THE TAKING OF THE CENSUS IN INDIA.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 139, 13 June 1891, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE TAKING OF THE CENSUS IN INDIA.

Many curious details are published in the Indian papers of the taking of the census. In Bombay, as elsewhere, the work waa commenced at eighb in the evening of Thursday, the 26th April. On the two previous days men had been sent about tha city, beating drums and warning the inhabitants bo be in their houses ab that hour upon bhe day named. They were also ad» monished bo have a lighb burning in each house. Accompanied by a small escort of police and a lantern-bearer, each enumera-. tor made his way from house to

house. All passengers met on the way were stopped and ordered to hurry home.; ' Going to prayers at the mosque' waa tha excuse of one, and the plea was indulgently allowed. In the quarter of the 'bastis**. and bamboo huts bhe interrogation was mainly from without, and the word of the respondents had to be taken. In some dwellings there were found as many as fifty inmates of different nationalities. Superstitious antipathies had to ba reckoned with, besides many absurd prejudices. Some were satisfied that tha census was only a preliminary to a general, raising of taxes ; others imagined that tha proceedings were connected with the> inquiry into child marriages ; then it waa considered suspicious that before the census dwellings were labelled, and a rumour went abroad thab the people's houses wera to be demolished to widen tbe road., Many, on the other hand, were seized with., the notion that the population of Bombayis considered too large, and that its was intended to draught off larga debachmenbs to other parts. Tha greatest difficulty of all was tha, case of houses occupied by Bengali. women whose husbands were absent at tha time. As no persuasion could induce one of these to utter the names of their husbands, tbe assistance of neighbours had to be obtained.