( 2 )
average strength. Taking the average of the period of ten years, beginning
with 1863, the difference appears to have been 6.3 per cent. The result has
been that in the course of eleven years past the number of native insanes
in confinement has all but doubled. Year by year an increasing strain has
been put on the resources of the existing asylums. These institutions cannot
be indefinitely extended. Dullunda, it is said, has already reached the limit
which, under existing circumstances, cannot be passed with safety. The
accommodation in the other asylums is in no way equal to their requirements.
The pressure for space has been very great. Since the year closed, a new asylum
at Berhampore, calculated to contain 225 patients, has been opened; and till other
arrangements are practicable, the Lieutenant-Governor has decided to maintain
also the Moydapore asylum, which the new one was meant to supersede. A con-
siderable reduction has thus been effected in the number of patients in Dullunda
and Patna; but no relief has yet been given to Dacca, where the overcrowding
has been worst of all, and accompanied by a lamentably high death-rate. It
was the intention of this Government to have pressed to an early completion
the construction of an asylum at Tezpore to receive all lunatics belonging to
the Assam districts, which, under existing arrangements, send their lunatics to
Dacca. The Chief Commissioner has already been addressed on the urgent
necessity which exists for such an asylum, and his attention will again be
drawn to the matter. Meanwhile temporary expedients must be adopted at
Dacca, and full use made of the Lalbagh barracks, in which inoffensive
lunatics might remain till further orders. It may be possible, with the com-
pletion of the Central Jails at Bhagulpore and Midnapore, to use the district
jail at one of these stations as an asylum for insanes, and the subject shall
have the attention of Government. As the maintenance of these asylums is
becoming more and more expensive to the State, the Lieutenant-Governor hopes
that all Superintendents will be careful to exact payment from those patients
or their friends who are able to pay, and to make the labor of the inmates
as productive as possible.
6. The total number of criminal lunatics who remained in confinement
at the close of 1872 was 209. The admissions and re-admissions during the past
year amounted to 72, against 65 who were discharged or died, and 216 thus
remained at its close. The daily average strength of this class of lunatics
was 187.8 males and 24.3 females. It was suggested that a separate asylum
should be built for these. In last year's resolution, however, the Lieutenant-
Governor expressed his intention to provide a separate asylum—not for
criminal lunatics as such, but for dangerous lunatics of any class. These were
found to amount to 133—106 males and 27 females.
7. While on a comparison with 1872 there was in the past year a slight
decrease (already noticed) in the number of admissions, there was an improve-
ment in the death-rate and in the number of recoveries. Of the total number
of persons under treatment, 278, or 18 per cent., were discharged cured. The
chance of recovery is said to diminish with the duration of the disease, and the
observation is borne out by the figures of the past year, which show that one-
fifth of the cures reported took place in less than three months, one-half under
six months, and three-fourths under a year. The ratios borne by cures and
partial recoveries to average strength were 28.1 and 6.6 per cent. respectively,
against 19.7 and 7.4 per cent. in the previous year.
8. The total number of deaths during the year was 119, or 8 per cent.
of the total number treated and 12 per cent. of the average daily strength.
The corresponding ratios on an average of five preceding years were 9.2 per
cent. and 13.9 per cent. respectively. The mortality in the Bengal asylums
compares not unfavorably with that in those of some other provinces, as will
be observed from the following table:—
Bengal ... ...
North-Western Provinces ...
Central Provinces ... ...
Oudh ... ...
Punjab ... ...
British Burmah ... ...
Madras
...
...
Daily average
strength.
991.4 ...
499.9 ...
232.4 ...
136.3 ...
283.5 ...
129 ...
307.47 ...
Deaths.
119 ...
55 ...
26 ...
22 ...
61 ...
11 ...
42 ...
Percentage of
deaths to strength.
12
11
11.2
16.1
21.5
8.5
13.6