Note 1 — Front matter

The earliest record of an attempt to arrange for the preparation of Statistical Accounts of the different districts of the Bombay Presidency is in 1843. In 1843 Government called on the Revenue Commissioner to obtain from all the Collectors as part of their next Annual Report the fullest available information regarding their districts.1 The information was specially to include their own and their Assistants’ observations on the state of the cross and other roads not under the superintendence of a separate department, on the passes and ferries throughout the country, on the streets in the principal towns, and on the extension and improvement of internal communications. As from Collectors alone could any knowledge of the state of the district be obtained, the Collectors were desired to include in their Annual Reports observations on every point from which a knowledge of the actual condition of the country could be gathered with the exception of matters purely judicial which were to be supplied by the Judicial Branch of the Administration. Government remarked that, as Collectors and their Assistants during a large portion of the year moved about the district in constant and intimate communication with all classes they possessed advantages which no other public officers enjoyed of acquiring a full knowledge of the condition of the country, the causes of progress or retrogradation, the good measures which require to be fostered and extended, the evil measures which call for abandonment, the defects in existing institutions which require to be remedied, and the nature of the remedies to be applied. Collectors also, it was observed, have an opportunity of judging of the effect of British rule on the condition and character of the people, on their caste prejudices, and on their superstitious observances. They can trace any alteration for the better or worse in dwellings, clothing and diet, and can observe the use of improved implements of husbandry or other crafts, the habits of locomotion, the state of education particularly among the higher classes whose decaying means and energy under our most levelling system compared with that of preceding governments will attract their attention. Finally they can learn how far existing village institutions are effectual to their end, and may be made available for self-government and in the management of local taxation for local purposes.