CULTIVATION
in
Bengal.
Collection of
Opium.
the Economic Products of India.
47
PAPAVER
in Bengal.
somniferum.
three times, the sickly and superfluous plants being got rid of and the
vigorous plants left at a distance of seven to eight inches from each other.
Dr. Lyell says of Behar that the young plants which are removed at the
first weedings " are sold and eaten as a salad, those of second and third
thinnings possess narcotic properties and are seldom used."
Flowering and Period of Collection of the Opium.— The plants take
from 75 to 80 days after germination to reach the flowering condition.
The petals, which are four in number, are gently removed when fully
matured, which is on the third day after expansion. These petals consti-
tute the " Flower Leaves" of the manufacturers and are employed in the
formation of the outer casing of the opium-cakes. In the course of another
eight or ten days the capsules are sufficiently advanced for the extraction of
the drug. The earliest collections in Behar may thus take place at the
end of January, but operations are continued throughout February and
even up to the middle of March. In the Benares Agency the season of
collection is a little later. The plants do not flower as a rule in the North-
West Provinces till March, and the collection of the drug is accordingly
sometimes extended to the second week in April.
Subsequent Treatment of the Land.—After the poppy is off the soil, the
land is usually allowed to lie fallow till the kharif sowings begin. In
some cases chéna is sown at once, then followed by a kharif crop, or some-
times the poppy is succeeded by indigo. In rare instances the fields are
specially reserved for poppy culture and left fallow between each crop.
II-NORTH-WEST PROVINCES & OUDH.
These remarks apply to the average opium cultivation under the Govern-
ment Agencies. As exhibiting, however, special features and amplifying
the facts given, the following passages may be taken from the Field €5'
Garden Crops of the North-West Provinces :—
P Permission to cultivate.—" The system on which opium s grown for
Government is not unlike that on which badni indigo is grown for an
indigo factory. Every cultivator wishing to grow that plant must obtain
a written license to do so, and receives at the same time an advance in
cash of from R12 to R13 an acre, paid in two instalments, one, two
months before the poppy is sown, and the second, one month after sow-
ing. The whole of the produce is purchased by Government, at a rate
varying between R4 - 8 and R6 a seer. This is the only form of cultiva-
tion in which the peasant can get his seed without paying interest to the
money-lender. The price paid by Government for the drug alone is, in
districts where the soil is good and the cultivation moderately careful, not
much less than R50 per acre. Something more is realised from the
seed and dried capsules. While the profits per acre are at least as
large as they are from wheat or any other ordinary crop not requiring
unusual care and expense for its production, the market is absolutely
certain, and the cultivator has to fear none of the sudden changes in price
which a diminished demand makes not infrequent in the case of other
products. In times of scarcity and famine the advantages of this form of
cultivation are very great. The crop is almost invariably grown close to a
well, and is therefore less dependent than others on the vicissitudes of the
season. This certainty enables the Opium Department to make further
advances on the crop besides those that had originally been given for seed,
and supplies the cultivators with money, which could not otherwise have
been obtained at all, or except at an exorbitant rate of interest. Under
these circumstances it is not surprising that this crop is extremely popular
with all classes of cultivators, though in a few districts the landlords have
shown at its first introduction some signs of the hostility which is aroused
N.-W. P. &
OUDH.
Permission.