"مراسلات بشأن إنشاء محطة تلغراف لاسلكية في البحرين" [و‎‎١‎٤‎٢] (٣٢٤/٢٩٥)

Copy of a letter from I. D. Elliott, Esq., Under-Secretary to the Government of India
in the Department of Commerce and Industry, to all Local Governments and Adminis
trations, No. 4722—116, dated Simla, the 20th June 1916.
The~Government of India have under consideration measures for checking
the present serious delays to telegraph traffic throughout the country. The
steady increase in the volume of traffic cannot, in the^ financial circumstances,
be met by adding to the number of lines; the congestion is accentuated owing
to the war by a very heavy increase in actual signalling operations due to the
abnormal length of important State telegrams, many of which have to be
collated; and'at the same time the telegraph personnel has been largely
depleted by the demands of the military authorities for the telegraphic services
in the field.
2. The present strain can be relieved only by exercising stricter control
over the use of the telegraph, and the attention of all Departments of the
Government of India has consequently been invited to the need for co
operating in the following directions in checking the congestion of traffic.
Officers must be responsible for securing that telegrams are not sent where
the object could be obtained, without inconvenient delay, by ordinary corre
spondence through the post: if, however, it is desirable to use the telegraph,
officers must prevent the unnecessary use of Express messages, and in parti
cular, if cypher telegrams are used should reduce their length to the smallest
possible limit. It is laid down as a measure of equal importance that tele
grams should be sent from the departmental offices to the Telegraph Office
in as steady a flow as possible, arrangements being made for their issue in
batches at regular intervals during office working hours, with the proviso that
no telegrams, other than very urgent messages, should be sent to the Telegraph
Office after four o'clock in the afternoon. A very limited staff can be kept
on night duty in the Telegraph Offices and the inevitable result of the present
office ^practice of accumulating the majority of the day's telegrams for issue
in one large batch in the evening is to block the lines in all directions.
3. Instructions to the above effect are being issued in all Imperial
Departments, and the Government of India trust that Local Governments and
Administrations will assist in reducing the delay in traffic by giving similar
instructions to officers under their control.
r, & P. Dipt, Pre«-No. i34»-8.8-16~129i