HC Deb 01 March 1897 vol 46 cc1334-5
MR. R. J. PRICE (Norfolk, E.)

I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to the statement of Sir Arthur Cotton, as published in The Friend of China, that the Godavery River might at this moment be pouring rice into the famine districts of the North in immense quantities, at a nominal cost of carriage of one penny a bushel, if only the several pieces of canal in the 1,000 miles between were united, which they might be for the cost of 20 miles of railway; and whether the Indian Government will consider the advisability of shortly undertaking the necessary works?

LORD GEORGE HAMILTON

The Godavery River Navigation Works, to which the hon. Member's Question relates, were carefully considered by the Government of the Central Provinces, the Government of India, and the Secretary of State in Council in 1871, and all these authorities agreed that the works should not be proceeded with. The large expenditure involved would have been out of all proportion, not only to the prospects of traffic, but to the amount of protection from famine which the undertaking might have afforded. There is no reason to believe that the Government of India have any intention of now proceeding with the scheme.