Central Provinces and Berar

CENTRAL PROVINCES AND BERAR. The Central Provinces of India were formed in 1862, and were augmented in 1903 by the Hyderabad assigned districts of Berar, which are leased in perpetuity to the British Government by the Nizam, at an annual rent of 25 lacs of rupees. In 1905 most of the Sam balpur district and five Uriya-speaking States were transferred to Bengal, and five Hindi-speaking States from Chota Nagpur received in exchange. The Province, therefore, now consists of the five divisions of Jubbulpore, Nerbudda, Nagpur, Chhattisgarh and Berar, which are divided into the 22 districts of Saugor, Damoh, Jubbulpore, Mandla, Seoni, Narsinghpur, Hoshangabad, Nimar, Betul, Chhindwara, Wardha, Nagpur, Chanda, Bhandara, Balaghat, Raipur, Bilaspur, Drug, Amraoti, Akola, Buldana and Yeotmal, and the 15 feudatory States of Makrai, Bastar, Kanker, Nandgaon, Khairagarh, Chhuikhadan, Kawardha, Sakti, Raigarh, Sarangarh, Chang Bhakar, Korea, Sirguja, Udaipur and Jashpur. There are two districts, Saugor and Damoh, on the Vindhyan plateau; south of these are the Nerbudda valley districts extend ing from Jubbulpore on the east to North Nimar on the west. South of these again is the great Satpura range of hills and plateaus upon which are situated the four plateau districts of Betul, Chhindwara, Seoni and Mandla and the uplands of Balaghat. South of the Satpuras are the three great plains of Berar, Nagpur and Chhattisgarh, all bounded by hills on the south, Chhattisgarh being divided from the rest of the Province by the Maikal range. The Province is practically surrounded by States, and at only three points does the boundary touch British territory proper, viz., the Jhansi and Mirzapur districts of the United Provinces, in the north of Saugor, and north of the Sirguja State respectively Khandesh of the Bombay Presidency in South Nimar, and West Berar and the Madras Zamindari Estates on the extreme south-east of Raipur and Bastar. Other wise the Province is hemmed in by the Central India States on the north, Nizam's territory on the south, and the Orissa feuda tory States on the east. Only the two Vindhyan districts drain into the Gangetic plain. The waters of the rest of the northern districts and West Berar are carried by the Nerbudda and the Tapti, fed by their many tributaries rising in the Satpuras, into the Arabian sea. South Berar and the Nagpur division drain south-westwards into the Godavari, the principal rivers being the Waingunga, the Wardha, the Paingunga and their numerous tributaries. The eastern and south-eastern portion, Chhattisgarh, is drained by the Mahanadi to the Bay of Bengal. Except for short reaches none of these rivers is navigable throughout the year.

Climate.

In climate the Vindhyan and Satpura districts are comparatively temperate ; the Nerbudda valley is hot, and the three great plains south of the Satpuras have the temperature of the Deccan, the heat from March to the middle of June being excessive, but very dry. The three northern tracts enjoy a very pleasant cold season ; in the three southern the cold is limited to occasional snaps, and the season is cool rather than cold. But, except in the extreme south of Chanda and the tracts nearest Bengal, where the "rains" produce an exceedingly steamy atmos phere, the Province has the advantage of a reasonably cool, rainy season, since both the cyclonic storms from the Bay of Bengal and the steady current of the south-west monsoon from the Arabian sea bring it moisture-laden clouds. The rainfall varies from 25 in. to 3o in. in the west, and from so in. to 6o in. in the east. The monsoon period is divided between early rains, often deficient, middle rains, seldom failing completely, and late rains, premature cessation of which frequently causes severe losses. In 1896 the late rains failed completely, and in 1899 all three periods were failures. These caused the most extensive famines in the history of the Province since it came under British rule.

Agriculture.

A line drawn from Katni in the north to Chanda in the south roughly divides the agriculture of the coun try. East of that line the principal crop is rice, and the rainfaTi is heavy. West of it, there are two sections—the northern in which wheat, gram and cold-weather crops are the most impor tant; the southern in which cotton and juar (big millet) are the great staples. The Nerbudda valley and the Vindhyan districts are the great wheat-producing areas; Nimar, Berar and Nagpur (West), mainly composed of Deccan trap, are the great cotton and juar tracts, but while cotton and juar are quite insignificant in the rice country, and rice is insignificant west of the line of division described, practically every district in the Province con tains some heavy black soil areas which produce wheat and cold weather crops. This variety of soil and cropping affords a certain degree of insurance again capricious rainfall. There are about five million acres of rice, three-and-a-half million acres of wheat, two-and-a-half million acres of juar and one-and-a-quarter mil lion acres of cotton. Besides these, there are large areas under oil seeds, linseed, sesamum and niger being the most important. There are pulses and peas of many kinds, and in the hills and light soils, small millet (Kodon and Kutki), the staple food of the aboriginal tribes.

In

Berar the system of land revenue settlement is the Ryotwara system, on the Bombay model. In the Central Provinces proper the proprietary system of Agra prevails, but the Central Provinces tenant enjoys by law and tradition a degree of protection greater than in any proprietary province, and with this security against arbitrary ejectment and arbitrary enhancement of rent, he has thriven wonderfully, in spite of fluctuations due to bad seasons and the debts which these bring in their train. Much has been ac complished by the creation and expansion of the Agricultural Department from small beginnings to a well-regulated service with experimental seed and demonstration farms, model cattle farms, scientific research and education to improve the yields and better the lot of the cultivator, while co-operative banks and societies have spread all over the country, affording cheaper credit than the moneylender will offer.

In the rice districts there are numerous irrigation works made by the people themselves, though few of these can stand against protracted drought. Government irrigation works only began to be undertaken 25 years ago, and in that time three large canals and many large and small storage works have been constructed, mainly in the rice districts. These now protect half a million acres from the effects of drought. There are still several large projects under construction and investigation, principally in the Bilaspur district, which had been somewhat neglected in this respect. There are about 20,000 sq. miles of Government forest reserves, and about 9,00o sq. miles of private forests; to which must be added 15,00o sq. miles in the feudatory States. There are valuable sal (Shored robusta) forests in the north-east, and teak (Tektona grandis) in almost every district, though teak of fine girth is limited to a few famous reserves. There are many mis cellaneous kinds of timber, bamboos and minor produce of com mercial value, while there are edible fruits and roots with which the forest tribes supplement their food supply. .The mohua tree (Bassia lati f olia) has a flower which is edible, and from which country liquor is distilled, as well as a nut from which oil is ex tracted. The Government forests yield an annual revenue of some 5o lacs of rupees.

Population.—Nearly one-fifth of the people are of aboriginal and old Dravidian races, Gonds being the most numerous. Nearly all the rest are immigrants, mostly Hindus, who entered, some in very ancient days, others intermittently (notably when the Moguls conquered the Deccan and exercised suzerainty over the Gond chiefs) . Many of these came from Malwa, some from Hindustan, but with the entry of the Mahrattas on the scene 200 years ago, a large influx of Mahrathi-speaking people poured in from the west. On the fringes along the east and south there are Oriya and Telugu immigrants. Mohammedans numbering only 34% of the population are to be found mainly in the towns, being descendants of settlers who clustered round Mogul posts and certain seats of Government, or such special cities as Burhan pur and Ellichpur. Individual Mohammedan families occupied land in the interior, but while only 9% of the total population is urban, 41% of the Mohammedans live in the towns.

With such heterogeneous elements and origins, there are great diversities of language. There are ten major languages, with many separate dialects of the same. There are 200,000 people returned as speaking many minor languages. In round numbers there are nine millions who speak various dialects of Hindi, and five millions who speak Mahrathi of various degrees of purity, the remaining two millions being divided up among tribal and other minor languages.

The first regular census was taken in the Central Provinces in 1872, in Berar a few years earlier. The figures of that census may be taken as representing the high-water mark of development be fore railways entered the Province. The last census is of 1931. The contrast is notable : This increase is shown in spite of a decrease during the decade 1891-1901, due to the great famines and the first ravages of plague, and virtual stagnation in the decade 1911-1921, which included the World War, two serious crop failures, and the great influenza scourge of 1918-1919, which claimed 1 million victims.

Railways.—Bef ore the railways came there was a burst of activity in the construction of some important trunk roads, some of which were allowed to fall into disrepair when the trunk lines of railway were made. A branch of the East Indian Rail way from Allahabad to Jubbulpore was the first railway made in the Province in 1870, while the G.I.P., bifurcating at Bhusawal, in Khandesh, sent one line to meet the East Indian at Jubbulpore, and a second branch through Berar to Nagpur. It was 20 years before the Bengal-Nagpur railway, absorbing a State meter gauge line from Nagpur to the borders of Chhattisgarh (opened in i 881) made a second connection between Bombay and Calcutta via Nagpur and Bilaspur, from which place a branch went over the Ghats and across the Rawa State to join the East Indian at Katni. The Indian Midland Railway, afterwards amalgamated with the G.I.P., made a fresh connection from Itarsi in Hoshanga bad, via Bhopal, Gwalior and Jhansi, with Agra and Delhi, and a branch from Bina, through Saugor and Damoh, connecting with Katni followed a few years later. Ten years later saw the next development by the Bengal-Nagpur Railway of narrow gauge lines (2 ft. 6 in.) across the Satpuris from Gondia in Bhandara to Jubbulpore, with branches to Seoni, Chhindwara and Mandla on the Satpura plateau. This was followed by a line from Gondia south-westwards to Chanda, where it met an extension of the Warora Coal Railway to the new coal-field at Ballaspur, a few miles south of Chanda. Connections on the same narrow gauge with this branch to Nagpur and on to Chhindwara followed. A further broad gauge connection between Nagpur and Itarsi was completed in 1926, crossing the Satpura district of Betul with a branch into the Chhindwara coal-field.

Two links, both under construction, alone remain to complete direct broad gauge connections between Southern India and the North, one from Warangal to Chanda, and the other from Vizianagram on the east coast to Raipur. One more link on the meter gauge is required to join the Hyderabad-Godaveri Railway at Hingoli with the Rajputana-Mulwa Railway at Khandwa, via Basim and Akola. When this, too, is accomplished, the network of railways in the C.P. and Berar will be completed, representing a length of 3,00o miles inside the Province. There are also feeder lines in the cotton country of Berar and Wardha, controlled by private companies. All these works represent an outlay of at least £25,000,000 and only a few feeder lines remain to be con structed. There are also 8,000 miles of roads, half being metalled and half gravelled, but with the great increase of motor traffic which is now beginning to penetrate even the remoter areas, there is still an enormous scope for road construction before village cart tracks cease to be the main method of wheel traffic.

Trade and Commerce.—The trade of the country has enor mously increased, the value of the rail-borne traffic being about 6o crores of rupees annually. The bulk of the exports are cotton, wheat, rice, oil seeds and other agricultural produce, but coal and manganese are now important items. Coal is unfortunately of too poor a quality to be of any use for metallurgical pur poses. There are coal-fields in Narsinghpur, Chanda and Wun (Berar), and in the Pench valley in Chhindwara (q.v.). It is used in cotton mills and factories and to some extent on the rail ways. The manganese deposits in Nagpur, Bhandara, Balaghat and Chhindwara are being vigorously worked, and some 500,000 tons a year are exported. There are plentiful bauxite deposits in Jubbulpore and Balaghat awaiting exploitation. Iron ore is found in many districts, but worked only by indigenous methods in small charcoal furnaces. There are large deposits of excellent ore in Chanda, but for want of coking coal it is practically un touched. There is also valuable limestone in many places, no tably near Katni, where lime and cement works are important industries.

Outside the cotton industry (which is represented by 12 spin ning and weaving mills and some 30o textile and connected fac tories, including ginning factories, employing in all about 6o.000 people), the gun-carriage factory in Jubbulpore and the Govern ment and railway workshops, organized manufacturing indus tries are confined mostly to small concerns scattered about in various districts, but the motor trade and electrical installations are increasing. Rural and small hand industries include hand weaving, the manufacture of brass and copper utensils, pottery, shoes, baskets, bamboo matting, carpentry and smithy work. but the larger colonies of handicraftsmen have suffered from the competition of machine-made goods, both local and imported. In the mass, however, cottage and hand industries still have a large output. They depend on agricultural prosperity and suffer with agriculture from the effects of bad seasons.

The Province has also made strides educationally. Colleges and high schools and subsidiary institutions have multiplied in numbers, and there is now a university at Nagpur, with institu tions for scientific and professional training, which have increased both in numbers and status. In the 4o years between 1881 and 1921 literacy among males increased from 51 to 10,3 per mille, and among females from 1 to 8 per mile. Literacy in English is confined to a few castes. 84 per i 0.00o, or under i %, of males can read English, but only 9 per io,000 females, or under r per thousand. Great efforts have been made to extend medical relief in hospitals and dispensaries, better knowledge of hygiene and child welfare. The public revenue reflects the general advance ment. Twenty years ago it was under two crores of rupees; it is now over six.

These two territories, now under a single administration, have a somewhat different history. The history of Berar is mainly the history of the Deccan, to which it geographically belongs. The Central Provinces were known to the races of the north as the "Forests of the South," inhabited by Rakshas or demons, but ancient Rajput dynasties penetrated to the more open parts of the country, and of these the famous Hai Hai Bansi dynasty ruled Chhattisgarh for many centuries until conquered by the Bhonslas in 1741.

The Gonds.

The rest of the Central Provinces were known as Gondwana, the kingdom of the Gonds, who held the wildest parts of the country. The oldest Gond kingdom was that of Chanda in the south, to which a history of about Boo years is sometimes attributed. In the north was the kingdom of Gar ha-Mandla, from which sprang the two sub-kingdoms of Deogarh in Chhindwara and Kherla in Betul. This last was overthrown by Hoshang Shah of Malwa, the founder of Hoshangabad. The Gond kings, who must have established their rule over older Rajput dynasties, are fond of describing themselves as Rajgonds, and of claiming a Rajput origin.

One of these Gond kings, said to have been the 47th of the Garha-Mandla house, named Sangramsha, in 1480 extended his dominion over the Nerbudda valley and the Vindhyan districts, including even the tract now known as the State of Bhopal. San gramsha lived until 1530, but a successor of his, Chandrasha, was forced to cede the two last-named territories to the Moguls in 1570, but, though these Garha-Mandla chiefs owed a nominal alle giance to the Mogul emperor, they maintained a virtual inde pendence until the weakening of the Mogul power let in the predatory forces of the Mahrattas and (in the north) the Bundela chiefs. The Garha-Mandla Raj was finally overthrown by the Peshwa in 1780.

The Gond Rajah of Deogarh had paid a visit of homage to Delhi, and was so impressed with what he saw there, that he turned Mohammedan, adopting the name of Bakht Buland and establishing a new capital at Nagpur. He was himself an enlight ened chief, but one of his grandsons, quarrelling over the succes sion, invited Raghoji Bhonsla from Berar to help him against his brother.

The Mahrattas.

Raghoji and his Mahrattas accomplished this mission, and returned to their own territory, but later he estab lished himself at Nagpur. Raghoji I., sprung from a peasant family in Satara, was a great leader, and by 1751 had conquered the territories of Nagpur, Chanda and Chhattisgarh. He defied the Peshwa, burnt Poona on the west, and on the east raided Ben gal, and extended his sovereignty over Orissa. He died in 1755 and his son Janoji was forced to submit to the Peshwa, but the next rajah, Mudhoji, and, after him, Raghoji II., acquired by pur chase the northern territories as well, and the Nagpur State there after comprised the whole of the Central Provinces, Orissa, and some of the Chota Nagpur States. By joining Sindia against the British in 1803, and as the result of Wellesley's victories of Assaye and Argaon, Raghoji lost Cuttack, Sambalpur and part of Berar. His successor, Mudhoji (known as Appa Sahib), by a treacherous attack on the British in 1818, was forced to cede the whole of the northern districts. Appa Sahib was allowed to hold the Nagpur territory, but on his further treachery being discov ered, he fled, and a minor grandson of Raghoji II. was recognized as rajah by the British government. During his minority the Nag pur territories were administered by the Resident, Sir R. Jenkins, until 1840. Raghoji III. died in 18J3, without male issue, and Lord Dalhousie declared the Nagpur State an escheat.

Central Provinces Under British Rule.

The northern ter ritories ceded in 1818 and known as the Sangor Nerbudda terri tories were administered as part of the Province of Agra. When the Nagpur territories escheated in 1853, they were administered by a commissioner as the Nagpur province. In 1861 they were amalgamated with the northern territories and became the Central Provinces. In 1903, Berar was added to the charge of the chief commissioner. In 1905, on the partition of Bengal, the Sambalpur district and the Uriya States adjacent to it were transferred to Bengal in exchange for five Hindi-speaking States of Chota Nagpur.

The first chief commissioner was the energetic Sir Richard Temple. His successor, Sir John Morris, governed the province for over 15 years, after which came a rapid succession of chief commissioners. Among these were men who made their mark in India, such as Sir Charles Crosthwaite, Sir Alexander Mackenzie, Sir Anthony (afterwards Lord) Macdonnell, Sir John Woodburn, Sir Denzil Ibbetson and Sir John Hewett. Only four of the later chief commissioners were men previously serving in the Central Provinces: Sir Andrew Fraser, Sir Reginald Craddock, Sir Ben jamin Robertson and Sir Frank Sly (in whose time the chief corn missionership was elevated into a governorship and council). The present governor, Sir Montagu Butler, is a Punjab officer.

The pioneer work of Sir Richard Temple and Sir John Morris, aided by a commission consisting mainly of military officers, pro vided the province with several important trunk roads, and with a land settlement on the zamindari system. The Tenancy Act of 1883 gave the tenantry of the province a degree of security in their holdings which no other zamindari province in India enjoys to a like extent. The land settlements then made have since been twice revised under a system which will always be associated with the name of Sir Bampfylde Fuller.

The first railway was opened in 1870, and the railway system of the present day extends to nearly 2,000 miles. The two trunk railways between Bombay and Calcutta pass through the north and south of the province respectively. The Marathi-speaking dis tricts in the south and west are more advanced than the Hindi speaking districts of the north and east.

There have been serious setbacks, for most disastrous famines occurred in 1867, 1897 and 1900, while there were serious crop failures in 1907, 1913, 1918 and 1920, which would have produced similar results but for the vastly improved protection afforded by the increased credit and prosperity of the people. Plague has also taken its toll of the large towns, the worst epidemics known having been in 1903 and 1909. The influenza outbreak of 1918 accounted for some 800,000 deaths.

The reformed constitution has had a chequered existence be cause of Nationalist majorities which refused to co-operate or to vote the pay of ministers, but matters have improved to some extent in the last few years.

History of Berar.

The fertile plain of Berar (the ancient Vidharba) has had a chequered history. It was under the sway of the various dynasties that ruled Southern India until the Mo hammedan invasion at the end of the 13th century, when it formed a province of the Bahmani dynasty, but about 1490 a rebellious governor, Imad ul Mulk, declared his independence and estab lished a kingdom, which was again wrested from his descendants in 1572 by the Ahmednagar king. It was ceded by him to the Moguls in 1595, when his own capital was besieged by them, and the Emperor Akbar's sons governed it together with Ahmednagar and Khandesh until Akbar's death in 1605. It then came under the rule of Malik Ambar the Abyssinian. On his death in 1626, the Emperor Shah Jehan once more annexed it.

Towards the end of the 17th century, when Mogul power was waning, Berar began to be overrun by the Mahrattas, who won from Delhi their claim to blackmail (clianth) . In 1724 Nizam Asaf Jah, establishing the independent line of Nizams of Hydera bad, claimed de jure sovereignty over Berar. This claim was dis puted by the Bhonsla rajahs, and for some 5o years the inhabitants were harried and ground down by this conflict of authorities. This was ended by Wellesley's victories of Assaye and Argaon in 1803, when the country west of the Wardha river was ceded to the Nizam.

Pindari and Bhil raiders, and also the exactions of their dis puting rulers, harried the people. The Nizam pledged the revenues as security for loans taken by him, the result being further exac tions from the Farmers General to whom the revenues had been assigned. The British at last intervened, in 1853, and a treaty was made with the nizam by which these territories came under British administration under the title of the Hyderabad Assigned Dis tricts. On the subject of boundaries this treaty was again revised in 1860, and it was agreed that the British government should ad minister Berar in trust for the Nizam, to whom was given the bal ance of the revenues after the cost of the Hyderabad contingent and of the administration of these districts had been met. Lord Curzon later concluded a fresh treaty with the nizam whereby the latter agreed to give a perpetual lease of these districts to the British government in return for an annual payment of 25 lakhs of rupees.

The six districts of Berar were reduced to four and a commis sioner's division attached to the Central Provinces, but the sov ereign rights of the Nizam continued. By an agreement dated Oct. 24, 1936, the King-Emperor reaffirmed the Nizam's sovereignty over Berar, and the Nizam agreed to Berar and the Central Prov inces being administered together as one province.

Berar, after centuries of harassment, has become a peaceful and prosperous sub-province, made wealthy by the cotton crop and cotton industry, and cultivated by as prosperous a tenantry as can be found anywhere in India outside the most highly irrigated tracts. The revenue settlements of Berar are ryotwari, namely, made with the peasantry direct. The system follows generally that of the adjacent districts of Bombay, and village headmen in Berar perform, for a percentage remuneration on the revenue they col lect, duties which, in the Central Provinces, are assigned to the malguzars, or village proprietors.

As Berar continues to be outside British India, its legislation has to be brought into effect by notification by the Governor-General, but it sends elected members to the Central Provinces Legislative Council, their position being legalized by their nominations to that council. (R. H. C.)