4
12. Education.—No city in India is more advanced as regards education
than Bombay. At the Census of 1901 nearly 20 per cent. of the total popula-
tion was found to be literate, a proportion which is very high for India.
Among Indian born persons the Parsis, as a community, showed the highest
percentage of literates among both males and females. Education is rapidly
developing in Bombay ; there are many elementary schools in the City, a fair
number of higher class schools, and the University. A large medical school is
attached to the University from which about 100 qualified medical men pass
out each year.
13. Occupation.—At the Census of 1906 a total of 588,713 persons were
returned as workers and 389,109 as dependents and non-workers. Among the
workers 502,544 were males and 86,169 females. It is sometimes imagined,
because women may be seen working as coolies, that it is a customary thing in
India for women of the poorer classes to become wage earners ; but this is not the
case in Bombay where only women of special castes and from certain districts
seek employment outside their own homes. It is a common idea that children
in Bombay augment family incomes considerably by their earnings, but in 1907
a total of only 3,000 children was employed in factories of all kinds in the
City. In 1906 Cotton Mills employed 82,867 males and 29,160 females ; the
average number at work daily was 100,798 ; and these 112,027 mill-workers
supported 55,539 dependents. In the same year there were 98,519 general
labourers on the island, including 20,278 female workers who supported
33,308 dependents; domestic and other service maintained 101,017 persons
including dependents ; 48,761 persons lived by washing, tailoring, cooking,
baking, etc ; a total of 113,671 persons obtained their living from trade, by
shopkeeping, dealing and hawking ; and 54,986 by the carriage of goods or
passengers on sea or land.
14. The vast majority of the population of Bombay belong to the working
classes, and of these people a very large number exist in a condition of the
greatest poverty. Out of the total of 588, 713 actual workers present in Bombay
in 1906, only 18,849 persons or just over 3"2 per cent. paid income tax, and of
these, only 2,192 were in receipt of more than only Rs. 5,000 per annum. Of
persons dependent upon salaries only 2,365 received more than Rs. 2,000 per
annum and 3,638 received less than 1,250 per annum.
15. Wages.—Among workers in Bombay, mill-hands are usually supposed
to be exceeding well off, but according to the Bombay Gazetteer the average
earnings of workers in the spinning and weaving mills is only Rs. 13 per mensem.
Men earn Rs. 14 to Rs. 30 a month, women Rs. 71/2 to 9 and children Rs. 5 to 7.
The rate of pay of the general labourer varies greatly according to the class
of work performed. Coolies employed in heavy work, loading and unloading
ships, coaling vessels, etc., may earn as much as from annas 12 to Re. 1 per day ;
coolies employed on earth work earn from 6 to 8 annas for men and from 4 to 7
annas for women ; those engaged in carrying parcels, etc., earn about 5
annas a day. Municipal biggaries receive Rs. 11a month, male sweepers about
and carpenters get an average of about Re. 1 per working day ; and smiths,
fitters and rnachinemen from Rs. 20 to Rs. 35 per mensem. Grooms and
coachmen generally get about Rs. 12 a month and boatmen and laskars from
Rs. 12 to Rs. 15. Domestic servants usually receive either Rs. 3 to Rs. 6 a
month and their food or Rs. 9 to 12 without food, but better class servants are
paid as much as Rs. 20 and upwards a month. Office peons, chowkidars and
messengers usually get from Rs. 10 to Rs. 12 a month and their clothes, and
railway porters Rs. 15. Street hawkers of fruit and food usually earn from
annas 4 a day up to Rs. 20 a month. The pay of the native clerks and shop
assistants varies from Rs. 25 to Rs. 50 and among the more highly paid from
16. Rent.—One of the heaviest items of expenditure in the domestic
budget of workers in Bombay is house-rent. About 85 per cent. of the population
lives in tenements of only one room and among these a large proportion are forced
to share their quarters with others. At the Census in 1901, 284,244 people or
more than one-third of the total population were found to be sharing rooms with