AGRICULTURE AND CROPS
~Classification by Zones.~--In order to give an intelligible account of
the huge area embraced by the Panjáb, N.W.F. Province, and Kashmír it is
necessary to make a division of the area into zones. Classification must
be on very broad lines based on differences of altitude, rainfall, and
soil, leading to corresponding differences in the cultivation and the
crops. For statistical purposes districts must be taken as a whole,
though a more accurate classification would divide some of them between
two zones.
~Classes of Cultivation.~--The broadest division of cultivation is into
irrigated and unirrigated, the former including well (_cháhí_), canal
(_nahrí_), and _ábí_. The last term describes a small amount of land
watered from tanks or _jhíls_ in the plains and a larger area in the
hills irrigated by _kuhls_ or small artificial channels. "Unirrigated"
embraces cultivation dependent on rain (_bárání_) or on flooding or
percolation from rivers (_sailáb_). (See Table II.)
~Harvests.~--There are two harvests, the autumn or _kharíf_, and the
spring or _rabí_. The autumn crops are mostly sown in June and July and
reaped from September to December. Cotton is often sown in March. Cane
planted in March and cut in January and February is counted as a
_kharíf_ crop. The spring crops are sown from the latter part of
September to the end of December. They are reaped in March and April.
Roughly in the Panjáb three-fifths of the crops belong to the spring
harvest. In the N.W.F. Province the proportion is somewhat higher. In
Kashmír the autumn crop is by far the more important.
[Illustration: Fig. 48. Persian Wheel Well and Ekka.]
~Implements of Husbandry and Wells.~--The implements of husbandry are
simple but effective in a land where as a rule there is no advantage in
stirring up the soil very deep. With his primitive plough (_hal_) and a
wooden clodcrusher (_sohága_) the peasant can produce a tilth for a crop
like cane which it would be hard to match in England. There are two
kinds of wells, the _charsa_ or rope and bucket well and the _harat_ or
Persian wheel.
~Rotations.~--The commonest rotation in ordinary loam soils is to put in a
spring and autumn crop in succession and then let the land lie fallow
for a year. Unless a good deal of manure is available this is the course
to follow, even in the case of irrigated land. Some poor hard soils are
only fit for crops of coarse rice sown after the embanked fields have
been filled in the monsoon by drainage from surrounding waste. Other
lands are cropped only in the autumn because the winter rainfall is very
scanty. Flooded lands are often sown only for the spring harvest.
[Illustration: Fig. 49. A drove of goats--Lahore.]
~Cattle, Sheep, and Goats.~--In 1909 there were in the British districts
of the Panjáb 4-1/4 million bullocks and 625,000 male buffaloes
available to draw 2,169,000 ploughs and 288,000 carts, thresh the corn,
and work a quarter of a million wells, besides sugar, oil, and flour
mills. The cattle of the hills, N.W. Panjáb, and riverain tracts are
undersized, but in the uplands of the Central Panjáb and S.E. districts
fine oxen are used. The horned cattle share 18 millions of pasture land,
much extremely poor, with 4 million sheep and 5-1/2 million goats.
Hence the enormous area devoted to fodder crops.
~Zones.~--Six zones can be distinguished, but, as no district is wholly
confined to the mountain zone, it must for statistical purposes be
united to the submontane zone:
(_a_) Mountain above 5000 feet Panjáb--Kángra, Simla, Native
States in Hills, Ambála,
Hoshyárpur.
(_b_) Submontane N.W.F. Province. Hazára,
Kashmír--whole
(_c_) North Central Plain Panjáb--Gujrát, Siálkot, Gurdáspur,
Amritsar, Jalandhar,
Ludhiána, Kapúrthala,
Malerkotla, Powádh
tract in Phulkian States.
(_d_) North-West Area Panjáb--Ráwalpindí, Jhelam,
Attock, Mianwálí.
N.W.F.P.--Pesháwar, Kohát,
Bannu.
(_e_) South-Western Plains Panjáb--Gujránwála, Lahore,
Sháhpur, Jhang, Lyallpur,
Montgomery, Multán,
Muzaffargarh, Dera Ghází
Khán, Baháwalpur.
N.W.F.P.--Dera Ismail Khán.
(_f_) South-Eastern Area Panjáb--Karnál, Rohtak, Gurgáon,
Hissár, Ferozepore,
Farídkot, Jangal tract in
Phulkian States, Native
States territory adjoining
Gurgáon and Rohtak.
~Mountain and Submontane Zones.~--In the Mountain Zone the fields are
often very minute, consisting of narrow terraces supported by stone
revetments built up the slopes of hills. That anyone should be ready to
spend time and labour on such unpromising material is a sign of pressure
of population on the soil, which is a marked feature of some hill
tracts.
[Illustration: Fig. 50. A steep bit of hill cultivation, Hazára.]
Below 8000 feet the great crop is maize. Potatoes have been introduced
near our hill stations. The chief pulse of the mountain zone is _kulath_
(Dolichos biflorus), eaten by the very poor. Wheat ascends to 8000 or
9000 feet, and at the higher levels is reaped in August. Barley is grown
at much greater heights. Buckwheat (_úgal_, _trúmba_, _dráwí_),
amaranth (_chauláí_, _ganhár_, _sariára_), and a tall chenopod (_bathu_)
are grown in the mountain zone. Buckwheat is common on poor stony lands.
[Illustration: Fig. 51. Preparing rice field in the Hills.]
The only comparatively flat land is on the banks above river beds, which
are devoted to rice cultivation, the water being conducted to the
embanked fields by an elaborate system of little canals or _kuhls_. This
is the only irrigation in the mountains, and is much valued. The
Submontane Zone has a rainfall of from 30 to 40 inches. Well irrigation
is little used and the dry crops are generally secure. Wheat and maize
are the great staples, but gram and _charí_, i.e. _jowár_ grown for
fodder, are also important. Some further information about Kashmír
agriculture will be found in a later chapter. For full details about
classes of cultivation and crops in all the zones Tables II, III and IV
should be consulted.
~North Central Panjáb Plain.~--The best soils and the finest tillage are
to be found in the North Central Zone. Gujrát has been included in it,
though it has also affinities in the north with the North-West area, and
in the south with the South-Western plain. The rainfall varies from 25
to 35 inches. One-third of the cultivated area is protected by wells,
and the well cultivation is of a very high class in Ludhiána and
Jalandhar, where heavily manured maize is followed by a fine crop of
wheat, and cane is commonly grown. In parts of Siálkot and Gujrát the
well cultivation is of a different type, the area served per well being
large and the object being to protect a big acreage of wheat in the
spring harvest. The chief crops in this zone are wheat and _charí_. The
latter is included under "Other Fodder" in Tables III and IV.
~North-Western Area.~--The plateau north of the Salt Range has a very
clean light white sandy loam soil requiring little ploughing and no
weeding. It is often very shallow, and this is one reason for the great
preference for cold weather crops. _Kharíf_ crops are more liable to be
burned up. Generally speaking the rainfall is from 15 to 25 inches, the
proportion falling in the winter and spring being larger than elsewhere.
There is, except in Pesháwar and Bannu, where the conditions involve a
considerable divergence from the type of this zone, practically no canal
irrigation. The well irrigation is unimportant and in most parts
consists of a few acres round each well intensively cultivated with
market-gardening crops. The dry crops are generally very precarious. In
Mianwálí the Indus valley is a fine tract, but the harvests fluctuate
greatly with the extent of the floods. The Thal in Mianwálí to the south
of the Sind Ságar railway is really a part of the next zone.
~The South-Western Plains.~--This zone contains nine districts. With the
exception of the three on the north border of the zone they have a
rainfall of from 5 to 10 inches. Of these six arid districts, only one,
Montgomery, has any dry cultivation worth mentioning. In the zone as a
whole three-fourths of the cultivation is protected by canals or wells,
or by both. In the lowlands near the great rivers cultivation depends on
the floods brought to the land direct or through small canals which
carry water to parts which the natural overflow would not reach. In the
uplands vast areas formerly untouched by the plough have been brought
under tillage by the help of perennial canals, and the process of
reclamation is still going on. The Thal is a large sandy desert which
becomes more and more worthless for cultivation as one proceeds
southwards. In the north the people have found out of late years that
this unpromising sand can not only yield poor _kharíf_ crops, but is
worth sowing with gram in the spring harvest. The expense is small, and
a lucky season means large profits. In Dera Ghází Khán a large area of
"_pat_" below the hills is dependent for cultivation on torrents. The
favourite crop in the embanked fields into which the water is diverted
is _jowár_.
~The South-Eastern Plains.~--In the south-eastern Panjáb except in Hissár
and the native territory on the border of Rájputána, the rainfall is
from 20 to 30 inches. In Hissár it amounts to some 15 inches. These are
averages; the variations in total amount and distribution over the
months of the year are very great. In good seasons the area under dry
crops is very large, but the fluctuations in the sown acreage are
extraordinary, and the matured is often far below the sown area. The
great crops are gram and mixtures of wheat or barley with gram in the
spring, and _bájra_ in the autumn, harvest. Well cultivation is not of
much importance generally, though some of it in the Jamna riverain is
excellent. The irrigated cultivation depends mainly on the Western Jamna
and Sirhind canals, and the great canal crops are wheat and cotton. This
is the zone in which famine conditions are still most to be feared.
In the Panjáb as a whole about one-third of the cultivated area is
yearly put under wheat, which with _bájra_ and maize is the staple food
of the people. A large surplus of wheat and oil-seeds is available for
export.
[Illustration: Fig. 52. Carved doorway.]