Our Fiscal Policy

The questioh or reducing the expenditure was considered by lard.4t4iiley to be problematical "; he believed in the efficacy. of "measures for the augmentation of revenue either h the improvement of the existing sources or by the deielopment of new means of taxation '" and he devoted this despatch to the consideration of the Customs duties anctof the points raised by the Government of India tw [...] to the revenue when the administration of justice had to be made dear and when the *Income tax protred a bitter failure the expediency of adding to the.resources of the State by an increase in the Import duties could not be seriously considered because the Free-Tradconscience of Manchester began to quiver. [...] This loss was accepted notwithstanding the fact that there was a deficit that the Afghan war was going on that the exchange was falling and that the recent arrangements for the probaction of the country against famine had to be suspended.' i The one essential condition in the pledges given n connection with the removal of these duties was that it should be carried out only when the finances we [...] The ports of agricultural India were more opens to the industries of the world than the free ports of England herself! The competition of manufactured goods had by this time killed the village industries of India. [...] The Finance Member did not admit the validity of the objection made to the.duties on cotton on the ground of protection and he even asserted that if any industry in the world deserved protection it was the cotton industry of India.' It is of interest to note that against this arbitrary decision of the Secretary of State six members of the India Council recorded minutes of dissent' 1. Of.