent, or resident
engineer, who is responsible to a superior engineer, who has
charge of a number of villages. Each field is numbered upon a
map, and a record is kept of the area cultivated, the character
of the crops sown, the dates or irrigation and the amount of water
allowed. Before harvest a new measurement is taken and a bill is
given to the cultivator showing the amount of his assessment,
which is collected when his crop is harvested. As there has never
been a crop failure, this is a simple process, and in addition
to the water rate a land tax of 42 cents an acre is collected
at the same time and paid into the treasury to the credit of
the revenue department, while the water rates are credited to
the canal department.

The chief engineer fixes the volume of water to be furnished to
each village and the period for which it is to remain flowing.
The local superintendent regulates the amount allowed each
cultivator, according to the crops he has planted. There are
six rates, regulated by the crops, for some need more water than
others, as follows:

Class. Crops. Rate per acre.
1--Sugarcane $2.50
2--Rice 2.10
3--Orchards, gardens, tobacco, indigo,
vegetables and melons 1.66
4--Cotton, oil seeds, Indian corn and all cold
weather crops, except grain and lentils 1.66
5--All crops other than specified above .83
6--Single water to plow, not followed by a crop .40

As I have shown you from the figures above, this enterprise has
proved highly profitable to the government, and its management
is entitled to the highest compliments.

The main canal was originally forty miles long, averaging 109
feet wide, with an average slope of one foot to the mile, and
capable of carrying seven feet four inches of water, or 10,000
cubic feet, per second. Twenty-eight miles have since been enlarged
to a width of 250 feet and the remaining twelve miles to a width
of 150 feet. The canal has been deepened to nine feet six inches,
and the intention is to deepen it one foot more. The banks of the
main canal are twenty-five feet wide at the top and are built
entirely of earth. A railway ninety-six miles long of three-foot
gauge has been constructed down the main canal, which is a great
convenience in shipping crops and pays a profit to the government.
It was constructed by the canal engineers while the ditch was
being dug. There are 390 miles of branch canals from thirty to
fifty feet wide and from six to eight feet deep, and 2,095 miles
of distributaries, or ditches running between villages and squares.
The banks of the branches and ditches are all wide enough for
highways, and thus enable the people to go from village to village
and get their crops to market. Several towns of considerable size
have already grown up; the largest, called Lyallpur, having about
10,000 inhabitants. It is the headquarters of the canal and also
of the civil authorities; and scattered through the irrigated
country are about 100 permanent houses used as residences and
offices by the superintendents and engineers.

XXI

THE FRONTIER QUESTION

The most sensitive nerve in the British Empire terminates in
Afghanistan, and the ghost of the czar is always dancing about
the Khyber Pass, through which caravans laden with merchandise
find their way across the mountains between India and the countries
of Central Asia. Every time there is a stir in a clump of bushes,
every time a board creaks in the floor, every time a footstep is
heard under the window, the goose flesh rises on John Bull's back,
and he imagines that the Great White Bear is smelling around the
back door of his empire in India. Peshawur is the jumping-off place
of the Northwest, the limit of British authority, the terminus of
the railway system of India and the great gateway between that
empire and Central Asia, through which everything must pass.
It is to the interior of Asia what the Straits of Gibraltar are
to the Mediterranean Sea, and the Dardanelles to the Black and
Caspian seas. While there are 300 paths over the mountains in
other directions, and it might be possible to cross them with
an army, it has never been attempted and would involve dangers,
expense and delays which no nation would undertake. The Khyber
Pass has been the great and only route for ages whether for war or
commerce. The masters of Central Asia, whether Persians, Greeks,
Macedonians or Assyrians, have held it. Alexander the Great crossed
it with his army. Timour the Tartar, whom we know better as
Tamerlane, came through upon his all-conquering expedition when
he subdued India to found the Mogul Empire, and if the Russians
ever enter India by land they will come this way.

The pass is reached by crossing a stony plain ten miles from
Peshawur, and winds through gorges and crevices in the mountains
for thirty-three miles at an altitude averaging 7,000 feet above
the sea. At one point the mountains close in to about 500 feet
apart and the rocks rise in sheer precipices on either side; in
other places the gorge widens to a mile or more and will average
perhaps three-quarters of a mile the entire distance. It is a
remarkable gateway, a natural barrier between hereditary enemies
and easily defended from either side. Kabul, the capital of
Afghanistan, is 180 miles from the western entrance to the defile.

The British fortifications are at Jamrud, nine miles from Peshawur,
and the terminus of the railways, where a strong garrison is
always kept. The pass itself is controlled by a powerful
semi-independent native tribe called the Afridis, estimated at
20,000 strong, who receive subsidies from the British government
and from the Ameer of Afghanistan to keep them good-natured on
the pretext that they are to do police work and keep order in the
pass. It is blackmail and bribery, but accomplishes its purpose,
and the pass itself, with a strip of highlands and foothills
on the Afghanistan side, is thus occupied by a neutral party,
which prevents friction between the nations on either side of
the border. The Afridis are fearless fighters, half-civilized,
half-savage, and almost entirely supported by the subsidies they
receive. Nearly all of the able-bodied men are under arms. A
few, who are too old or too young to fight, remain at home and
look after the cattle and the scraggy gardens upon the gravelly
hillsides. The women are as hardy and as enduring as the men
and are taught to handle the rifle. The British authorities are
confident of the loyalty of the Afridis and believe that the
present arrangement would be absolutely safe in time of war as
it is in time of peace--that they would permit no armed body,
whether Russians or Afghans, to cross the pass without the consent
of both sides, as is provided by treaty stipulations.

The arrangement is as effective as it is novel and the Afridis
carry out every detail conscientiously. The pass is open only two
days in the week, on Tuesdays and Fridays. No one is permitted
to cross or even enter it from either side except on those days.
And even then travelers, tourists and others actuated by curiosity
are not allowed to go through without permits. The caravans going
both ways are required to camp under well-formed regulations
at either entrance until daylight of Tuesday or Friday, when
they are escorted through by armed bodies of Afridis horsemen.
There is not the slightest danger of any sort to anyone, but it
is just as well to go through the ceremony, for it keeps the
Afridis out of mischief and reminds them continually of their
great responsibilities. These caravans are interesting. They
are composed of long strings of loaded camels, ox-carts, mules
and donkeys, vehicles of all descriptions and thousands of people
traveling on foot, who come sometimes from as far west as the
Ural Mountains and the banks of the Volga River. They come from
Persia, from all parts of Siberia and from the semi-barbarous
tribes who inhabit that mysterious region in central Asia, known
as the "Roof of the World."

The camel drivers and the traders are fierce-looking men and
extremely dirty. They have traveled a long way and over roads
that are very dusty, and water is scarce the entire distance.
They look as if they had never washed their faces or cut their
hair, and their shaggy, greasy, black locks hang down upon their
shoulders beneath enormous turbans. Each wears the costume of
his own country, but they are so ragged, grimy and filthy that
the romance of it is lost. The Afghans are in the majority. They
are stalwart, big-bearded men, with large features, long noses
and cunning eyes, and claim that their ancestors were one of the
lost tribes of Israel. Their traditions, customs, physiognomy and
dialects support this theory. Although they are Mohammedans, they
practice several ancient Jewish rites. The American missionaries
who have schools and churches among them are continually running
up against customs and traditions which remind them forcibly of
the Mosaic teachings. They have considerable literature, poetry,
history, biography, philosophy and ecclesiastical works, and some
of their priests have large libraries of native books, which, the
missionaries say, are full of suggestions of the Old Testament.

One of the most successful missionaries in that part of the world
was an apostate Polish Jew named Rev. Isidore Lowenthal, a remarkable
linguist and a man of profound learning. He translated the Bible
and several other religious books into Pashto, the language of
the Afghans, and was convinced that he shared with them the same
ancestry. A story that is invariably related to travelers up
in that country refers to his untimely taking off, for he was
accidentally shot by one of his household attendants, and his
epitaph, after giving the usual statistical information, reads:

He was shot accidentally by his chookidar.
Well done, thou good and faithful servant.
I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The Afghanistan question, is, so to speak, in statu quo. The
ameer is friendly to the British, but asserts his independence
with a great deal of firmness and vigor, and is an ever-present
source of anxiety. He receives a subsidy of $600,000 from the
British government, which is practically a bribe to induce him
not to make friends with Russia, and yet there are continual
reports concerning Russian intrigues in that direction. He declines
to receive an English envoy and will not permit any Englishmen
to reside at his court. The Indian government is represented
at Kabul by a highly educated and able native Indian, who is
called a diplomatic agent, and has diplomatic powers. He reports
to and receives instructions from Lord Curzon directly, and is
the only medium of communication between the ameer and the British
government. The present ameer has been on the throne only since
the death of his father, the ameer Abdur Rahman, in October,
1901, and for several months there was considerable anxiety as
to what policy the young man, Habi Bullah Khan, would adopt.
During the last three years of the old man's life he yielded
his power very largely to his son, and selected him twenty wives
from the twenty most influential families in the kingdom in order
to strengthen his throne. Although Habi Bullah is not so able or
determined as his father, he has held his position without an
insurrection or a protest, and is no longer in danger of being
overthrown by one of the bloody conspiracies which have interlarded
Afghanistan history for the last two centuries.

The British were fortunate in having a viceroy at that critical
period who was personally acquainted with the young ameer and a
friend of his father. When Lord Curzon was a correspondent of
the London Times, before he entered parliament, he visited Cabul
and formed pleasant relations with the late ameer, who speaks
of him in most complimentary terms in his recently published
memoirs. The old man happened to die during the darkest period of
the South African war, and Russia took occasion at that critical
moment to demand the right to enter into independent diplomatic
negotiations with Afghanistan for the survey of a railroad across
that country. Only a few years before, Great Britain fought a war
with Afghanistan and overthrew Shere Ali, the shah, because he
received a Russian ambassador on a similar errand, after having
refused to allow a British envoy to reside at his court or even
enter his country. And there is no telling what might have happened
had not Lord Curzon taken advantage of his personal relations and
former friendship. Russia selected a significant date to make
her demands. It was only a fortnight after the British repulse
at Spion Kop, and Ladysmith was in a hopeless state of siege.
Such situations have a powerful influence upon semi-civilized
soldiers, who are invariably inclined to be friendly to those
who are successful at arms. However, Lord Curzon had influence
enough to hold the ameer to the British side, and the latter
has ever since shown a friendly disposition to the British and
has given the Russians no public encouragement.

The official report of the viceroy to the secretary of state for
India in London, covering the ten years ending Dec. 31, 1902,
contains the following interesting paragraph concerning the greatest
source of anxiety:

"Relations with Afghanistan have been peaceful throughout the
decade. Although there is reason to believe that Afghan influence
among the turbulent tribes on the northwestern frontier was at
times the cause of restlessness and disorder, the Durand agreement
of 1893, followed by the demarcation of the southern and nearly
all the eastern Afghan boundary, set a definite limit to the
legitimate interference of Afghanistan with the tribes included
in the British sphere of influence. Under that agreement the annual
subsidy paid by the British government to the ameer was increased
from L80,000 to L120,000. A further demarcation, which affected
alike Afghanistan and the British sphere, was that which resulted
from the Pamir agreement concluded with Russia in 1895. Russia
agreed to accept the River Oxus as her southern boundary as far
east as the Victoria Lake. Thence to the Chinese frontier a line
was fixed by a demarcation commission. This arrangement involved
an interchange of territories lying on the north and south bank
of the Oxus respectively between Afghanistan and Bokhara, which
was carried out in 1896. The Ameer of Afghanistan also undertook
to conduct the administration of Wakkhan, lying between the new
boundary and the Hindu Kush, in return for an increase of his
subsidy.

"Under the strong rule of the late ameer the country for the
most part enjoyed internal peace, but this was broken by the
revolt of the Hazaras in 1892, which was severely suppressed.
In 1895-96 Kafiristan, a region which the delimitation included
in the Afghan sphere of influence, was subjugated. Political
relations of the government of India with the late and with the
present ameer have been friendly, and were undisturbed by the
murder of the British agent at Kabul by one of his servants in
1895, an incident which had no political significance. In the
year 1894-95 His Highness sent his second son, Shahzada Nasrulla
Khan, to visit England as the guest of Her Majesty's government.
The Ameer Abdur Rahman, G. C. B., died in October, 1901, and
was peacefully succeeded by his eldest son, Habi Bullah Khan,
G. C. M.G."

There is no doubt as to what Lord Curzon knows and believes
concerning the aggressive policy of Russia in Asia, because,
shortly before he was appointed viceroy of India, he wrote an
article on that subject for a London magazine, which is still
what editors call "live matter."

"The supreme interest," he said, "ties in the physical fact that
it (the northwestern frontier) is the only side upon which India
has been or ever can be invaded by land, and in the political
fact that it confronts a series of territories inhabited by wild
and turbulent, by independent or semi-independent tribes, behind
whom looms the grim figure of Russia, daily advancing into clearer
outline from the opposite or northwest quarter. It is to protect the
Indian Empire, its peoples, its trades, its laboriously established
government and its accumulated wealth from the insecurity and
possible danger arising from a further Russian advance across the
intervening space that the frontier which I am about to describe
has been traced and fortified. Politicians of all parties have
agreed that, while the territorial aggrandizement of Russia is
permissible over regions where she replaces barbarism even by
a crude civilization, there can be no excuse for allowing her
to take up a position in territories acknowledging our sway,
where she can directly menace British interests in India, or
indirectly impose an excessive strain upon the resources and the
armed strength of our eastern dominions. The guardianship of the
frontier is, therefore, an act of defense, not of defiance, and is
an elementary and essential obligation of imperial statesmanship.

"Originally it was supposed that there were but three or four
passes or cracks by which this mountain barrier was perforated,
and that if British soldiers only stood sentinel at their exits
an invader would have no other alternative but to come down and
be annihilated. Modern surveys, however, have shown that the
number of available passes is nearer 300 than three, a discovery
which has suggested the policy of establishing friendly relations
with the tribes who hold them, and thus acquiring an indirect
control over their western mouths. For just as the main physical
feature of the frontier is this mountain wall, with its narrow
lateral slits, so the main political feature is the existence
in the tracts of country thus characterized of a succession of
wild and warlike tribes, owing allegiance to no foreign potentate,
but cherishing an immemorial love for freedom and their native
hills."

Although the idea of consolidating these border tribes into a
single province, with an administrator and staff of officers
of its own directly under the control of the viceroy, was first
suggested by the late Lord Lytton, it has been the good fortune
of Lord Curzon to carry it into effect, and it is considered one
of the wisest and most notable events of his administration of
Indian affairs. The new community, which is called the Northwest
Frontier Province, was organized in February, 1901, and takes in
the wide stretch of territory, which is described by its name.
It is directly governed by an agent of the governor general and a
chief commissioner, who allow the widest liberty and jurisdiction
to the local chiefs consistent with peace and good government. The
new system has been working since 1902, and while it is yet too
early to calculate the results, the improvement already noticed in
the condition of affairs, peace, industry, morals, the increase
of trade and the development of natural resources justifies the
expectation that the semi-barbarous tribes will soon yield to
the influences of civilization and settle down into industrious,
law-abiding and useful citizens. At least their organization and
discipline under the command of tactful and discreet English
officers gives to India a frontier guard composed of 30,000 or
40,000 fearless fighters, who will be kept on the skirmish line
and will prove invaluable through their knowledge of the country
and the mountain trails in case of a border war. The military
position of England has thus been strengthened immensely, and
when the railways now being constructed in that direction are
completed, so that regular British and native troops may be hurried
to the support of the wild and warlike tribes whenever it is
necessary, a constant cause of anxiety will be removed and the
north-western frontier will be thoroughly protected.

The problems connected with the aggressive policy of Russia on
the Indian frontier are very serious from every point of view
to every Englishman, and whenever the time comes, if it ever
does come, the frontier will be defended with all the power of
the British Empire. The aggressiveness of Russia has been felt
throughout India much more than anyone can realize who has not
lived there and come in contact with affairs. It has been like a
dark cloud continually threatening the horizon; it has disturbed
the finances of the country; it has entered into the consideration
of every public improvement, and has, directly or indirectly,
influenced the expenditure of every dollar, the organization of
the army, the construction of fortifications and the maintenance
of a fleet. The policy of Lord Curzon is to bring all the various
frontier tribes, which aggregate perhaps 2,000,000, under the
influence of British authority. To make them friends; to convince
them that loyalty is to their advantage; to organize them so
that they shall be a source of strength and not of weakness or
peril; to teach them the blessings of peace and industry; to
avoid unnecessary interference with their tribal affairs; to
promote the construction of railways, highways and all facilities
of communication; to extend trade, introduce schools and mechanical
industries, and to control the traffic in arms and ammunition.
The commercial and the military policies are closely involved
and in a measure one is entirely dependent upon the other.

South of Afghanistan, and the westernmost territory under British
control, is Baluchistan, whose western boundary is Persia and the
Arabian Sea. It was formerly a confederation of semi-independent
nomadic tribes under the Khan of Kalat, with a population of about
a million souls, but twenty-six years ago, after the Afghan war of
1878, those tribes were taken under the protection of the Indian
government and Sir Robert Sanderman, a wise, tactful and energetic
man, assisted the native rulers to reorganize and administer
their affairs. During that period the condition of the country
has radically changed. British authority is now supreme, the
primitive conditions of the people have been greatly improved,
they have settled down almost universally in permanent towns
and villages, many of them are cultivating the soil, producing
valuable staples and improving their condition in every respect.
The country consists largely of barren mountains, deserts and
stony plains. Its climate is very severe. The summers are intensely
hot and the winters intensely cold. The wealth of the people is
chiefly in flocks and cattle, and they are now raising camels,
which is a profitable business. The chief exports are wool and
hides, which are all clear gain now that the cultivation of the
fields provides sufficient wheat, barley, millet, potatoes and
other vegetables to supply the wants of the people. Fruits grown
in the valleys are superior to anything produced in other parts
of Asia. The apples and peaches of Baluchistan are famous and
are considered great delicacies in the Indian market. There is
supposed to be considerable mineral in the mountains, although
they have never been explored. Iron, lead, coal, asbestos, oil
and salt have been found in abundance, and some silver.

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