Four years in Upper Burma

by W. R. Winston

3. The Burman temperament and constitution is found to be peculiarly liable to succumb to this temptation.

4. Seeing and feeling the alarming growth of the evil, the Burmans have bitterly complained, and begged their rulers to remove the evil, but in vain.

5. Officials in different parts of the province have faithfully reported these things, and their reports have been in print for years.

6. The evil has gone on increasing to this day, and now has reached unprecedented proportions. In Lower Burma the excise revenue (liquor and opium) has increased 80 per cent. in the five years ending with 1890, whereas the increase of population has only been 22 per cent. for the ten years. The excise revenue of all India yields an average of 4 annas per head of the whole population; in Lower Burma it averages 9 annas.

7. And lastly, we are in danger of doing the same thing in the new province of Upper Burma unless we alter our policy.

What is required for the removal of this evil is a complete reform. The feeble attempts at remedy so far have shown themselves to be useless.

The first attempt at improvement was the closing of the greater part of the licensed shops in Lower Burma. A good deal has been made of that by the upholders and defenders of the present system. We are told that there is only one licensed opium house in Akyab, for instance. An eyewitness tells us that in forty-five minutes he visited fifty opium dens in that town of “only one licensed shop,” and he was told that there are in the district not less than one thousand places where opium is sold. That one house pays 158,000 rupees (about £10,533) annually for licence duty.

The system of high licences has been tried, and the price has been put up, until in Rangoon the price of the drug is equal to its weight in silver, but this makes little or no difference.

Sir Alexander Mackenzie, the present Chief Commissioner of Burma, now proposes to make it penal to sell opium to Burmans in Lower Burma, as it is in Upper Burma, or for Burmans to be in possession of opium; but this is merely trifling with the evil. If it is ineffectual in Upper Burma, what good is it likely to accomplish in the Lower province, where so many have acquired the habit?