34
DARJEELING CIRCLE.
Bogra district.
8. Bogra.—The full number of operations has been kept up in Bogra, 18,477, against
16,469 the year before, and this, too, after a very bad start at the beginning of the season, from
the first supply of lymph sent down having been lost in the port, causing a delay of several
weeks, and from the later work being irregular over the Adumdighi thana, where a severe
outbreak of small-pox threatened from inoculation by one man only, and from the sickness
of two old experienced vaccinators, one having got cholera and recovered, and the other
breaking down under chronic fever. Each man operated on 3,079.5 persons.
The birth-rate of the whole district is little over 20,000 annually, which would have
been reached by the six Government vaccinators alone but for the circumstances mentioned
above. Except in November, when the vaccinators were not quite in hand under a new
native superintendent—the son of a dispensary vaccinator, of course trying to fall back
on his father's method—the work of the district was excellent. I made a point on account of
native superintendent Tujummul Hossein's promotion to officiate as deputy superintendent
to visit Bogra twice during my tour, which I had never been able to accomplish before, and
showed the men that there was to be no decline from other years; and on my second visit
I was much pleased with every thing. The ratio of success was quite up to 98.36 per cent.
Several of the instructed inoculators again came forward for instruments and lymph,
but I am sorry to say they have submitted no returns.
The introduction
of Act IV of 1865,
recommended
There was a municipal vaccinator for Bogra and one for Sherepore, so that the birth-rate
must now be more than overtaken, and the introduction of Act IV (B.C.) of 1865 made most
advisable.
Two inoculators have again appeared in the field—one spreading small-pox over
Adumdighi, the other over outpost Dhonant—of Seryakandi.
From fewer of them having come forward for vaccine lymph this year than usual, and
from their having again begun the practice of variolation, which had been in abeyance for
several years, I feel sure that they will never be convinced that the Government is in
earnest about vaccination until it forbids inoculation by law; and a clear case has been,
I submit, made for the introduction of the Act, as in 1871-72 and in 1872-73 the successful
vaccinations exceeded the birth-rate; and this I feel sure will be the case when the work of the
municipal vaccinators is added to that done by the men in Government pay in 1873-74.
Khetlal thana was the area where vaccination was begun in November. It extends
over 118 square miles, has a population of 38,632, or only 327 persons per square mile, being the
least populous of any thana in Bogra. It was completed by the end of January, and a
number of villages which had been removed into the Shibgunge jurisdiction were also com-
pletely protected, and the thana of Adumdighi begun. The work in it had, however, to be
scattered, as an inoculator had spread small-pox into many villages. There was some opposi-
tion here created by a man calling himself a vaccinator, who had been at work for some
time going about and discrediting the operations of the Government men when they came
into his vicinity. The native superintendent reports that after seeing what he did he could
not find a case of true vaccination.
This man's history is unknown to me, as he had never received instruction from the
vaccine establishment; and where he got lymph is as much a puzzle to me as where the
rajbari vaccinators of Dinagepore obtained their supply. There are 223 villages in Khetlal,
out of which I verified the returns in 182.
There were 12,836 people vaccinated in Khetlal out of a population of 38,632, nearly
a third, showing how little protection is afforded to them by inoculators.
Four hundred and thirty-five villages were protected in the season.
Protected area in
Bogra.
The protected area in Bogra now consists of thana Bogra, thana Shibgunge, and
thana Khetlal, with a population of 314,808, or nearly half that of the whole district.
Rajshahye district
9. Rajshahye.—A little vaccination had to be carried on in Rajshahye from May
to September to keep small-pox in check, but the number of operations declined in the hot
weather of 1873 to 827, against 3,859 in 1872, which is very gratifying. This, with the absence
of a vaccinator formerly paid by the Promothonath Fund of Nattore, has reduced the number
largely from the previous year. There were several other reasons for this : as the illness of one
of the vaccinators; the sparser population of the area taken up—Beauleah; the sudder thana,
parts of which had often been visited by vaccinators before, but was finished according to
the Surgeon-General's recommendation. There was stiff opposition for a time on the part of
some silk-spinning munduls and villagers employed in making goor, but it was got over after
keeping the work a good deal back. It did not arise, so far as I learned, from any caste or
religious feeling; it was prompted by economic reasons, the owners of silk filatures objecting
to their spinners being absent from their work while being vaccinated or suffering from vaccine
fever. The headmen of villages where sugar-cane was much cultivated put in similar pleas.
Number
vaccinated.
The number of persons vaccinated was 22,727, or 4,545.4 per man, showing that there was
no neglect of duty on the part of the establishment.
The whole of thana Beauleah was gone over, and can now be added to thana Pooteah and
outpost Aranee of Belmariah, which is a continuous protected area.
A few villages remaining over in outpost Doorgapore, of Pooteah, from last season were
protected, and the work carried on into thana Charghat, which I hope to take up next season.