DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.29302#0015
< 3 )
Tbat the past quarter of a century has witnessed a consider-
able increase appears to be beyond doubt, but Colonel Waee
has mentioned some facts which suggest that a limit has
now been reached which will only be very gradually enlarged.
In fact, the population is already about as numerous as the
land can support in comfort. For such small luxuries as
they possess the people are in all probability dependent on
the sale of miscellaneous produce in the hill marts or on the
wages of their labour. Should the population continue to
increase, it must either he relieved by emigration or develop
a class entirely supported by wages. There is little room,
perhaps for any deterioration in the standard of living.
5, The system of joint responsibility has been introduced
in theory throughout the whole district.
But hitherto it has never been enforced
in practice, and probably never will be. The individual
holding, as in the neighbouring Hill States, is the real revenue
unit, and the tenures are essentially ryot war . If the jagir
and mail lands of the three interior ilaquas (which are
peculiar in. circumstances) be omitted, it appears that 77
per cent, of the cultivation is in the hands of the owners
in Bharauli and Kdlka, 86 per cent, in Simla, 95 per cent, in
Kot Guru, and 98 per cent, in Kot Khai. The remainder is
held by tenants whose rentals are somewhat various. The
individual holdings are small. In the exceedingly limited
Kalka ilaqua an owner’s cultivated holding averages 8*2 acres.
But in Bharauli and the Khalsa lands of Simla the average
is only 2 acres ; and 4 acres in the Khdlsa lands of Kot
Guru and Kot Khai. A tenant’s holding is 2 acres in the
Khalsa lands of Kot Guru, half that quantity in the Khalsa
lands of Kot Khdi and Simla, and less than an acre in the
other two ilaquas. These figures, however, require to be
taken with some modifications. Thus in Bharauli each culti-
vated holding has attached to it a double portion of grass lands.
And in all the ilaquas it must be remembered that the
number of owners’ holdings in the settlement record is
generally a good deal larger than the number of proprietor
families; that is to say, each family has on the average
more than one holding. Colonel Wace has applied the
correction necessary on this account to his figures for Simla
and the two Kots. The results given above for these three
iidquas, therefore, represent as nearly as possible the true
average area per family. No similar correction has been,
applied to the Bharauli and Kdlka figures. Nor is it possible
Tbat the past quarter of a century has witnessed a consider-
able increase appears to be beyond doubt, but Colonel Waee
has mentioned some facts which suggest that a limit has
now been reached which will only be very gradually enlarged.
In fact, the population is already about as numerous as the
land can support in comfort. For such small luxuries as
they possess the people are in all probability dependent on
the sale of miscellaneous produce in the hill marts or on the
wages of their labour. Should the population continue to
increase, it must either he relieved by emigration or develop
a class entirely supported by wages. There is little room,
perhaps for any deterioration in the standard of living.
5, The system of joint responsibility has been introduced
in theory throughout the whole district.
But hitherto it has never been enforced
in practice, and probably never will be. The individual
holding, as in the neighbouring Hill States, is the real revenue
unit, and the tenures are essentially ryot war . If the jagir
and mail lands of the three interior ilaquas (which are
peculiar in. circumstances) be omitted, it appears that 77
per cent, of the cultivation is in the hands of the owners
in Bharauli and Kdlka, 86 per cent, in Simla, 95 per cent, in
Kot Guru, and 98 per cent, in Kot Khai. The remainder is
held by tenants whose rentals are somewhat various. The
individual holdings are small. In the exceedingly limited
Kalka ilaqua an owner’s cultivated holding averages 8*2 acres.
But in Bharauli and the Khalsa lands of Simla the average
is only 2 acres ; and 4 acres in the Khdlsa lands of Kot
Guru and Kot Khai. A tenant’s holding is 2 acres in the
Khalsa lands of Kot Guru, half that quantity in the Khalsa
lands of Kot Khdi and Simla, and less than an acre in the
other two ilaquas. These figures, however, require to be
taken with some modifications. Thus in Bharauli each culti-
vated holding has attached to it a double portion of grass lands.
And in all the ilaquas it must be remembered that the
number of owners’ holdings in the settlement record is
generally a good deal larger than the number of proprietor
families; that is to say, each family has on the average
more than one holding. Colonel Wace has applied the
correction necessary on this account to his figures for Simla
and the two Kots. The results given above for these three
iidquas, therefore, represent as nearly as possible the true
average area per family. No similar correction has been,
applied to the Bharauli and Kdlka figures. Nor is it possible