MR. HERBERT ROBERTS (Denbighshire, W.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to the speech of the Lieutenant Governor at the Legislative Council at Calcutta on the 30th ult., in reference to the regulations which would be adopted in that city by the Government in view of the outbreak of the plague; whether the Lieutenant Governor is correctly reported to have given an assurance that no wholesale quarantine would be imposed, as at Bombay; that in no case would wife and husband be separated; and that every respect would be paid to the Purdah system; and whether he can give any information as to the extent to which the inoculation treatment against plague by Professor Haffkine's method had been adopted at Calcutta?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIAI have seen the newspaper account of the Lieutenant Governor's speech to which the honourable Member's Question refers. I have ascertained from the Viceroy that assurance has been given by the Bengal Government that wholesale quarantine against plague will not be enforced, but that arrangements will be made for inspecting travellers from infected localities, for segregating persons suspected of plague and for treating plague-stricken travellers. Members of families will not be separated when sent to segregation camps, and the Purdah system will be respected. Private plague hospitals and segregation camps are permitted. Inoculation is not enforced on anyone, but arrangements are made for inoculating, under Professor Haff- 405 kine's system, persons who desire to be thus protected, and special concessions have been made to encourage this form of inoculation.