CO882-(4-5) — Page 273

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O. 882

5 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

1792, Encl. 9.

Anel. 7, p. 22.

$10.

19-20 of målet.

Bucl. 7.

"

4

64

12

doubtful whether the frot of the tax being lighter will produce as much effect in increased regularity of payment sa would at first sight be anticipated.

(4.) The difficulties arising from different kinds of lands. However small the tax may be, it will at least seem unjust if levied uniformly on cultivated and uncultivated, fertile and unfertile lands; whereas, if a distinction is made, it will be as necessary as in the case of the grain tax to have perpetual revisions and re-assessments. Then again it will at least seem unjust that lands, on which the tax has been redeemed, should be placed in no better position than lands which are at present subject to it. This point is put by the Acting Surveyor-General in the late debate on the subject as follows: "If you remove the paddy tax from those paddy lands which have not been freed, it is practically as much as giving one tenth of the value of the produce into those people's pockets, while those provident people who have redeemed their land "from the tax will simply suffer to that extent."*

Again, as pointed out by the Government Agent of Sabaragamuwa, the taxation of highlands in the Kandyan Provinces will be, or at any rate will be regarded as being, a breach of faith, for, by the proclamation of the 21st of November 1818 (sec. 17), all taxes whatever were abolished in those provinces except the tax on paddy lands. One result of the present partial tax is that questions do not now arise as to various political and religious exemp→ tions, but they must arise if a general land tax is projected. This will be a very grave difficulty, but it will not to my mind be altogether a dis. advantage. The exemption of temple lands from taxation is a dead weight to Ceylon. It will be seen that the Ceylon National Association consider that some irrigation rate should be levied on these landa, which proposal Mr. Panabokke in his speech in the late debate characterised as a breach of a solemn Convention between the British Government and the Kandyans. So it would be; it would be contrary to section 21 of the Proclamation already quoted, and the taxation of the highlands in the Kandyan Provinces would be an equal violation. It had better be realised at once that these exemp- tions will be very awkward in case of a general land tax being decided upon; but, on the other hand, it seems to me that they cannot continue for ever, and that little by little the owners or trustees of temple lands, e.g., must be invited to contribute in their own way and through their own organisations, to the well-being and food supply of the Buddhists, who form the bulk of the Ceylon community and who use almost exclusively vegetable food.†

(5.) Among minor difficulties it may be noted that, according to some authorities, the taxation of gardens would be specially unpopular. Mr. Templer, Whenever have heard an opinion ex-

e.g., says,

(1

• For the redemption of the paddy tax in past years, see Bessional Paper, No. 30 of 1876.

40

† In the Convention of 1888, however, the Governor, by Cianas 56, reserved "full power to alter the present provisions as may appear hereafter necessary and expedient." See the late Surveyor-General's Remarks on this point and on a land tax generally, Eastern, No. 25; p. 15.

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pressed by an ordinary villager, is has sedifi

me that he regarded with fiorror the propied to ← tax his garden and chena." According to them,

■ land tax would strike a class still poorer than the guiya, or cultivating class. This is the view taken by Mr. Wade, Government Agent of the very poor province of Sabaragamuwa.

It may be asked, why should it be more dinoult to introduce a general land tax into Ceylon than into India, where it has been so universally adopted! The answer which has been given to me on this point, but which I have not verified from Indian authority, is that--

(1.) In India there was always ample procedent for such a tax, whereas in Ceylon it would be in innovation, and all the writers on this subject lay stress on the great distaste of the Native peasantry to any form of taxation other than that to which they have been accustomed. This objection, how- ever, would presumably to some extent, at any rate, be obviated by very gradual introduction of the tax, if that were possible.

(2.) In Ceylon the land is divided into tiny lota, and held in infinitesimal shares, to an extent unknown in India.

(3.) The practice of chena cultivation, so preva- lent in Ceylon, by which one plot of ground is cultivated in one year and another in another, is said notto prevail to the same extent in India. This kind of nomadic cultivation would add greatly to the difficulties of levying a land tax.

Lastly, it may be noted as an objection to a general land tax imposed in lieu both of the import duty and the paddy tax, that it would shift on to the land all the tax now paid through imported grain by the immigrant coolies and the town popu lation. This is well pointed out in the 27th and 28th paragraphs of the Select Committee's report.

P

12.

An increase in the salt tax has been proposed What oth

tax.

Land

as a partial substitute for the grain taxes. There t are, as has been seen, three main taxes on the Natives, the grain tax, the salt tax, and the road boun

All these are economically indefensible; and The mk the salt tax is perhaps the most indefensible of the 1792, Ba three, being, as Mr. Wace points out, at once a tax p. 24. on food and a monopoly. In Mr. Jevers' judgment, p. 18. "From the Cobden Club point of view it is as indefensible as the grain tax, and it certainly "would be much more difficult to defend it.' There seems, however, to be fairly general con- sensus that it does not on the whole press hardly on the people, and could be raised without osuring distress. Mr. O'Brien (who, it may be noticed in Encl. 5. passing, has no doubt that the people regard the road tax as more oppressive than the grain tax, and would prefer its abolition not merely to the reduction but even to the abolition of the grain tax) states in his memorandum on the subject that, in his opinion," the eroise might be doubled without

being materially felt by the people."

智障

Mr. Moir thinks "the salt revenue might be in- Encl. 7, p. "creased without causing hardship." Mr. Elioti p. 12.

soos "no objection to a moderate advance of the price of salt, say 50 per cent., if more revenue in

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