Thoughts from the void: Memorandum on Hemp Drugs in Indore State 1894

Memorandum on Hemp Drugs in Indore State, Vol 3, Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1894-1895, https://digital.nls.uk/74464868

The cultivation of the hemp plant for the purpose of producing bhang, ganja and charas is so extremely limited in this State that there is no scope whatever for putting it under administrative control. The whole area under narcotic hemp plant cultivation is given in the appendix.* The figures given there show that the maximum area during the last twenty years was 354 bighas, minimum 66 bighas, and the average 181 bighas. The cultivation is confined to a few mahals in the Nimar district, bordering on the Narbada, and in Sanwer a few miles to the north of Indore. Thus it will be seen that although the State puts no restriction on the cultivation, or controls it in any way whatever, the ryot has not found it to his advantage to grow it largely, although the plant is capable of thriving almost everywhere in the State. There is no special rate of assessment charged on land under hemp cultivation; but is determined solely by the quality of the soil, and is usually Rs. 7 to Rs. 8 a bigha. No wild hemp is found in the State. Here or there a plant may be seen by road or river side or near the huts of fakirs, etc., due to the dropping of the hemp seed by consumers. The growth being thus limited the manufacture of ganja and bhang is necessarily so. Under the excise system prevalent in Indore, the import and export of the hemp drugs are not shown under a separate head denoting the hemp drugs, but are included under the general head of ' kirana ' (i. e., drugs, spices, etc.), and cannot therefore be accurately given. There is no doubt that the drugs are both imported into the State and exported from it, but not to that extent which would make it desirable to assign special heads in the State accounts to their traffic. As in the case of cultivation, so here there are no restrictions on either the importation or exportation of any of the hemp drugs. They can be imported or exported by any body to any extent without a license on the payment merely of the fixed duty. Practically the trade is so limited as not to require its regulation by the State. The importers of ganja and other drugs are generally the banias and there is no limit fixed to the storing and transport of these drugs, by them. Sale. The sale is either (1) wholesale or (2) retail. No license is required for wholesale, and there is no maximum limit to the quantity a wholesale dealer may sell at a time. There is, however, a minimum limit, namely, 60 seers, prescribed by a regulation of the State below which the wholesale dealer may not sell on pain of liability to confiscation of his commodity and a fine up to Rs. 50 by the customs officer and to unlimited amount by the Darbar. The occasions on which the darbar have exercised its powers in this respect are very rare indeed, and have done so extremely moderately. The State prescribes no minimum or maximum price of sale, and the wholesale dealer may dispose of his ware at any price it may fetch. The right to sell in retail is farmed out by public auction, and none but the leaseholder or his agents can make retail sales. The ijardar or leaseholder is at liberty to open any number of shops at any place which may be convenient to him, In practice, however, it is understood that he follows the advice of the customs officers of the State. As a matter of fact at present the retail farmer has only one shop of his own in the city of Indore, and has commissioned fifteen tobacco-sellers, to whom he sells a quantity not exceeding half a seer at an interval of two or three days, to sell for him. In the mofussil the contractor usually has one shop at the head-quarters of every mahal, making about forty shops in all in the districts. Although it cannot be said that the number of shops is determined deliberately with a view to area and population, it naturally adjusts itself to the demand, and therefore indirectly to area and population. There is no such thing in the State as "local option" firstly, because the matter is so small as not to require any such measure being adopted by the State; and, secondly, because the people themselves have never asked and have no need for it. The thing does not amount to an evil giving rise to complaints requiring a remedy. The average amount of the retail contract for the last eleven years is Rs. 5,140 per year. The law prescribes no limit, maximum or minimum, in point of quantity to the retail sales to, or possession by, a consumer. But it has fixed the rates of the retail sale of each of these drugs, which are as follows: ganja, at half a seer a rupee in Indore city and one seer a rupee in the mofussil, bhang at four seers a rupee throughout the State, and charas at five tolas a rupee throughout. The probable yearly consumption of these drugs in the State may be about 200 maunds of ganja and an equal quantity of bhang, leaving charas quite out of account as being inappreciable. These figures are the result of a very rough calculation, and not based upon reliable statistics. Having regard, however, to the probable number of consumers and the quantity consumed by an average consumer, they appear to be approximately correct. Duties. Besides the amount realised from the ijara or monopoly of retail sale, which is Rs. 5,140 yearly on an average as stated before, there are two duties levied on these drugs known as "katati" or inward, and "bharati" or "nikasu" or outward. These terms include the import and the export duty proper, that is, the duty levied on goods brought into the State from, or sent out of the State to, foreign territory as well as the duty levied on goods transmitted from one mahal to another within the State itself at each mahal. The "katati" and "bharati" are levied at the same rate at the place itself. But the rate varies in different districts, being maximum Rs. 3-12-0 per rás of 3 maunds or 120 seers and minimum annas 12 for ganja; maximum annas 15 for one rás and minimum annas 8 for bhang; and maximum Rs. 7-11-0 and minimum Rs. 5-8 per rás for charas. The duties are levied at the Sayar nakas by which every merchandize must pass. Evasion to pay the duty is punishable with confiscation of the goods smuggled and a fine up to Rs. 50 by the customs officer, or to an unlimited amount by the Darbar. The temptation to smuggle is greatly checked by the smallness of the duty and by the comparatively heavy liability to punishment. An enormously excessive tax like that of Rs. 335 per maund levied in Bengal (see page 324, volume V of Dr. Watt's Dictionary) would, in the very nature of things, invite smuggling, whereas the small rates levied by Indore cannot be expected to operate in that direction. There is still a reason to believe that these drugs are smuggled into the State from Ujjain; and from Sanowad they are possibly smuggled into the adjoining British territory or other Native States. Excepting at these two points, smuggling is seldom heard of. Administration. The central administrative power rests with the Darbar. The executive head of customs and excise for the Indore city and Indore zillah is the Muntazim Sayar and for the other zillahs the Subha of each zillah. The present excise system in respect to hemp drugs in the State, so far as it may be so called, is based upon a few standing circular orders promulgated by the Darbar in the State Gazette from time to time. Some of these have already been noticed in their proper places in this memorandum. The system is on the whole working fairly relatively to the importance of the interests involved and no modification of it is contemplated.

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Memorandum on Hemp Drugs in Indore State 1894

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