Timeline of Major Famines in India During British Rule

ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/f/fiske/john/f54u/chapter9.html - 37k John Fiske-The Unseen World, and other essays (chapter 9) IX. THE FAMINE OF 1770 IN BENGAL.[30] [30] The Annals of Rural Bengal. By W. W. Hunter. Vol. I. The Ethnical Frontier of Lower Bengal, with the Ancient Principalities of Beerbhoom and Bishenpore. Second Edition. New York: Leypoldt and Holt. 1868. 8vo., pp. xvi., 475. During the famine of 1866 it was found impossible to render public charity available to the female members of the respectable classes, and many a rural household starved slowly to death without uttering a complaint or making a sign. “All through the stifling summer of 1770 the people went on dying. The husbandmen sold their cattle; they sold their implements of agriculture; they devoured their seed-grain; they sold their sons and daughters, till at length no buyer of children could be found; they ate the leaves of trees and the grass of the field; and in June, 1770, the Resident at the Durbar affirmed that the living were feeding on the dead. Day and night…..The extent of the depopulation is to our Western imaginations almost incredible. During those six months of horror, more than TEN MILLIONS of people had perished! It was as if the entire population of our three or four largest States—man, woman, and child—were to be utterly swept away between now and next August, leaving the region between the Hudson and Lake Michigan as quiet and deathlike as the buried streets of Pompeii. Yet the estimate is based upon most accurate and trustworthy official returns; and Mr. Hunter may well say that “it represents an aggregate of individual suffering which no European nation has been called upon to contemplate within historic times.” This unparalleled calamity struck down impartially the rich and the poor. The old, aristocratic families of Lower Bengal were irretrievably ruined. The Rajah of Burdwan, whose possessions were so vast that, travel as far as he would, he always slept under a roof of his own and within his own jurisdiction, died in such indigence that his son had to melt down the family plate and beg a loan from the government in order to discharge his father’s funeral expenses. And our author gives other similar instances. The wealthy natives who were appointed to assess and collect the internal revenue, being unable to raise the sums required by the government, were in many cases imprisoned, or their estates were confiscated and re-let in order to discharge the debt.The course taken by the great famine of 1866 well illustrates the above views. This famine, also, was caused by the total failure of the December rice-crop, and it was brought to a close by an abundant harvest in the succeeding year. “Even as regards the maximum price reached, the analogy holds good, in each case rice having risen in general to nearly twopence, and in particular places to fourpence, a pound; and in each the quoted rates being for a brief period in several isolated localities merely nominal, no food existing in the market, and money altogether losing its interchangeable value. In both the people endured silently to the end, with a fortitude that casual observers of a different temperament and widely dissimilar race may easily mistake for apathy, but which those who lived among the sufferers are unable to distinguish from qualities that generally pass under a more honourable name. During 1866, when the famine was severest, I superintended public instruction throughout the southwestern division of Lower Bengal, including Orissa. The subordinate native officers, about eight hundred in number, behaved with a steadiness, and when called upon, with a self-abnegation, beyond praise. Many of them ruined their health. The touching scenes of self-sacrifice and humble heroism which I witnessed among the poor villagers on my tours of inspection will remain in my memory till my latest day.” But to meet the famine of 1866 Bengal was equipped with railroads and canals, and better than all, with an intelligent government. Far from trying to check speculation, as in 1770, the government did all in its power to stimulate it. In the earlier famine one could hardly engage in the grain trade without becoming amenable to the law. “In 1866 respectable men in vast numbers went into the trade; for government, by publishing weekly returns of the rates in every district, rendered the traffic both easy and safe. Every one knew where to buy grain cheapest, and where to sell it dearest, and food was accordingly brought from the districts that could best spare it, and carried to those which most urgently needed it. Not only were prices equalized so far as possible throughout the stricken parts, but the publicity given to the high rates in Lower Bengal induced large shipments from the upper provinces, and the chief seat of the trade became unable to afford accommodation for landing the vast stores of grain brought down the river. Rice poured into the affected districts from all parts,—railways, canals, and roads vigorously doing their duty.” The result of this wise policy was that scarcity was heightened into famine only in one remote corner of Bengal. Orissa was commercially isolated in 1866, as the whole country had been in 1770. “As far back as the records extend, Orissa has produced more grain than it can use. It is an exporting, not an importing province, sending away its surplus grain by sea, and neither requiring nor seeking any communication with Lower Bengal by land.” Long after the rest of the province had begun to prepare for a year of famine, Orissa kept on exporting. In March, when the alarm was first raised, the southwest monsoon had set in, rendering the harbours inaccessible. Thus the district was isolated. It was no longer possible to apply the wholesome policy which was operating throughout the rest of the country. The doomed population of Orissa, like passengers in a ship without provisions, were called upon to suffer the extremities of famine; and in the course of the spring and summer of 1866, some seven hundred thousand people perished. January, 1869. http://www.lonympics.co.uk/Famine_in_India.htm Famines in India There were 14 famines in India between 11th and 17th century (Bhatia, 1985). B.M. Bhatia believes earlier famines were localised and it was only after 1860, during the British rule, that famine came to signify general shortage of foodgrains in the country. In the latter half of the 19th century, there were approximately 25 major famines across India which killed between 30 and 40 million people. The famines were the result of the almost total collapse of India's native industries, as its skilled artisans were driven out of work while British imports flooded the Indian markets. The famines were a product both of uneven rainfall and British economic and administrative policies, which since 1857 led to the seizure and conversion of local farmland to foreign owned plantations, restrictions on internal trade, heavy taxation of Indians to support unsuccessful British expeditions in Afghanistan like the Second Anglo-Afghan War, inflationary measures that increased the price of food, and substantial exports of staple crops from India to Britain. (Dutt, 1900 and 1902; Srivastava, 1968; Sen, 1982; Bhatia, 1985.) Some British citizens such as William Digby agitated for policy reforms and famine relief, but Lord Lytton, the governing British viceroy in India, opposed such changes in the belief they would stimulate shirking by Indian workers. The first Bengal famine of 1770 is estimated to have taken nearly one third of the population. The famines continued until Independence in 1948, with the Bengal famine of 1943-44 being among the most devastating, killing 3-4 million during World War II. The Famine Commission of 1880 observed each province in British India, including Burma, had a surplus of foodgrains, and annual surplus was 5.16 million tons (Bhatia, 1970). At that time, annual export of rice and other grains from India was approximately one million tons. In 1966, there was a 'near miss' in Bihar, when the USA allocated 900,000 tons of grain to fight the famine. It is the closest independent India came to a famine. The increase in food to the population is also reflected in the fact in the 50 years of British rule (1891 to 1941) the population grew by 35% (from 287 million to 389 million) whereas in the 50 years of democratic rule from 1951 to 2001 the population grew by 183% (from 363 million to 1,023 million). The fact there have been no famines even with a population that has almost tripled makes it an even more impressive achievement for the democratic government. Chronology-1630-1631: there was a famine in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. 1770: Indian territory ruled by the British East India Company experienced the first Bengal famine of 1770. An estimated 10 million people died. 1780-1790s: millions died of famine in Bengal, Benares, Jammu, Bombay and Madras. 1800-1825: 1 million Indians died of famine 1850-1875: 5 millions died of famine in Bengal, Orissa, Rajastan and Bihar 1875-1902: 26 million Indians died of famine (1876-1878: 10 millions) 1905-1906: famine raged in areas with the population of 3,3 million. 1906-1907: famine captured areas with the population of 13 million 1907-1908: famine captured areas populated by 49,6 million Indians. In 1943, India experienced the second Bengal famine of 1943. Over 3 million people died. In 1966, there was a 'near miss' in Bihar.

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