THE POPULATION OF WESTERN INDIA.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIR,—Your optimistic leaderette in the Spectator of March 16th with regard to the reduction of population in Western India will scarcely be accepted by residents there. To say that ,‘ Indians never abandon their villages while they can help it," or that if they do they do not return, is no more accurate than to make similar general statements about Africans or Europeans. As a matter of fact, even in so small a portion as Gujarat certain classes readily emigrate (a very small fraction) and certain others do not. But whatever merely temporary effect the Famine had on the population of the villages was largely over long before the date of the Census, and it is much to be feared that the diminution of population which then appeared was due, not to emigration, but to death. Allowing for a natural increase of population similar to that of the previous decade, the Census returns would seem to show that over a large part of Gujarat no less than a quarter of the population has disappeared. Of course, this is not all directly due to famine, but largely, also, to abnormally unhealthy seasons, which carried off numbers of people quite beyond the reach of famine. But need we demand any more serious proof of the devastation of this part of India than that which you yourself admit,—the " curious scarcity of child voices in the villages " P—I am, Sir, &c., J. S. S. [Our correspondent has not, apparently, read with any great care the note he criticises. We distinctly stated that "the misfortune has been a terrible one."—ED. Svectator.1
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