1 SALT REVENUE DEPARTMENT FOR THE OFFICIAL YEAR 1895-96.
2 is for this reason,quite impossible to ascertain exactly how much B£VIEW BY SECTIONS
3 of the salt purchased by the banjaras was really carried into FACUBADES:
4 . Central India. Undoubtedly a good portion of the salt they de-
5 elare for sale in Central India is really disposed of in Meywar
6 and along the routes inside of Central India. There is good
7 reason for this statement. During the past two years I have
8 noticed that an increasingly large proportion of the banjaras
9 are Maroo Bhats, Bishnois, and Muhammadans, all of whom
10 are known as “ banjaras,” and who go no further a field than
11 Meywar, while the number of the el banjaras, the Jats, and
12 Bamanias, who have always traded with Central India, has not
13 only declined, but individual “ ¢undas” (as they call their droves
14 of pack-bullocks).are smaller.”
15 “The constant lament of the banjara is that he cannot ¢om-
16 pete with the railway, and he has good reason for his lament,
17 as the railway not only delivers the salt in the warkets in
18 ‘Central India in a fraction of the time the banjara takes in
19 travelling with his drove of bullocks laden with salt, but, what
20 is equally important, the railway lays the salt down in Cen-
21 tral India in the best possible condition, whereas the ban-
22 Jjara’s salt, which is loaded and unloaded daily, arrives damaged
23 in appearance and decreased in weight.”
24 “The inevitable decline in the banjara trade has been so
25 fully discussed in previous reports from this office, that it
26 ‘would be simple repetition to go further into the subject here.”
27 “ As regards the falling off in the banjara trade last year,
28 which amounted to over 74,000 maunds, half of it may be as-
29 eribed to railway competition, the remaining moiety is owing
30 ‘doubtless to the partial failure of the rains in consequence or
31 which the banjaras’ trading season, which in a good year lasts
32 from about the first week of July to the end of October, was
33 very short-lived as early in September ‘the tanks contained
34 little, if any, water, and by the end of the month they were dry,
35 and there was.no water anywhere.”
36 “Tt is interesting and instructive to note that salt was sent
37 from here tothe extent of over 16,000 maunds by railway
38 under the through-traffic system to stations on the Udeypur-
39 Chitore Railway opened during the year, and which serves a
40 tract of country in which formerly the banjaras found sale
41 for some of their salt. This fact indicates that the banjara,
42 asa trader direct with the source, must be crushed by the
43 railway, and must ultimately be content to supply the wilder
44 portion of Central India with salt supplied to the large markets,
45 such as Saugor and Bhopal, by the railway.”
46 “Ttis unfortunate for the banjara that he must recede, and
47 ultimately disappear, before the advance of the Railway, but
48 so far as this source is concerned, and froma Departmental point
49 of view, the disappearance ofthe banjara is of little import-
50 ance, as this salt source is no longer dependent on the banja-
51 ra trade, and the public benefits by the railway displacing the
52 banjara in getting salt cheaper and in better condition.”
53 51. The following statement is an abstract account for the Receipts and charges on
54 past year of the receipts from the through-traffic charge of — "ronsh-trafic sales.
55 three pies per maund, and of the expenditure incurred by the
56 Department in dealing with this salt and consigning it :-—
57 ( 37 )