INDIAN FAMINES - Institute for Social and Economic Change

AND PRESS CRITICISM.
U3
guished from the Executive Government. Although,
as already remarked, the climate and
soils, and the consequent periods of harvest,
vary to a considerable extent in India, yet all
are alike affected by the tropical rainfall. We
may therefore, in considering a supposititious
famine, presume that the alarm is given towards
the end of the rainy season-say beginning of
September, when it must be decided whether a
dearth is probable or not. I do not, of course,
pretend to say what the deliberations of the
Viceroy and his Council are likely to be, but
at this juncture they will decide whether importation
should be undertaken or not; and
an important part of their duty will be to
keep the decision arrived at perfectly secret,
as was so successfully done during the early
part of the present famine. The exportation
of food-grains will also be a subject of
debate. This has been discussed freely in the
public press, and it is a matter which no local
influences tend to envelop in darkness; and
therefore, doubtless, everyone who will read
these pages has already formed his opinion on
the subject. My object, as may be gathered