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Arakan: - One Who Preserves and Takes Care of Their Own Nationality. |
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Publication by Arakan Action Association (AAA.) |
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Arakan Past – Present – Future |
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BY JOHN OGILVY HAY, J.P. |
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Arakan Library was founded by a group of Arakan Action Association (AAA) in exile in Thailand from Burma in 2007 doing to voice for the knowledge, the people democratic and human rights.
Copyright © 2007 Arakan Libray All Rights Reserved. Free counter, Since 2005.
Arakan Action Association (AAA) Chotana Road , Chaing Mai ( 50301 ), Thailand. Email : arakanactionassociation@walla.com , +66—089-637-4383, +66—053-409-577 |
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Reply. India Office, Whitehall, S.W., 2nd Dec, 1891. P.W. 2209. Sir, - I am directed by the Secretary of State for India in Council to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 14th ult. Submitting proposals for the construction of a railway in Burmah from Mandalay to the Chinese frontier. In reply I am to inform you that the Secretary of State is unable to entertain the proposals stated in the memorandum accompanying your letter. – I am, &c. Horace Walpole. J. Qgilvy Hay, Esq.
Letter to the Right Honourable the Secretary of State for India. 8th December 1891. I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of Mr. Secretary Walpole’s letter, P.W. 2209, of 2nd Dec, 1891, informing me that your lordship was unable to entertain the proposals accompanying my letter (No. 14) of 14th Nov. 1891, for the construction of the railway from Mandalay through the Shan States to Kun-Lon on the Salween. These proposals were considered and prepared in conjunction with gentlemen acquainted with the country, its requirements, and the work to be done, as also with the feelings of financiers as to that department. They were submitted in compliance, as it was understood, with a desire on the part of your lordship to know on what terms the work could be undertaken, when I was informed that my proposals would be undertaken, when I was informed that my proposals would be forwarded for the consideration of the Government of India. It was not supposed that these proposals would at once be received in their entirely, but there was necessarily a difficulty in at once formulating terms acceptable to all parties, and what may be primarily put forward must be worked and accommodated to mutual satisfaction. I cannot therefore help expressing my own disappointment, and that of the friends working with me in this important matter, that your lordship should not have seen your way to entertain the proposals, while withholding any intimation as to the lines and terms on which a modus operandi could be established. I am writing always on the assumption that your lordship as well as the Government of India are desirous of acting on the intimation made both in India and this country, that the policy of Government was to encourage private enterprise by all legitimate means in the construction of railways and other works for the development of the country, and the extension of trade and commerce. In view of the difficulties, which on several occasions have officially been stated to be “enormous,” and that “engineering difficulties of course meant largely increased expenditure,” it must be self-evident that considerable inducement must be held out to “private enterprise” to take it up, especially in a new country, very different from what may be expected in the more known and settled districts of India proper. Through my own knowledge of the engineering difficulties is necessarily limited, I am working with good advisers in that department – gentlemen of experience – in whom Government could not fail to put confidence; and the importance and urgency of the work induce me again respectfully to bring it under your lordship’s consideration, in the hope that a workable arrangement may be arrived at, as much in the interest of the Government and the country as of the subscriber. The latest public advices from Burmah are to the effect that the present allotment for railway work in that country, say fifty lakhs per annum, is to be devoted entirely to the Mu Valley line, which, though doubtless very important for local and administrative purposes, cannot accomplish what is required for the development and extension of trade so urgently pressed on your lordship by the whole mercantile and manufacturing communities of the question, it is calculated that as the Mu Valley work cannot be completed before 1895 or 1896, so the Burmah-Shan China connection must be deferred till that date, and its construction delayed for some years thereafter, unless extraordinary and extraneous action is taken both as to funds and constructive work. – I have the honour to be, &c., &c.
Reply. India Office, Whitehall, S.W., 14th January 1892. No. 2384. Sir, - I am directed to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated the 8th December 1891, offering some further observations in respect to railway extension in Burmah towards the China frontier. In reply I am desired to inform you that previous proposals by you on this subject have been transmitted to the Government of India, to whom a copy of your letter under reply will also be sent. – I am, &c., George N. Curzon. J. Ogilvy Hay, Esq.
Extract from Letter to his Excellency the Viceroy and Governor-General of India in Council. 18th December 1891. By the present I beg to hand you copy of his lordship’s reply. I further beg to wait on you with copy of a subsequent letter I addressed to his lordship (the Secretary of State for India), under date 8th December 1891, to which I respectfully ask your lordship’s attention. The importance of the speedy prosecution of the railway connection between Burmah and China in the interest of the empire generally, as well as for the development of Burmah and the Shan States, is so great and urgent, that I feel confident it will be my excuse for bringing it strongly to your notice. – I have the honour to be, &c., &c.,
Acknowledgement. No. 69 R.C. Gov. of India, P.W.D. Railway Construction. Calcutta, 18th January 1892. Sir, - I am directed to acknowledge the receipt of your letters of the 14th November and 18th December 1891, to the address of his Excellency the Governor-General in Council, forwarding copies of correspondence with the Right Honourable the Secretary of State regarding the proposed construction of a railway from Mandalay through the Shan States to Kun-Lon Ferry, on the Salween river. In your letter you ask the attention of the Governor-General in Council to the importance of the speedy prosecution of the railway connection between Burmah and China. It is observed, however, from the correspondence, that the Secretary of State lately expressed his inability to entertain, the proposals you have put forward, and that you have again addressed his lordship on the subject on the 8th December last. Under these circumstances the result of this communication will be awaited before any further action is taken. – I have, &c., F.B. Hebbert, Offg. Under-Secretary
Letter to his Excellency the Viceroy and Governor-General of India. 8th January 1892. I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of your lordship’s secretary’s letter of 9th December 1891, and to thank you for your promised consideration of my previous letters. Noting a telegram in the ‘Times’ intimating that a conference is to be held month in Calcutta of officers connected with Assam and Burmah, to take into consideration our relations with the tribes on our frontier, and being much interested in the matter, as bearing on the proposals I have on several occasions made for the extension of railways in Eastern Bengal and Burmah, I addressed a letter to the Secretary of State for India on the 5th inst, asking to be favoured with copies of reports made of expeditions into the Chin and Arakan Hills during seasons 1889-90. I hope to receive these shortly; meantime beg to hand your Excellency copy of my letter, and respectfully ask your reference to my previous letters therein noted, copies of which I doubt not were forwarded to your Government from the India Office. – I have the honour, &c., &c.
Letter to the ‘Times,’ as to Calcutta Conference on Eastern Frontier Policy. (While going through the press, this letter, with the map, has been retured “with the Editor’s compliments and thanks.”) (Not Published.) 21st January 1892. To the Editor of the ‘Times.’ 1) Sir, - In 1875 I had published by Mr Stanford, of Charing Cross, a map showing various routes for the development of trade in Eastern Bengal and Burmah, including trade with China through the latter country; that was before our acquisition of Upper Burmah, a circumstance which has altered some of the features in the proposals mooted, from the better knowledge we now have of our surroundings. A copy of this map was submitted to you at the time, and you were pleased to notice it in a short review in your issue of 2nd October 1875. In your columns of 9th idem you gave place to some explanatory remarks from me in reply, stating my object in publishing the map.
2) Late telegrams in your paper report an approaching conference in Calcutta of various officers of Government, including the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal and the Chief Commissioners of Assam and Burmah, to discuss the future administration of the “Lushai country.” In view of this conference, I think it opportune to call attention to the map above alluded to, and, asking your kind attention to the following remarks bearing on the subject, I beg to hand you herewith a copy of the map for reference, more especially as the principal of the routes suggested are being realized – when they may be so in full remains in the womb of futurity. The paragraphs from your columns above referred to you will find on the map. As is well known, the borders of our provinces of Assam, Chittagong, and Arakan were the constant scenes of raids from the wild tribes in their neighbourhood, and it may be in your recollection that a little girl named Mary Winchester was carried away in one of these raids, leading to an expedition into the Lushai country in the season of 1871-72 for her recovery, and the punishment of the raiders. Columns started from Cachar and Chittagong, and a wing of a Madras regiment was sent to Akyab to march through the Arakan hill tracts to join them. I need not go into the details of this expedition, which, after the usual burning and devastation, returned victorious, a temporary terrorism having been established. Our frontiers, however, continued to be kept in a constant state of alarm, until there was a burst on the Chittagong frontier in 1888, “when Lieutenant Stewart of the Canadian Regiment was shot, and some others of the survey party he was in charge of cut off.” This lad to another expedition into the Lushai country, accompanied by the Commissioner of Chittagong as civil officer in charge. The usual burning and destruction of property (including grain), the principal feature for remark being the proclamations of the civil officer, that unless submission was made “villages would be burned.” This is civilized policy in this enlightened nineteenth century! Shortly after this affair with Lieutenant Stewart’s party, and in anticipation of the expedition just referred to, I wrote in a prominent paper, (In the ‘Scotsman,’ 31st December 1888) “The raids,”&c. In writing in another place as to the abandoned Chittagong-Arakan road, I wrote: “It would have done much towards the civilization and development of the country to the north and east of Chittagong and Arakan, with which we may yet have trouble, - not that this road would have gone through those districts, but it would have attracted settlers along its route, and they would gradually have come in contact with the wild tribes on our borders, creating intercourse which would doubtless have had a civilizing influence over them, paving the way for what we now require – access through their territory. There have been two raids lately – the first (previously referred to) after so many years of quiet, in which Lieutenant Stewart was shot; the second, said to be by Shendoos from the Arakan hills, when three men and a woman were killed, and nine men and fifteen women and a woman were taken captive. A succession of these occurrences may have the effect of getting up a general agitation along the frontier.” Colonel Woodthorpe, of the Indian Survey Department, in a paper read before the Royal Geographical Society giving an account of his explorations in the Chindwin valley, referred to our relations with the Nagas and Singphoos on the borders of Assam, showing that in time past our Government has been somewhat remiss in not opening up intercourse more freely with these tribes, and we were now reaping the fruits of this remissness, as, when we now wanted a passage through their country, we found them obstructive. “Until we can get a position in their very midst, the most effectual way to deal with these tribes would be the construction of a railway by the shortest route from Arakan to Upper Burmah. This would form a basis from which to work northward in bringing these tribes under our civilizing influences. This is as important a matter as any that can be considered in connection with our under-populated province of Burmah and our over-populous districts of Bengal, from the latter of which it is proposed to migrate settlers to grants in Burmah. Doubtless it will be said the country is too rugged to attempt such a work, but engineering skill can overcome all obstacles; and considering the importance of the work, both as regards its effects on the tribes and the facilities it will give to carry out the immigration scheme into Burmah, all obstacles to its accomplishment must be removed.” As to the country through which the above-mentioned railway would go, much information has been gained by the intelligence Department during the past two years, particularly by a reconnaissance made in February to May last year by Lieutenant Walker, report of which has been published, showing that the route is perfectly practicable without any of the “stupendous political features” which have for many years been put forwards to shelve such an important work – a work the importance of which is now gradually dawning on official minds, and which possibly the coming conference may determine to carry out. At the time of the expedition of 1871-72 I was resident in Arakan, and had had my attention previously directed to the isolation in which this province stood, owing to its having no connection by road or rail either with Chittagong on the one side or Burmah on the other, the consequence being that the country was perfectly undeveloped and unexplored, and its trade entirely confined to rice grown in the immediate vicinity of the rivers and creeks with which the country is intersected, these being the only means of bringing produce to market. What improvement is there in this respect up to date? A recent telegram from your Rangoon correspondent said there were not forty miles of common road in the province, and it has been officially stated that its boundaries not a hundred miles from the Commissioner’s headquarters are unknown; and we took possession in 1826!! 8) At the time of the Burmah was of 1852-53, the then Governor-General, Lord Dalhousie, ordered the construction of a road from Chittagong to Akyab with the view of marching native troops to Burmah, some of those ordered there during the war having refused to cross the “Kala-pance.” After lakhs of rupees had been spent on this road, the late Sir Henry Durand was deputed to report on it, the consequence being (a foregone conclusion) that the road was abandoned, and the line of earth has since returned to its original virgin state. This was at the time considered by those connected with the province a penny-wise pound-foolish policy, but financial pressure for other purposes carried the day, to the neglect of Arakan. What would have been the benefit to the country had its construction been completed? All the coolie labour required in the great rice-trade comes from Chittagong, and the country wants settlers. Had the road been made, the bulk of the coolies, instead of coming and going with the seasons, would in all probability have settled down and helped to increase the cultivation and general development of the province. It would also have been of inestimable importance had there been any opposition on the part of the Burmese in the last war. Another instance of neglect of Arakan may here be mentioned, which led to a sad calamity. I allude to the assassination of the Governor-General, Lord Mayo, at the Andamans. When it was known he was to visit Burmah, representations were made to him that he should visit Akyab to see its neglected state and its capabilities. He was earnestly entreated, indeed beseeched, to make a call at the port on his way to or from Rangoon. Stronger influences, however, than a feeble voice from Arakan were used to divert his attention from what should have been considered a duty, to a needless, useless visit to a penal settlement, and hence a terrible punishment for a dereliction of duty – a noble victim sacrificed, bad advisers escaping scathless. Alas! Alas! Bengal influence has been the bane of Arakan ever since we took possession of it, using it as a good milch cow! These were the experiences of a bygone past; good times are now looming in the future, and the enlightened policy which the coming conference will doubtless inaugurate, will, it is hoped, result in benefit to Arakan, and bring Akyab to the front as one of the most rising ports in India. 9) In viewing all these preceding matters, I had my attention also directed to the fact that there was no probability of the Eastern Bengal Railway being continued on from its terminus at Goalundo (which still continues its terminus), and all these circumstances combined led me to the conclusion which I endeavoured to express by the map previously referred to – vis., “that all the trade of Eastern Bengal (to the east of the Brahmapootra) must find its outlet at Akyab, and that the line of communication would be necessary for connecting Burmah with India, being joined by the line from Akyab to Upper Burmah.”
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