1 i <
2 PACHBADRA.
3 Project for construction
4 of sidir gs
5 The Luni Salt Tract.
6 te
7 ¢ REPORT ON THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE NORTHERN INDI4
8 the manufacturers who neglect their pits and who endea-
9 vour to force inferior salt upon the Department, and it
10 is these men whom itis necessary to stimylate to exertion.
11 The result of the working of the experimental pit, which
12 was dug by the Department in 1897-98, shows that the rate
13 of one anna a maund is ample remuneration to the Kharwals
14 for their salt, The pit was cleared of salt for the first time
15 during the year under report, and the outturn was maunds
16 13,3724, worth Rs. 835-12-6 at the rate of one anna a maund.
17 The pit cost Rs. 712-9-3 to dig and set with thorns, and-
18 Rs. 273-11-6 were expended in extracting the salt and clean-
19 ing and resetting the pit, a total expense of Rs. 986-4-9.
20 The next crop will therefore not only meet the balance of
21 the expenditure, but leave a large profit; and thereafter a
22 handsome profit will accrue of about 3ths of the gross
23 value of the salt at the one anna a maund rate.
24 42. The difficulty in years of drought, such as have
25 recently been. experienced, of conveying salt at Pachbadra
26 from the pits to the railway station is great and the cost is
27 heavy. A project for constructing sidings from the station
28 to the most productive portions of the tract is therefore
29 under consideration, and I am in correspondence with the
30 Manager of the Jodhpur-Bikaner Railway on the subject.
31 The sidings will probacly enable the Uepartment to reduce
32 considerably the rate of payment to the through traffic
33 contractor for conveying salt to the railway, and may in
34 this way effect eventually some economy, while they will
35 obviate the danger of a break down in the through traffic
36 atrangements—a danger with which in recent years we have
37 more than once been threatened.
38 43. The preventive arrangements on the Luni continued
39 without change. Maunds 4,533-24 of free salt were distri-
40 buted in April and May 1902 at the rate of six sers per head
41 to 30,224 persons inhabiting 39 villages in the delta of the
42 river, compared with a distribution of maunds 4,822-14 to
43 32,149 persons during the same months of the’ previous year.
44 The decrease in the population is said to have been due to
45 migration to Sind and Kathiawar in consequence .of the
46 deficiency in the rainfall of the monsoon of1go1. I visited
47 the Luni tract during the year, and the visit confirmed my
48 impression that under present conditions the establishment
49 employed is engaged mainly in protecting the ‘salt revenue of
50 the Jodhpur Darbar and the Bombay Salt Department. When
51 Banjatas visited Pachbadra and the vicinity in numbers, the
52 circumstances may have been different; but now the danger
53 of any considerable quantity of Luni Salt reaching areas
54 where the salt of this Department is consumed outside Marwar
55 is, in my opinion, very small. If we withdrew our establish-
56 ment, the Darbar would be compelled to exercise some
57 supervision to protect its own revenue. The cost of the
58 establishment is, however, only Rs. 6,937 a year, and the
59 present is not a suitable time for suggesting the imposition
60 of any additional burden upon the Jodhpur State. Our
61 men also undoubtedly help to prevent smuggling from the
62 Runn and the Luni delta into Bombay. The Inspector and
63 most of his men will in future be brought into Pachbadra to
64 work there when the salt deposits in the delta are washed
65 away, as usually happens, in the monsoon months, A
66 good flood in the Luni leaves the tract perfectly safe for 3 or
67 4 months.
68 ( 8)