§ MR. SAMUEL SMITH (Flintshire)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether he is aware that the number of acres under poppy cultivation in Bengal during 1898–9 was 564,000, being the largest in the decade, and an increase of 24,000 on the previous year; that the number of chests of opium manufactured in the Bengal Government factories in 1898–9 was 54,192 as against 46,834 in 1897–8, being larger than any other year in the decade; and that the payments made to cultivators of the poppy in Bengal by the Indian Government in the same year amounted to Rx. 2,217,786 as against Rx. 2,021,536 in the previous year, being the largest amount in the decade; and, seeing that the pass duty on opium exported from the Malwa States was lowered in 1897 to Rs.500 per chest, being the lowest figure at which it has stood for nearly forty years, in order to overcome the competition of other crops and prevent the poppy from being driven out of cultivation in those States, whether he proposes to take any steps to discourage the increased growth and manufacture of opium in India.
§ LORD G. HAMILTONI am aware that the area under poppy cultivation in Bengal in 1898–9 was larger than in any other year of the decade, and that the quantity of opium produced was considerably larger than it was in the preceding year, mainly owing to a good agricultural season. But the production of 1898–9 was greatly below that of several successive years of the preceding 959 decade, nor was the quantity of opium manufactured for export and for internal consumption in 1898–9 as great as the average quantity annually exported during 1898–1890. As the production of opium in India varies greatly from year to year, and has not increased, but diminished on a comparison of the decade ending 1899 with the decade ending 1889, I see no reason for taking such action as is suggested.