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HOBLI

PECORD OFFICE

Reference -

TC.O.882/12

| PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH~NOT 10,

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Military.

This is a department which is no longer required. Nominally the Sultan is said to be the Commander-in-Chief of the soldiers, but it is under the effective control of the Chief Treasurer.

These irregulars, called Hagubékalum, consisting of over 600, are paid in kind twice a month. The regulars or Sifain, as they are called, at Malé, of about 25 in number, are regularly employed to guard the Palace, and are the Sultan's bodyguard.

On State occasions this guard and the irregulars accompany the Sultan.

Income.

The chief income is derived from import and export duties. Eight and one-third per cent. is charged on every article imported and is taken in kind. Rs. 2/50 is charged on export of dried fish per hundredweight. A great variety of goods are imported and the articles taken as duty stacked in godowns. These (of which some get rotten) are periodically sold at the Kachcheri or Bodu Badérigé, by auction, generally to foreign merchants, at 25 per cent. less than the market value and on credit, without any security whatever. Most of the foreign shop-keepers are carrying on their trade with the goods purchased from the Government on credit. At present traders owe to Government over Rs. 100,000/- and this amount is being augmented monthly with no hope of Government ever getting it back.

According to Maldivian customs no foreign trader is allowed to leave the place without paying his debts, but since of late they have found a way out of this difficulty by either selling his business to a friend of his with his debts and leaving the place never to return and settling down in his native place with the money he had so shrewdly earned. The result is that our unsuspecting Government is no richer than before and still go on auctioning on credit the useless goods they are collecting from the imported articles, at a loss of over 25 per cent.

This uneconomic policy of Government has, during past five years, increased foreign shops of Malé by about fifty per cent.

These new shop-keepers do not require to open a shop with the capital of their own, as they are getting all kinds of imported goods from Government on credit.

Land Policy.

The policy, or rather want of a fixed policy with regard to Government Islands is, it seems, retarding the natural progress of the islands.

At present islands are leased out in most cases to those who are favourites or friends of different Ministers. As soon as one gets the lease of an island, he or his agent will go to it, get as much as he can from it, and not infrequently, cut all the saleable timber and prepares himself to hand it over the year after to the next lessee and in turn continues the same devastation. This policy of short-term lease has denuded the Maldives of necessary timber for boat and house building and has even now resulted in a scarcity of firewood, a hundredweight of which is now sold at Malé for three rupees against 60 cents a hundredweight in Colombo for quantities.

A partly matured coconut tree now fetches Rs. 8/- to 10/-, whereas a decade ago a tree could be bought for Rs. 1/50 to Rs. 2/-. Fishing boats and other smaller crafts are mostly built of coconut trees and they are also used in house-building purposes.

December, 1930.

C. 83266/31 [No. 13].

No. 5.

E. ABDUL HAMID DIDI.

THE OFFICER ADMINISTERING THE GOVERNMENT

(Confidential.)

MY LORD,

to

THE SECRETARY OF STATE.

(Received 6th April, 1931.)

[Answered by No. 6.]

Queen's House, Colombo, 14th March, 1931. I HAVE the honour to invite a reference to the correspondence ending with Your Lordship's telegram No. 18 (Confidential) dated 21st January, 1931, in which you intimated your approval of Sir Herbert Stanley's suggestion that I should visit the Maldive Islands while administering the Government in the interval between the

* No. 3.

7

departure of Sir Herbert Stanley and the arrival of Sir Graeme Thomson. I enclose copies of letters dated 25th January, 1931, and 9th February, 1931, from Sir Herbert Stanley to His Highness the Sultan. On 17th February the Colonial Secretary was informed by the Maldivian representative in Colombo that the first of these two letters had been received and that arrangements were being made to welcome me.

2. I embarked on board H.M.S. Enterprise (Captain P. E. Phillips, D.S.O., R.N.) at Colombo shortly after 9 p.m. on 3rd March, accompanied by my Aide-de- Camp, Captain W. M. McNeill and Mr. Abdul Hamid Didi, the Maldivian representative at Colombo, and we anchored inside the Malé Atoll, about a mile from Malé Island at about 9.30 a.m. on 6th March. A salute of 21 guns was fired from the ship; which was answered promptly by a salute of 25 guns, fired with reasonable rapidity and regu- larity, from the shore battery. Shortly after, a gig, propelled by 16 oarsmen, set out from the shore, conveying the Chief Treasurer and Prime Minister, Abdul Majid Didi, and His Highness' Private Secretary, E. Ahmad Didi, full particulars in regard to whom will be found in Sir Herbert Stanley's Confidential despatch of 13th October, 1928.* They were received by my Aide-de-Camp and arrangements were made for His Highness the Sultan to come on board at 1 p.m., and for myself and Captain Phillips to return his call immediately after. The Prime Minister expressed a desire to see me, but I was not prepared to interview him at this stage, and he handed to my Aide-de-Camp a copy of His Highness the Sultan's reply to Sir Herbert Stanley's letter of 25th January. I enclose a copy of that letter. I was informed that the Sultan was in poor health and would probably find some difficulty in paying his visit, as he was suffering from sores on his legs which caused him considerable pain.

3. Punctually at 1.0 by Maldivian time, His Highness' barge left the shore. I do not propose to describe in detail the ceremonial followed during this visit or during my return visit, as it corresponded in almost every particular with that so fully described in Sir Herbert Stanley's despatch of 13th October, 1928. His Highness was received on board by Captain Phillips and conducted past a Guard of Honour to the after part of the quarter-deck, where I received him. We had a short formal con- versation, during which Abdul Hamid Didi acted as interpreter. I inquired after His Highness' health, and suggested that the Principal Medical Officer of the ship should visit him ashore, a suggestion which he accepted with evident pleasure. After an exchange of the usual compliments His Highness left the ship, being accorded a salute of 17 guns.

His Highness was accompanied by the Prime Minister and his Private Secretary, and a number of other officials and notables, who remained standing during our interview, and none of whom were introduced to me on this occasion, nor until after my subsequent interview with His Highness at his Palace.

4. Immediately after His Highness' barge had reached the jetty I set out from the ship, accompanied by Captain Phillips, my Aide-de-Camp and Mr. Abdul Hamid Didi. I was received at the jetty by the Sultan and his entourage and we proceeded in procession to the Palace, a salute of 17 guns being fired meanwhile.

5. My interview with His Highness at the Palace was very much on the lines of Sir Herbert Stanley's interview in 1928, with the difference that the interpretation was direct from English to Maldivian and vice versa and that the Sultan's replies to my questions were not prompted, the conversation being solely between him and myself, through the medium of Mr. Abdul Hamid Didi.

6. I commenced the proceedings by expressing the hope that His Highness was not unduly fatigued by the visit to the Enterprise and the walk from the jetty, and His Highness replied that he was pleasantly surprised to find himself so little fatigued. I then commented favourably upon the smartness of the Guard of Honour which had received me at the jetty. I went on to explain that His Majesty's Government had no desire whatever to interfere in Maldivian affairs, but merely desired that the Maldivians should be well governed in accordance with their own customs. I had heard that the present system of Government was giving rise to certain difficulties, and thought it possible that my experience of other Mahommedan countries might enable me to assist with useful advice. His Highness replied that he would be very grateful for and upon my suggesting that, as a preliminary, I might talk with his Ministers and some

my

advice, of the notables the next day, said that this would be arranged. I then referred to His Highness letter to Sir Herbert Stanley, and said that I fully sympathized with His Highness' desire that his son should succeed him, unless he were, in accordance with Maldivian custom, declared unfit to do so. At the same time I explained my concern at the Prince's complete seclusion from all affairs of State, and said that it seemed to me of great importance that he should follow the example of our own Prince of Wales

* No. 1 in Eastern No. 151