CENTRAL PROVINCES MEMORANDUM.
61
were left in the hands of the men who had bought them for the preceding quarter at the old
monthly rates of license fees and on the condition that they purchased only at a Government
store or from distributing agents appointed by Deputy Commissioners. Wholesale vendors
were employed as distributing agents on a commission at rates varying from 9 pies to 1½
anna per rupee on the fixed selling price of Rs. 2-14-0 per seer: this price included both the cost
to Government and the fixed duty.
13. The ganja issued for consumption in the year was for the most part raised in the
season July to November 1878, and in respect of that season's crop no difficulty in realizing
duty under the arrangements just described was experienced. But at the close of the preced-
ing year there were stocks of old ganja, the produce of the autumn of 1877, and on these a
duty of Rs. 30 a maund was made leviable under the Chief Commissioner's orders: where
these stocks in the hands of any one person exceeded 1 maund, a special rate in excess of
Rs. 30 a maund was exacted; but in several districts payment of duty was evaded, licensed ven-
dors having been allowed, in spite of orders to the contrary, to purchase, after the clese of
1878, quantities largely in excess of what was necessary to carry them on to the end of March
1879.
14. " Bhang" (foreign) was taxed this year for the first time, but statistics of receipts
under this head are not available till 1882-83. The rate first fixed was Rs. 8 per maund, and
any licensed retail vendor was permitted to import what he required on prepayment of duty
at that rate. At the same time a rate of Rs. 10 was imposed on charas. The rate on bhang
was raised in July to Rs. 8 per maund less than that charged for ganja, i.e., to over Rs. 100
per maund, taking the ordinary ganja rate to be Rs. 2-14-0 per seer. The cost price in Raj-
putana and other sources of supply was Rs. 10 to Rs. 12 per maund. From records in this
office it appears that in the preceding half of the year 1879 about 7 maunds were imported
into Nimar, Hoshangabad, and Jubbulpore, and that in those districts and also in Chanda,
Seoni, Saugor, and Raipur there were old stocks amounting in all to 22 maunds 24 seers. The
only districts in which there was any licitly imported charas was Jubbulpore, and the amount
there was 37½ seers only.
On "local bhang," or refuse ganja, a duty of 3 annas per seer was, imposed, the article
being issued to licensed vendors at this rate from the Government stores. The chief use of
this was as medicine for cattle to get them into good condition.
15. In this year Ganja License Forms VII and X, prescribed by Notification No. 4627,
dated the 5th November 1878, were cancelled, and licenses published with Notification No. 996
dated the 12th March 1880, substituted therefor. This step was taken at the instance of the
Commissioner of Excise with the object of protecting our revenue against smuggling by rail
from foreign territory or from British territory beyond the Central Provinces. Ganja was
cultivated in particular in the Indore territory south of the Nerbudda, 7 villages in which the
plant was raised forming a group round Sanawad on the railway line between Khandwa and
Indore and constituting what was almost an island of foreign territory within the Nimar district.
The amount of ganja raised annually was about 1,500 maunds, and this could be bought on the spot
at from Rs. 2-4 to Rs. 2-8 a maund, no pass or permit being required. The badness of the roads and
the insecurity of life and property throughout Central India rendered it practically impossible
for traders in this ganja to reach a market otherwise than by rail and therefore by passing
through British territory. It was obviously essential to keep a watch on consignments so
sent, and rules 7 and 8 of the Notification of November 1878 were meant to be read, with
Forms VII and X, as requiring imports from outside the Central Provinces to be taken to a
Government store-house under one license (Form VII) and then exported under another
(Form X). But Form VII merely required that imported ganja should be delivered at the
Central Store, "to be there disposed. of according to the orders in force for the produce of
cultivators resident beyond the Central Provinces." It was therefore found necessary to pro-
vide specifically for the examination of consignments booked to railway stations within the
Central Provinces, and the revised Form VII contained the necessary conditions. At the same
time Form X, which in its original shape was practically useless, was altered so as to render all
ganja, whether purchased within the Central Provinces or in course of transit through them
for sale in other parts, liable to examination by any Provincial Excise officer at any time.
16. The gross receipts under ganja for the year were Rs. 89,937, but the arrangements
for securing payment of the newly imposed direct duty cost Rs. 6,636, so that net receipts
were only slightly in excess of those for 1878-79.
The quantity of ganja sold retail was nearly 600 maunds, representing some 800 maunds
of uncleaned hemp, but it would not be safe to conclude that this represents anything like the
quantity actually consumed during the year. In Nimar only 6 maunds 24 seers of ganja
were sold under the sanctioned arrangements, but there can be no doubt that this amount was
quite insufficient for the wants of the district, and smuggling from the Sanawad pargana of
Indore is known to have gone on to a great extent. Retail prices everywhere ruled much higher
than they had ever done before, the cost price to licensed vendors being nowhere less than Rs.
2-12-0 per seer, or about 2 pice for one pice weight. The total number of retail shops rose to
1,223, but the figures for districts differ greatly in many instances from those of 1877-78 and
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