Conditions and Doings in India.
Page 18
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Warning the Calcutta Cabby Collectively. India's Imports.
By our own Correspondent in Calcutta.
Troublesome Taxi-cabs in Calcutta.
It is not exactly known whether it, is the desire of Calcutta taxicab drive r.,ie get rich in a burry. out they have an unenviable reputation of rushing about the streets at an alarming pace, knocking people down and then bolting as fast as their taxi will carry them. Perhaps it may be well to state in the first place that the drivers are all natives or Eurasians, whose wages e unid haritiy attract the skilled Loudon taxi-driver, and some of the natives of Bengal de not rank high with the inhabitants of countries who possess a standard code of honour, hence the callousness combined with cowardice of some of them when a pedestrian is run over. Speaking of Bengal and the .Bengalese, Lord Macaulay long ago announced that The land is a low lying land,
And the people a low lying people.
The Commissioner of Police here has tried to get even with the taxi-drhers by 'nuzzling the engiece, that the taxi, when going full speed, cannot exceed 12 miles an hour, but for some reason or other this arrangement has not proved to be satisfactory, for some of the drivers manage to fly about the streets as fast as ever. However, Sir F. L. Halliday, Commissioner of Police, does not propose to let the matter
drop. He has summoned the whole of the taxidrivers to his office and has warned them finally that any driver found to be travelling at a pace beyond the allowed speed will promptly have his licence cancelled. The Commissioner certainly means business, and perhaps we shall now hear a good deal less of furious driving and taxicab accidents.
The Expense of the Bombay Taxicab.
By tho way, tile taxicab seri. ice continues to do well here and in Bombay, notwithstanding that the fares charged are much in excess of those charged by first-class two-horse cabs. I tested this matter of fares the other day by driving to College Street in a first-class conveyance and returning by the same route in a taxi. The double-horse cab fare was 8d. and the taxi fare worked out at just double. Yet it is difficult to get a taxi when one wants one. They are so clean and fast that the class of people who use them do not, bother about the extra cost. I should say that the Indian Taxi and Motor Co. are doing excellent business, and they have done some griod as well by forcing horse cab owners to turn out better conveyances than used to be the ease before the advent of the taxi. The time is not far distant when other large towns in India will catch on to the taxi idea, and that will mean more work for your manufacturers. But, paradoxical as it may appear, the more work that is heaped on manufacturers the better they like it. I feel confident that India will continue to please them.
Imports of Motor Vehicles. Interesting Figures.
Only a verv few years ago motor vehicles of any sort were quite unknown in India, and it was firmly believed that the great heat of the plains of this country would preclude the use of motors, commercial or others, not only on account of the effect of the fierce tropical sun on the woodwork, which, it was erroneously said, would fall to pieces, but also because the engines could not be kept. sufficiently cool to work to the best advantage, if at all. Another objection was that. it would not be safe to carry petrol in tanks exposed to tl.e summer sun. At the time, these objections looked formidable ; but, after all, there was absolutely nothing in them. At all events, the value of motors of all sorts imported has jumped from nil a very few years ago to 7,324,420 rupees (15 rupees = L1) last year. That is a very solid contribution to the cash accounts of motor manufacturers, is it not? I am sorry that the value of commercial motors imported is not shown separately in the Customs accounts, but it was large. I find that of the total value given 5,232,688 rupees went into the pockets of British manufacturers. I have been at some pains to prepare a little statement to show your readers how their foreign competitors are faring in so far as Indian orders for motor vehicles go, and in order to permit them to make comparisons, odious or otherwise, I give figures for three years. These figures, it must be understood, show the value of the imports of motor vehicles into India from the United Kingdom and the principal (not all) foreign countries during the years 1909, 1910 and 1911. The countries omitted for the sake of brevity only sent goods of small value:—
Import. of Motor Vehicles.
You will notice from both these statements that Indian motor vehicle progress is upwards and onwards, and that both India and Burma are promising fields worthy of conquering. In regard to the second statement, I should point out for the sake of clearness that the towns shown are not necessarily the actual users of the vehicles imported. For instance, take Bombay. A large percentage of the motors landed there were for a certainty not even ordered from that city, but from the Central Provinces, Hyderabad and other localities for which Bombay is the distributing centre. Similarly the Karachi imports are not all used in Karachi by any means; the bulk of them are for the Punjab, the North-West Frontier Province and also for Delhi, of which you have, no doubt, heard so much of late, as one of the " boons " announced by the King at Delhi was the transference of the capital of India from Calcutta to that city of fevers, boils and flies.