Burma: Census of India 1901 Vol. I - Khamkoo

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REPORT ON THE CENSUS OF BURMA,
Chin-born population accounts for the excess of about i percent. This would
mean that the rate of natural increase in Lower Burma during the decennium was
i *5 per cent, per annum.
36. In Upper Burma we have practically no birth and death figures to help us
in our calculations. Thereturns show, however, that, whereas in 1891 of the total
population enumerated within the limits of Upper Burma proper, 73,868 persons
had been born outside those limits and 55,580 beyond the limits of the province as
a whole, the corresponding figures for 1901 were 114,396 and 76,601- We shall,
in these circumstances, be justified in setting down the increase to the population of
Upper Burma due to foreign immigration at a total of 21,021. This represents 3-8
per cent, of the total increase that has taken place in that area within the last 10
years.
The increase due from migration from other portions of the province is thus
*9»"5 7> or 3"6 per cent., and natural causes account for the balance of 926 per
cent. The above calculations ignore the natural increase that has been going on
among the foreign-born population in Upper Burma during the decennium under
consideration, but, as they stand, the figures will give a general idea of the relative
strength of the different factors that have brought about an increase of the population
since 1891.
37. Let us now consider how the total provincial increase has been distributed
Increases and
, .
decreases by districts.
over the districts of Upper and Lower Burma. Subsi-
.. ~ , . .. , , « i i t-v- i-
diary lable No. IIA. and the District diagram appended
, ,, , ,. ,
to this Chapter show that, with the of and exception Prome Thayetmyo,
L B
where there is a falling off in population of 3,173 and
10,455 souls, all the districts in Lower Burma have
partaken of the numerical growth, but in very varying degrees.
The inhabitants of the
Kyaukpyu district are only three per cent, more numerous than they were 10 years
ago ;
on the other hand those of the Myaungmya district have multiplied to the extent
of 46 per cent. Thongwa follows close on Myaungmya with an increase of 45
per cent. In the Pegu district the percentage of growth is
43 per cent. The reason
for the very substantial rise in the last three districts is not far to seek. There is no
necessity to look beyond their fertile paddy plains to see where their attraction for the
immigrant lies. It is the influx of cultivators, desirous of opening up the rich wastelands
of the delta, that has sent up the population totals ;
the " natural" factors alluded
to above have had but little hand in the work. " Large areas, which 10 years
ago were forest," says the Deputy Commissioner of Pegu, " are now under cultivation."
Immigration, the Deputy Commissioner of Myaungmya tells us, has sent the
population of the Wakema township up by 64 per cent. The strangers come to
a great extent from Madras and other portions of India, but to a certain extent also
from the less favoured regions of Upper and also of Lower Burma. The high
rate of increase in these three districts is not a thing of recent creation. During the
preceding decade the growth was generally as high in the delta as' in the 10 years
under review. In fact in the old Thongwa district the percentage of increase
between 1881 and 1891 was 57 per cent., so that we may infer that the high -water
mark of immigration in this quarter of the province has by now in all probability
been reached. Next to Pegu in growth of population comes, curiously enough,
Northern Arakan, with an increase of no less than 41 per cent. Here, however,
we must recognize the operation of special causes. There may have been immigration
during the ten years 1891 -1900, the death-rate may have. fallen and the
birth-rate risen, but the Deputy Commissioner himself admits that the increase
is more apparent than real and is due in the main not to these factors, but merely
to improved enumeration. After Northern Arakan there is a drop in the percentage
of growth. Toungoo shows the next highest figure (32 per. cent.) for which
immigration from Upper Burma seems to be mainly responsible, and next comes
Rangoon Town with 30 per cent. Hanthawaddy and Henzada, the two most
denselv populated districts of the province, exhibit increases of 22 and 1 1 per cent,
only, thus showing that the limit of their capacity for supporting a growing
population has almost been reached. Bassein district has the same figure
as Hanthawaddy. We learn from the Deputy Commissioner of Bassein that this
district " is not now considered by the Upper Burman to offer him the same chances as