Page:A Statistical Account of Bengal Vol 14 GoogleBooksID c44BAAAAQAAJ.pdf/204

Rh in land in Bhágalpur is £382,762 per annum. In 1860-61, the year in which an Income-Tax was first levied in Bengal, the amount of duty paid by agriculturists, including landholders and others, deriving their income from landed property, was £6715, which represents, at the rate of four per cent, a total income of £167,875. In 1872-73, when the tax was last raised, the amount derived from land was £2508, which, at the rate of one per cent., gives an income derived from land of £250,800. The Road-Cess valuations were made in the following year, and are certainly not too high, when it is remembered that the income-tax in the last year of its existence was very leniently enforced, and was applied only to incomes exceeding £100 a year, whilst the Road-Cess Act reaches those of £5.

The following figures give the number of persons of all classes assessed in 1860-61, 1864-65, and 1872-73, arranged in the two first years according to the amount of their incomes, and in the last according to their professions as well as their incomes. In 1860-61, the number of persons having incomes under £50, amounted to 3015; between £50 and £100, 561; between £100 and £500, 306; between £500 and £1000, 44; between £1000 and £5000, 35; between £5000 and £10,000, 3; above £10,000, one person: total number of persons taxed out of a population, as then estimated, of 1,239,666 souls, 3965. In 1864-65 this total fell to 837; there being assessed on anincomean income [sic] between £50 and £100, 531 persons between £100 and £500, 251; between £500 and £1000, 27; be tween £1000 and £5000, 23; between £5000 and £10,000, 4; and above £10,000, one. In 1872-73, the annual return of assessments gave the following details: Of persons having incomes between £100 and £200, there were professors of (a) religion, 2; (b) law, 14; (c) medicine, 1; persons following various minor employments, (a) salaried clerks, bailiffs, and shopmen, 10; (b) domestic servant, 1; persons engaged in commercial pursuits—general merchants, not manufacturers, 20; piece goods merchants, 45; grain merchants, 115; salt merchant, 1; others, 3; trader in metals, 1; in food, 5; in salt, 3; in spirits, drugs, and tobacco, 6; in miscellaneous articles, 9; dealers in animals, 2; wholesale manufacturer of sugar, 1; proprietors and sub-proprietors of land, 178; tenants, 141; proprietor of houses, 1; persons deriving incomes from interest from other sources than interest of Government securities, 91; miscellaneous income holders, 107. Of persons having incomes between £200 and