CO885-(20-21) — Page 532

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O.885

21 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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ORDINANCE,

Section 16.-Is previous notice to the manager necessary?

Section 51.-The section requires the Protector, with the aid of a Government Medical Officer, to examine the sick on board. What appears to be necessary is a very careful medical examination of every immigrant by one or more competent Medical Officers acting under the general control of the Surgeon-General. It is desirable to repatriate immediately immigrants who are physically unfit, and to detain under competent medical supervision those who would, if sent to an estate, necessarily go to the estate hospital.

Section 52 authorises the Protector to repatriate unfit persons. If medical opinion definitely and finally pronounces a man unfit prompt repatriation should be compulsory.

Section 63.-If an adult is “not ' able-bodied,' and not capable of performing service as an agricultural labourer," are managers permitted to order him to work as an agricultural labourer ?

Section 71-It seems undesirable to exclude any kind of deaths from the annual return of deaths on estates, and suicides should least of all be excluded.

Section 74.-It seems reasonable to restrict the automatic stoppage of the supply of immigrants to cases in which the mean death-rate is excessive. But it seems also desirable to require that the Protector be satisfied as to the sanitary and other condi- tions obtaining on an estate in which the last year's death-rate was abnormal. With a small population in a village the death of three or four old people or infants in a single year may cause a marked percentage increase. With an indentured popula- tion in the prime of life, similar fluctuations are much less probable. Where the death-rate is, say, three times as much as the normal in a single year, it is well that the causes should be known and not assumed. If an estate is reducing its indentured population steadily, an excessive death-rate will for years pass unnoticed so far as this section is concerned.

Section 77.--We have no objection to the enhancement of the period of indentured service of women from three to five years. But if it renders the recruitment of women difficult the change should not be made. We think that as the Emigration Agents recruit only the minimum number of women required, it would be well to consider if the minimum should not be raised to 50 per cent.

Section 87. Clause 3.-The Medical Officer should make his requisition in an estate book to be kept for the purpose, and the employer should have a right of appeal to the Surgeon-General, and a further right of appeal to Government. The Pro- tector and Inspectors should see if requisitions, when final, have been carried out.

Section 90.-The addition proposed (Section 90a) seems suitable. We are aware that the necessity for systematic measures to reduce ankylostomiasis is recognised.

Section 92. This section should be amplified so as to authorise a Medical Officer to prescribe the issue of any diet to an indentured immigrant.

Section 93.-The first sub-section had better be omitted. the purchaser must be known. It is one more penal clause, and as such objectionable, To prove the offence if it is not needed. The punishment of the purchaser is the surest remedy if sale or barter can be proved.

Part VII.

The duty and responsibility of controlling hospitals, &c., should be handed over to the Medical Department, and the sections modified accordingly.

The visits under Section 102 should be tri-weekly unless the Governor for special reasons authorises less frequent visits. It is desirable that the dwellings, &c., should be visited monthly, but the matter may be left to the discretion of the Surgeon- General, subject to the control of Government.

Section 103 might require the Government Medical Officer to keep such hospital records as the Surgeon-General, with the approval of Government, may direct.

the

Section 110. Omit Clause (1).-If special authorisation is necessary, hospital staff and attendance may be authorised to restrain any patient from leaving the hospital. Resistance would then be refractory behaviour under Clause (6). The hospitals should be so constructed, fenced, and watched that patients cannot slip out unobserved. We have seen hospitals whence egress was always easy.

Section 116. See note on Section 92.-It is desirable in most cases that when patients leave hospital they should be well fed and well supervised. The estate should bear the cost of special diet, even if the man is fit for light work and employed on such work, unless the doctor is of opinion that the sickness was the direct result of the man's own misconduct.

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Section 117.-We think the addition made by Ordinance 15 of 1908 is objection- able for reasons already communicated. But until it is shown to affect task-work wages it might stand. We do not think that the Government of India has ever assented to the surrender of the right to free medical attendance and house accommo- dation.

Section 126.-We think that in practice the provision for paying for overtime is insufficient, and would suggest an addition somewhat as follows:-

In the absence of any special agreement between the employer and an able- bodied indentured immigrant, the latter shall when he has been present at time work for not less than nine hours before 4.30 p.m. be paid for any additional time work done after 4.30 p.m. at the rate of one cent for each period of twelve minutes or fraction of such period.

Penal Sections in Parts VIII. and IX.

Section 110. The punishment for a first offence might be five shillings or seven days.

For a second or subsequent offence ten shillings or fourteen days. Section 124-First offence: 10 shillings or seven days.

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Later

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Section 128.-First

20 10

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11

Later

20

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fourteen days.

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10 10

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seven days

Section 129.-Any Section 130.-Any

"1

Section 131. Clause (1) seems to be the same as Clause (4) of Section 130.-If

the threatening words used are not merely abusive or insulting the offence might be dealt with under the general law.

Omit Clause (4) and see later addition.

First offence: 10 shillings or 7 days. Later

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At the end of Part VIII. add a section in some such form as this:-

Any person who aids or instigates an indentured immigrant to commit any offence punishable under this part shall be liable to the same penalty as if he had himself committed such offence.

Section 136.-Can this be enforced? easily. The existing conditions are possibly very different from those obtaining It might enable men to levy blackmail when this was drafted. Do people at the railway station ask immigrant porters for their papers before employing them? (See note on Section 214.)

Section 140.-In paragraph 2 for

indentured

The Stipendiary Magistrate may order substitute shall order, &c. prisonment should be withdrawn. If the estate manager prosecutes later it will he The power of ordering im- time enough to order imprisonment. The persons authorised in paragraph (1) to arrest an absentee might be authorised also to take him to the estate.

As regards the clause penalising an immigrant (who is not proved to be an immigrant but illegally assumed to be an immigrant from his general appearance) for not proving that he is not an immigrant, it should be omitted. The Immigration Department may establish a thumb-print register, or keep a careful record of weight, height, and identifying marks with an index, but a man should not be called upon to prove that he is not such as the prosecution must first prove him to be. A Magis- trate cannot punish the man in any case till he is proved to be an immigrant, nor indeed can anyone arrest him on suspicion of being an immigrant. As regards the procedure, it does not seem necessary to require that an apprehended deserter should in all cases be brought to a police station and thence to a Magistrate. If the authority who arrests him is confident of being able to hand him over direct to the estate the intervention of the police and Magistrate is uncalled for. If, owing to the hour at which the arrest is made, the arresting authority thinks it safer to lodge the prisoner in a police-station, he may be authorised to do so. charge of the station might be authorised to hand him over to an estate authority on Even then the officer in the production of the manager's receipt or of an order from an Inspector or from the Protector. Forty-eight hours' interval might be given for the production of a receipt or order. This will not prevent the estate from lodging a complaint either before or after. The prisoner, after his arrival at the station, might claim to go before a Magistrate and be asked then to take the risk of being convicted of any offence proved against him or of being remanded for evidence of such an offence. But it

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