'Reports of administration for 1918 of divisions and districts of the occupied territories in Mesopotamia. Volume I' [‎135v] (275/470)

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sanitary cess tax. At first, this was levied at the rate of Re. 1/- per sarifah; but
later the Military Governor altered it to Re. 1/— per household. While coffee-shop
licences were taxed, if the liquor were kept in a shop the usual shop tax was charged,
while the 30 per cent, godown tax was levied if the liquor were kept in a house. In
view of the fact that coffee-houses have a tendency to spread their benches over the
street, whereby municipal ground is consumed and traffic thoroughfares curtailed,
it has been proposed that coffee-shop licences should revert to the former scale,
which was about 40 per cent, higher than the present scale. Coffee-houses are very
paying concerns, and can well afford the increase. A small search fee of Re. 1/- has
been ifnposed by way of fine for the extra work caused by hawkers, &c., who lose
their licences. But the success of the year under the head of taxation has been the
abolition of the farming of the ground rent tax and the 2J per cent, brokerage on
animals sold in Suq-al-Dijaj. The collection of these two taxes is now in the hands
of a municipal tax-collector, who in one month collected an amount equal to the
price paid for the farm for a quarter.
Pauper Burial and Poor Relief .—During the past year Rs. 3,186/12/-, exclusive
of Rs. 15/- paid monthly to an undertaker, have been expended on pauper burial
by the Basrah municipality, this figure representing the burial expenses of nearly
300 paupers. The tendency is for this form of relief to increase. In Turkish times
there was very little pauper burial. The reason for the increase under the present
administration seems to me to lie in the fact that Government has established a
civil hospital and an isolation hospital. Poor people who die in these institutions
are left by their friends and relations to the charity of the municipality. It
practically never happens that poor people who die outside these institutions are
buried by the municipality. Such being the case, I am of opinion that, in default of
preventive checks to be exercised at the isolation hospital and the civil hospital,
the various communities of Basrah should subscribe a proportion of the annual
expenditure. The great majority of paupers buried by the municipality are
Mohammedans, and I think that the municipality should receive help from the
Moslem Relief Fund. For the present, the monthly allowance to the undertaker
has been cut, in view of the fact that he is paid for each burial, and it has been
arranged that the civil jail shall bury the paupers who die there. Subsistence
cases and poor relief have been transferred to the Municipal Commissioner, c Ashar.
But sometimes this office, in exceptional circumstances, releases a poor widow &c.'
from house tax or some other such imposition of Government.
Trade.—!t is not easy to write in detail under this head, because statistics
are too difficult to obtain. The piece goods trade, which makes or mars Basrah,
has flourished all the year. Prices have been high and the merchants have made
big profits. But the signing of the Armistice with Germany has caused for the
moment a complete suspension of piece goods trade. Merchants have on their
hands large stocks of bales, for which there is no market. There are no buyers at
the old prices in Basrah, and the communications and transport to Mosul and
Persia, the chief market for piece goods, are not yet available to any extent There
is complete confidence among the bigger merchants that the market will rise again
withm a month or two, because of the urgent need of enemy countries for cotton
goods, the probability of a big rise m the cost of labour, which would prevent cotton
and r th 0 pNnrfih k T1 pre " war pn( k e ’ a f d the eventual opening of the roads to Persia
t But tlie smaIler men > acquired
their bales on compialas, ’ will be broken if they cannot sell now and in a
favourable market. For it must be remembered that the success of the piece goods
trade durmg the war had induced a considerable number of smaller men to sneculate
and to borrow much beyond their means. A scheme has been stS
syndicate of the bigger merchants, with a big capital, and to put this syndicate on
the market as one buyer and seller. The syndicate will buy from the smaller
e me T5 r ^ ^ “ n °l to sdl * Price to be ZtL
K rl th ( V There , 1S much t0 be s aid for this idea. But it means the
abolition of the smaller merchants and the concentration of the piece coods trade
in a few hands, a result which might one day develop into a dangerous condole!
le scheme has not yet advanced beyond the stage of discussion. But it seems to
me the solution of the whole question lies in the speedy opening of the Persian
market Were it possible to do that at once the situation would become normal
again, there would be no need of a combine, and the smaller merchants wouid rema n
During the process of demobilisation, when trucks and ships will be cominv down