The forecast of the Indian Budget published by the India
Office on Wednesday is highly favourable. Owing to im- provements in the receipts from the railways, from opium, from salt, Excise, Customs, and other minor sources, the net surplus for 1904-5, after paying for the Tibetan Mission, and part of the cost of Army reorganisation, will be £3,485,000. There will therefore be a reduction of the Salt-tax, except in Burmah, by 25 per cent., a grant of £334,000 for police reform, another of 2233,000 for the extension of primary education, and others amounting to £510,000 for agricultural development and aid to different municipalities. The surplus for next year. 1905-6, is therefore calculated at less than a million ; but in the absence of special misfortunes like wars or famines the tendency of Indian revenues is to increase slightly. No financier has yet, however, been able to discover a tax for India which could be slipped up and down according to the necessities of the year. Taxes on the two obvious subjects for such taxation, tobacco and sugar, would probably create too great a storm of discontent, as would a monopoly of the injurious luxury, betel.
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