GOVERNMENT OF BENGAL.
LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT
DEPARTMENT.
Public Health.
CALCUTTA, THE 27TH JANUARY 1923.
RESOLUTION—No. 154P.H.
Minister n charge : The Hon'ble Sir S. N. Banarji, Kt.
READ—
The Reports of the Director of Public Health, the Sanitary Board, and the Chief
Engineer, Public Health Department, for the years 1920 and 1921.
READ also—
The annual statistical returns and short notes on vaccination for the years
1920-21 and 1921-22.
1. Public Health.
(Statistical, Epidemiological and General Public Health Administration.)
Population.—It is at the outset to be premised that for the purposes of
this review, the total population of Bengal, excluding the Chittagong Hill
Tracts, was taken in 1920 as 45,329,247 (1911 Census) and in 1921 as
46,522,293 (1921 Census). The increase in the last ten years has not been
uniform throughout Bengal.
The Chittagong Division shows an increase of 11.9 per cent., while the
Burdwan Division has an alarming decrease of 4.9 per cent. The Presidency
Division gave an increase of only 0.2 per cent., while there were increases of
2.0 and 6.6 per cent. in the Rajshahi and Dacca Divisions. Five districts in
the Burdwan, three in the Presidency and two in the Rajshahi Divisions
have lost from 0.5 to 10.5 per cent. of their population. Recorded deaths
and births during the decennium 1911—1920 were 14,101,677 and 14,860,257
against 13,728,296 deaths and 15,797,344 births in the decennium 1901—1911.
The natural increase of the population was checked by the ravages of the
great influenza epidemic, which tock a toll of roughly 750,000 lives.
2. Birth-rate and death-rate.—In 1920 and 1921, the number of
recorded deaths in Bengal was 1,481,612 and 1,403,030, while 1,359,913 and
1,301,001 births were recorded.
The provincial birth-rates in the two years under review were 30.0 and
28.0 per mille as compared with the quinquennial average of 30.8. In 1920.
Madras and the North-West Frontier Province returned lower birth-rates
than Bengal, while in 1921 all provinces except Assam and (again) the
North-West Frontier Province recorded higher rates than this province.
The Bengal death-rates in 1920 and 1921 were 32.7 and 30.1 per mille.
In 1920, two provinces and in 1921 four provinces returned lower death-rates
than Bengal, but the Director of Public Health points out that it is the rate
of natural increase (births compared with deaths) which afford the best
evidence of a country's health. Judged by this criterion, Bengal was the
most unhealthy province in the whole of India in 1920, and seventh on the
list of 1921. He attributes Bengal's unhappy position in the scale to its
unsatisfactory economic condition.
" The country was not in 1920 providing subsistence for its population * * * *
For the explanation of the declining birth-rate of 1921, we must study the economic
conditions of 1920 and the beginning of 1921. At first sight the report of the Director
of Agriculture on the harvest of 1920 seems to suggest that the economic conditions of
the agricultural population at the end of 1920 and beginning of 1921 were at least as good
as, if not better than, in the 12 months previously. But the prosperity of an agricultural
population is governed by two main factors,—the yield of the harvest and the market
prices realized."