§ SIR MANCHEEJEE BHOWNAGGREEI beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether any reply has been received to the communication addressed by him to the Government of India with the view of supplementing the amounts subscribed to the Mansion House and other voluntary famine funds by a national grant, so as to place at the disposal of that Government an adequate sum for the purpose of making advances to the ryots and for supplying them with cattle, seeds, implements, and other necessaries for carrying on agricultural operations with the next rainfall.
§ LORD G. HAMILTONThe Government of India intend to provide a large sum, by way of supplement to what will be available from the various charitable funds, for supplying the ryots in the famine districts with cattle, seeds, and other necessaries for carrying on agricultural operations. The details of the scheme are not yet completely settled, but the assistance to be given to the cultivators will probably take the form of advances without interest, repayable by instalments not to begin for a year from the present time, and with power to the local Governments to make large remissions, thus converting the advances, or a portion of them, into gifts, as circumstances may require.