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by which I have been able to secure approximate accuracy of returns have been to hold
each Native Superintendent personally responsible for the truth of all reports forwarded
through him. This is less hard than it seems, as it lies quite in the power of the Native
Superintendent to check the slightest attempt at falsification, demanding only a moder-
ate amount of activity on his part to scrutinise the work of the five or six men under
him.
Considering this, it has been my habit to fine the Native Superintendent in
whose district anything of the kind has occurred, but in one of the cases mentioned
above I had to dismiss him as well as the vaccinator, as he had connived at the deceit,
and otherwise been guilty of remissness of duty.
After the above was written, being in Benares for a few days, I thought I might
as well examine the last work of the season, and see whether my men were to the very
end equally prepared for inspection as when a visit from me was expected. The work
of my oldest vaccinator, a man who has always given me much satisfaction, I found
correct up to the latest entry, but I grieve to say that the manner in which the
Native Superintendent and two of the vaccinators had been performing their work since
my last inspection obliges me to dismiss them from the service and report them to
Government. My suspicions were aroused when I saw in the day-book of one of the
city vaccinators the name of a village, fourteen miles distant, where he had operated
on three boys and three girls seven days previously. The Native Superintendent,
Mahomed Bux, corroborated the correctness of this entry, but, to satisfy myself, I went
out the following morning with the vaccinator to the village in question. My surprise
may be judged when I found six boys of various ages waiting my arrival, and all with
fresh scratches of the needle on their arms. Before making any remark, I asked the
youngest child when and by whom he had been vaccinated. He replied without hesi-
tation, " late last night," at the same time mentioning the vaccinator's name. Another
and older child repeated this statement, until the vaccinator came up with the village re-
gister, when the cases entered corresponded with those before me, but not with the entry in
the day-book. On inquiring into the matter, I discovered that the Native Superintendent
was fully aware of the deceit practised, and that either he or the vaccinator himself
had come out to this village during the previous night, and got up for my inspection
these cases, to tally with the number recorded in the vaccinator's day-book. The
other delinquent, a brother of the Native Superintendent, I found had lately made
several false entries, and one in a village that did not exist. The verity of this
man's book the Native Superintendent had also testified to. Having once before had
occasion to warn this man on account of the false returns given by one of his vacci-
nators, I consider it my duty to report him as unfit to hold an appointment under
Government.
7. The remarks I made in my last report regarding the elaborate forms now re-
quired from this department have been quite borne out by the experience of this year.
In order to reach the capacity of the half-educated vaccinator, and wholly uneducated
" Mali," with whom I have to deal in this district, I had printed in Nagree, in a form
calculated to meet the requirements of Statement No. I. of the new vaccine returns,
some five hundred copies each of "village registers," "day-books," and " monthly re-
turns." Though these were simplified as much as possible, yet, to furnish all the in-
formation required by the Government of India, they contained even then no fewer
than from twelve to twenty columns. At first the number of mistakes was overwhelm-
ing, and even now it is common to find a " Mali" making up his grand total of cases
by adding the totals of the " caste," " age," and " sex" columns all into one, thereby
multiplying on paper the number actually vaccinated. From this it will, I think, be
evident that the vaccinators and " Malis " have a larger share of office-work than is
compatible with the satisfactory performance of their manual duties.
8. In accordance with the views of the Sanitary Commissioner with the Government
of India, instructions were received, just before the commencement of the vaccine
season, to post the vaccinators to " mortuary registration circles," i.e., to thannahs,