DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.24890#0049
( 40 )
care was taken to avoid caste objections and to secure the
well-being of the inmates, yet poorhouse life was always
repugnant to the people generally. The inmates consisted so
largely of persons broken down by disease or infirmity that
the institutions might have been more correctly described
as infirmaries. Whatever there was of repulsive or shocking
in the aspects of the famine, was to be found in the poorhouses,
which, broadly speaking, were asylums for the reception of
starving vagrants or homeless cripples.
The place occupied by the poorhouse in the scheme of
relief operations was that of receiving house or temporary
shelter for* all who could not be otherwise relieved. The only
permanent inmates were the infirm vagrants. The rules
required the District Officer to sort out periodically the
inmates of the poorhouse, to draft to the relief works those
who were capable of labour, and to send to their homes
those helpless ones who had any fixed residence, there to be
brought on the village relief lists. In this way it was designed
that the gratuitous relief system should consist, broadly speak-
ing, of two great forms : first, relief on works for all in need
of relief who were able to labour and their dependants; second,
relief at their homes for all unable to labour, but in need of
relief. The poorhouse remained then the refuge of the home-
less infirm from whom it was hardly ever possible to exact
labour. But when the inmates could work they were made to
work.
It may here be also stated that the orphans and other
deserted famine waifs were collected, generally at district
headquarters, in an orphanage, where they received special
treatment. After a short residence the children were found
to improve immensely in health and physique.
Outdoor or home relief required a very elaborate
organization and a very extensive agency. Its aim was to seek
out in their own homes all those who had been deprived of
their ordinary means of support and were unable to work for
their living, to test the reality of their claims, to bring them
on a free list, to arrange for the regular payment of the
allowances which, according to the fixed scale, might be found
necessary for their support, and to strike off their names as
soon as they appeared in a position to earn their own support
or to claim it from any one able and bound to maintain them.
These operations were carried out in every village in the
famine districts, covering an area of 44,000 square miles
with a population of 20J millions, and with less exhaustive-
ness in the “ Scarcity ” area of 28,000 square miles with
a population of 14| millions.
The task was a comparatively simple one in towns
where the people were collected within narrow limits and
where voluntary agency was largely available. But for the
care was taken to avoid caste objections and to secure the
well-being of the inmates, yet poorhouse life was always
repugnant to the people generally. The inmates consisted so
largely of persons broken down by disease or infirmity that
the institutions might have been more correctly described
as infirmaries. Whatever there was of repulsive or shocking
in the aspects of the famine, was to be found in the poorhouses,
which, broadly speaking, were asylums for the reception of
starving vagrants or homeless cripples.
The place occupied by the poorhouse in the scheme of
relief operations was that of receiving house or temporary
shelter for* all who could not be otherwise relieved. The only
permanent inmates were the infirm vagrants. The rules
required the District Officer to sort out periodically the
inmates of the poorhouse, to draft to the relief works those
who were capable of labour, and to send to their homes
those helpless ones who had any fixed residence, there to be
brought on the village relief lists. In this way it was designed
that the gratuitous relief system should consist, broadly speak-
ing, of two great forms : first, relief on works for all in need
of relief who were able to labour and their dependants; second,
relief at their homes for all unable to labour, but in need of
relief. The poorhouse remained then the refuge of the home-
less infirm from whom it was hardly ever possible to exact
labour. But when the inmates could work they were made to
work.
It may here be also stated that the orphans and other
deserted famine waifs were collected, generally at district
headquarters, in an orphanage, where they received special
treatment. After a short residence the children were found
to improve immensely in health and physique.
Outdoor or home relief required a very elaborate
organization and a very extensive agency. Its aim was to seek
out in their own homes all those who had been deprived of
their ordinary means of support and were unable to work for
their living, to test the reality of their claims, to bring them
on a free list, to arrange for the regular payment of the
allowances which, according to the fixed scale, might be found
necessary for their support, and to strike off their names as
soon as they appeared in a position to earn their own support
or to claim it from any one able and bound to maintain them.
These operations were carried out in every village in the
famine districts, covering an area of 44,000 square miles
with a population of 20J millions, and with less exhaustive-
ness in the “ Scarcity ” area of 28,000 square miles with
a population of 14| millions.
The task was a comparatively simple one in towns
where the people were collected within narrow limits and
where voluntary agency was largely available. But for the