It was estimated in 1905 that the world’s output of cotton was 19,000,000 bales, of which 13¾ millions were produced in the United States, 3 millions in India, and nearly 1¼ millions in Egypt, Japan and China being India’s best customers for the raw article. At the same time the total number of spindles employed in working up the world’s raw cotton was 116 millions, of which 48 millions were in the United Kingdom, 24 millions in the United States, and a little over 5 millions in India. There were 203 cotton mills in India, employing a daily average of 196,369 persons. The Bombay Presidency possessed 70% of the mills and much the same percentage of spindles and looms. The industry dates from 1851, when the first mill was started. But though India has special advantages in home-grown cotton and cheap labour, the labour is so inefficient as to make competition with Europe difficult. It is calculated that an Indian power-loom weaver working 72 hours a week can turn out 70 ℔ of cloth, while a European working 54 hours can turn out 468 ℔, and that one Lancashire weaver can do the work of six Indian power-loom weavers and nine hand-loom weavers. While these figures hold good, India cannot be a serious competitor with Europe in the cotton industry.
Jute.—Next to cotton, jute is the most important and prosperous of Indian manufactures. With the advance of commerce it is more and more required for its best-known use, as sacking for produce. Australia and Argentina need it for wool and wheat, Chili and Brazil for nitrates and coffee, Asiatic countries for rice, and the world as a whole for its increased output of produce. The supply has not kept pace with the demand, and the consequence was a steady appreciation in price from 1901 onwards. The cultivation of jute is confined, to a comparatively restricted area, more than three-fourths of the total acreage being in eastern Bengal and Assam, while nearly the whole of the remaining fourth is in Bengal. In 1907, however, experiments were made towards growing it in other parts of India. In Behar it has begun to replace indigo, and some success was achieved in Orissa, Assam and Madras; but jute is a very exhausting crop, and requires to be planted in lands fertilized with silt or else with manure. About half the total crop is exported, and the remainder used in the jute mills centred round Calcutta, which supply cloth and bags for the grain export trade. The number of jute mills in 1904 was 38, employing 124,000 hands, and since then the number has tended constantly upwards. The export of jute in 1905-1906 was 14,480,000 cwt. with a value of £12,350,000.
Silk.—The silk industry in India has experienced many vicissitudes. Under the East India Company large quantities of mulberry silk were produced chiefly in Bengal, and exported to Europe; and Malda, Murshidabad, and other places in that province have long been famous for their silk manufactures. Other kinds of silk are native to certain parts of India, such as those produced by the “castor oil” and the muga silkworms of Assam; but the chief of the wild silks is the tussore silk, which is found in the jungles nearly throughout India. Large quantities of comparatively coarse silk are made from silk so produced. In Assam silk is still the national dress, and forms the common costume of the women, but the men are relinquishing it as an article of daily wear in favour of cotton. Amongst the Burmese, however, silk still holds its own. Owing to disease among the silk-worms the industry has declined of recent years; and in 1886 an inquiry was held, which resulted in putting the silk-rearing industry of Bengal on a better basis. The most hopeful ground, however, for the industry is Kashmir, where Sir Thomas Wardle reported that the silk was of as high a quality as from any part of the world. The most important seat of the silk-weaving industry is Bengal, but there are few parts of India where some silk fabrics are not woven. The silk weavers of India possess the very highest skill in their craft, and with competent and energetic management and increased capital the industry could be revived and extended.
Other Manufactures.—The demand of the Indian population for woollen fabrics is very small in comparison with that for cotton, and although the manufacture of blankets is carried on in many parts of India, the chief part of the indigenous woollen industry was originally concerned with shawls. Kashmir shawls were at one time famous, but the industry is practically extinct. The chief seat of the woollen industry now is the Punjab, where a considerable number of weavers, thrown out of work by the decline of the shawl industry, have taken to carpet-making. The chief centre of this industry is Amritsar. The output of the woollen mills is chiefly used for the army and the police. In addition to these and the cotton and jute mills there are indigo factories, rice mills, timber mills, coffee works, oil mills, iron and brass foundries, tile factories, printing presses, lac factories, silk mills, and paper mills. There is a large trade in wood-carving, the material being generally Indian ebony in northern India, sandal-wood in southern India, and teak in Burma and elsewhere.
From an artistic point of view the metal manufactures are one of the most important products of India.
Brass and Copper Work.—The village brazier, like the village smith, manufactures the necessary vessels for domestic use. Chief among these vessels is the lota, or globular bowl, universally used in ceremonial ablutions. The form of the lota, and even the style of ornamentation, has been handed down unaltered from the earliest times. Benares enjoys the first reputation for work in brass and copper. In the south, Madura and Tanjore have a similar fame; and in the west, Ahmedabad, Poona and Nasik. At Bombay itself large quantities of imported copper are wrought up by native braziers. The temple bells of India are well known for the depth and purity of their note. In many localities the braziers have a special repute either for a peculiar alloy or for a particular process of ornamentation. Silver is sometimes mixed with the brass, and in rarer cases gold. The brass or rather bell-metal ware of Murshidabad, known as khagrai, has more than a local reputation, owing to the large admixture of silver in it.
Pottery is made in almost every village, from the small vessels required in cooking to the large jars used for storing grain and occasionally as floats to ferry persons across a swollen stream. But, though the industry is universal, it has Pottery. hardly anywhere risen to the dignity of a fine art. Sind is the only province of India where the potter’s craft is pursued with any regard to artistic considerations; and there the industry is said to have been introduced by the Mahommedans. Sind pottery is of two kinds, encaustic tiles and vessels for domestic use. In both cases the colours are the same,—turquoise blue, copper green, dark purple or golden brown, under an exquisitely transparent glaze. The usual ornament is a conventional flower pattern, pricked in from paper and dusted along the pricking. The tiles, which are evidently of the same origin as those of Persia and Turkey, are chiefly to be found in the ruined mosques and tombs of the old Mussulman dynasties; but the industry still survives at the little towns of Saidpur and Bubri. Artistic pottery is made at Hyderabad, Karachi, Tatta and Hala, and also at Multan and Lahore in the Punjab. The Madura pottery deserves mention from the elegance of its form and the richness of its colour. The United Provinces have, among other specialties, an elegant black ware with designs in white metal worked into its surface.
Mineral Resources.
Putting aside salt, which has been already treated, the chief mining resources of India at the present day are the coal mines, the gold mines, the petroleum oil-fields, the ruby mines, manganese deposits, mica mines in Bengal, and the tin ores and jade of Burma. Other minerals which exist but have not yet been developed in paying quantities are copper ore, alum, gypsum and plumbago.
Coal.—Coal has been known to exist in India since 1774. The first mine at Raniganj dates from 1820, and has been regularly worked up to the present time. Coal of varying quality exists under a very extensive area in India, being found in almost every province and native state with the exception of Bombay and Mysore. In respect, however, of both the number and size of its mines Bengal comes easily first, with seven-eighths of the total output, the largest mines being those of Raniganj, Jherria, and Giridih, while the Singareni mine in Hyderabad comes next. Many of the Bengal mines, however, are very small. There are some important mines in Assam and the Central Provinces. The importance of the Indian coal production lies in the hope that it holds out for the development of Indian industries, especially in connexion with the nascent iron and steel industry. Coal and iron are found in conjunction in the Central Provinces, and the Tata Company has recently been formed to work them on a large scale. The railways already use Indian coal almost exclusively, and Indian coal is being taken yearly in greater quantities by ships trading to Eastern ports. The total output in 1905-1906 was 8,417,739 tons; while there were 47 companies engaged in coal-mining, of which 46 were in Bengal.