No. 983, JUDICIAL, 8TH JUNE L806.
GOVERNMENT OF MADRAS.
JUDICIAL DEPARTMENT.
£ EAD letter from the Surgeon-General, No. T—5-A, dated 15th April 1896.
ORDER—No. 983, Judicial, dated 8th June 1896.
The report on the administration of the Lunatic Asylums of this Presidency
during 1895 was submitted with punctuality. The arrangement of the matter in it
appears, however, to be capable of improvement. In some instances, e.g., paragraphs
[) (r/) and 5 (/^), subjects are placed under inappropriate headings ; in others, e.g.,
paragraphs 3 and 6, kindred matters are separated by discussions of questions to which
they bear no relation ; and in others information upon a clearly denned branch of the
administration is scattered over several places in the report in a manner which
renders any general view of the subject difficult of attainment. Examples of this
last defect ave to be found in the treatment of the statistics of health, and of the
subject of manufactures. The Surgeon-General will be requested to divide his
future reports under the four main headings of (1) Population and accommodation,
(2) Statistics of health and treatment of the sick, (3) Finance (including manufactures)
and (4) General, comprising such matters as do not come within the other three divi-
sions, and to deal with each aspect of the administration in its appropriate place under
these headings.
2. Population and Accommodation.—The following table compares the statistics
of the population of the asylums for the last two years : —
Population at
beginning of year.
Ad missions.
Discharged.
Died.
Remaining at end
oi year.
Year.
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a
1 13 d 3 3
urel
impro
p
CD
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1
o
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rimin:
O
o
H
o
o
H
O
o
H
O
o
H
o
O
*
1894
434
150
584
178
44
222
91
28
119
50
14
64
463
160
623
1895
463
160
623
175
46
221
104
22
126
84
26
110
448
160
608
The high proportion borne by the civil to the criminal population continued.
The Surgeon-General will be requested to take active steps during the course of the
year to ascertain whether some appreciable number of the civil lunatics who are harm-
less cannot be handed over to their friends and relations. It appears to His Excellency
in (Jouucil that the State is at present maintaining many of this class who should
properly bo taken charge of by their families and who would bo happier with them
than in an asylum. In Bengal the criminal lunatics form more than one-half of the
whole asylum population. The proportion is much smaller in this Presidency. In
this connection the attention of all District Magistrates will be drawn to the necessity
of making sure, before sending a lunatic to an asylum, that such a course is really
necessary for the public well-being. From cases which have recently come to notice
it appears that this is not always done.
It will be observed that though the year opened with thirty-nine more inmates
in the three institutions than did 1894, and admissions hardly varied at all, yet an
increase in the number of discharges and a great advance in the deaths reduced the
population at the end of the year to fifteen less than in the preceding year . The
advance in the number of insanes who were discharged cured, which occurred mainly
iu the Madras asylum, and was the highest figure but one recorded in the previous
decade, appears to point to increased care there. The increase in the number of
deaths is dealt with below.