NIANUFACTURI:S. VOI* centuries 'India ha, been noted for its beautiful fabrics and metalwork, made chiefly in the houses of the natives. They formerly constituted a large proportion of the exports of the country, and competed even with English goods until prohibitory laws were passed 113. Parliament to protect the British industry. Soni• Indian products, on account of the ex quisiteness of the workmanship, occupy a class of their own• and have not been supplanted. But most native Indian industries are 14 a primitive type, and in a society so thoroughly impervious to the spirit of progress their modification and improvement have been impossible. Consequently the development of the factory system in England trade it possible to manufacture products much more cheaply than could be done by the laborious methods of Indian workmen. In addition, recent improvements in transportation facilities have enabled European manufacturing centres to com mand a large part of the ]radian inarket• with the result that in the home market in sonie lo ealities. and in some outside markets, the Indian products have been almost entirely supplanted. The growth of the imports of cotton manufactures is suggestive of the extent to which the native industry has been supplanted. For a further account of these movements, see para graph on Commerce.
Large numbers of native workmen have thus been either thrown out of or forced to make a ehange of occupation. which was dis countenanced by the prevailing social order. This has resulted in widespread poverty among the laboring classes and given occasion for one of the most serious charges against the alien adminis tration. The National Indian Congress (see crn 111( rut) has voieed the prevailing sentiment in mummy.: resolutions demanding a high tariff on imported manufactures in order to protect the home industry.. Another emphatic (lenient] is that the educational system of the country be altered so as to place more emphasis upon industrial training in order that rising generations may be better prepared to assist in the introduction of Oil•tholls, :Wet il)11 on Education.)
Attempt, to establish improved methods have generally depended upon foreign management and untrained native labor, besides having to eon tend with obstacles growing out of differenees of caste. Of disadvantages growing out of a lack of material resources, the great want of fuel and the inferior quality of the coal are the most serious. Under these eonditions the progress of improved methods of manufacturing is slow.
The most important manufacture is that of the coarser grades of cotton. The average num ber of hands employed in the cotton-mills in creased gradually from 53.62-1 in 1SS3 to 112.000 in 1S90 and 1(13,000 in 1900, while the number of mills increased from (12 in ISS3 to 1S(1 in 1900. About three-fourths of this industry, centres in the city of Bombay. A similar inerease was ob served in the jute and hemp industry, which in 1900 employed 101,600 hands, as against 42,797 in 1883. It centres in the region about Calcutta. Among the other more important establishments are woolen, paper, flour, rice, oil, and lumber mills, the breweries, coffee-works and indigo and sugar factories. The total number of factories inspected under the Factories Act in 1899 was 1110, employing 360,000 men, 65,300 women, and 27,400 children. The provinces of Bombay and Madras each employed over a third of the total force. Among other manufactured Indian prod ucts are silk (including beautiful figured stuffs), various articles of luxury, such as highly wrought work in ivory, gold, silver, copper. and brass, cashmere shawls, etc. In weaving and in carving and inlaying wood and ivory, the native artisans are unsurpassed.