Resolution on the Report on the Tezpur Lunatic Asylum for 1881.
READ-
Extract from the Proceedings of the Chief Commissioner of Assam in the General
Department^—No, 2,023, dated Shillong, the 17th May 1882.
The Annual Report on tlio Tezpur Lunatic Asylum for tlio year 1881.
Also letter No. 145 1)., dated Shillong, the 24th March 1882, from the Deputy-Snrgcon-
General, Jliastern Frontier District, to the Secretary to the Chief Commissioner of
Assam, forwarding the above Report.
Also Resolution on tho Report of the Tezpur Lunatic Asylum for the year 1880.
RESOLUTION.
THE statistics of the Asylum are fairly satisfactory. The numbers have increased,
being 55 at the end of the year, against 46 at the beginning, but of the admissions less
than one-third are believed to be chronically insane. There were 7 deaths daring the
year, the same number as in 18b0, but out of a larger population, and the average daily
number of sick was 2'63.
2. It is observed that of the two re-admissions, one, a woman, was re-admitted only
twenty days alter she had been discharged as cured. Should such a fact (which prima
facie seems to show an error of judgment on the part of the releasing visitors) occur again,
it should be specially noticed, and explained in the Report.
3. The cost per head of each patient was less than in 1SS0, though the greater
cheapness of food was to some extent balanced by the increased establishment. The
patients were more usefully employed than, before ; they raked Rs. 331-6 worth of
vegetables in the garden, and made baskets which sold for Rs. 70 ; there was il;-i. 20
worth of arrowroot in store at the end of the year. Of the milk they consumed,
Rs. 137-12 worth was supplied by the Asylum's cows. These figures make up a
total of Rs. 559-2, not Rs. 5U0-3-9, as shown in Statement 11. Of the cash received for
baskets (Rs, 70) Rs. 4.0 were paid into the Treasury and Rs. 30 are unaccounted for.
Rs. GO were alsoieeeived from paying patients. The total cash expenditure was, according
to Statment 9, Rs. 7,451-1-3; and, deducting the Rs. 100 received, the cash expenditure was
Rs. 7,354-1-3. The Comptroller will be asked to verify this statement; and in future the
Superintendent should obtain his countcrsignature to Statement 9 before submitting it.
4. When the Chief Commissioner visited the Asylum, in April 1881, he objected
to the absence of any arrangements for segregating the criminal from the non-criminal
lunatic population ; and he also directed steps to be taken to deepen the well, which is
now liable to run dry, and to provide a tank in which the patients should bathe and
wash. More than a year has now elapsed, but nothing whatever has been done to carry
out these orders.
5. The Deputy-Surgeon-General suggests that an overseer of the Public Works
Department should attend the Committee meetings to take orders as to work to be done.
The Chief Commissioner thinks this is unnecessary. It is the Superintendent's business
to push forward and carry through whatever has to be done in the Asylum. In matters
requiring skilled labour, such as the deepening of the well anil the construction of a
masonry tank, he would require assistance from the District Engineer; but such other
work as repairs to huts, building new huts, erecting a stockaded partition between the
two classes of lunatics, and constructing a padded cell, do not require professional aid,
and should be carried out by the Superintendent himself.
By order of the Chief Commissioner of Assam,
C. J. LYALL,
Offg. Secy, to the Chief Commr. of Assam.