Page:Indian Journal of Economics Volume 2.djvu/412

 46,000 a year, or 29 per village in 21 years. family years; equal average once in 27 years. Thus each has only one chance of buying a plot in 54 or if we assume that vendors ancl yenices are in numbers, then the chance comes on It is this scarcity value which accounts for the rise in Kulu. In this Himalayan tract the average for the period 1871-1891 was Rs. 27 per acre; 1891 to 1912 it was Rs. 85 per acre. the Gazetteer remarks that the price such remote tracts as price from The writer o! of the land entirely due to for cultivation bears no relation to t. he profit 'to be made ou of it. Across the Central Himalayan chain.the price is in Lahul and Rs. 133 in Spiti. These are the intense scarcity of land and the scattered nature habitations adds a high site value of the land. is no good to a man with money in one to know that land is for sale two villages off. It ih becoming increasingly clear that the factors referred to have raised the price well above the economic limit. The latest Report on the Court of Wards in the Punjab deals with a cultivated area of over 200,000 acres; the estimated value is only Rs. 94 per acre. The gross income accruing from this large area works out at under 7 per cent of the value; after paying land revenue, the rate is reduced to 5 per cent, and when the cost of management and ordinary repairs is deducted, the resulting profi is 4 per cent. If the land were valued at 157 times the land revenue (the multiple for 1916-17) he net profit would be only 3 per cent. It is difficult to form an accurate estimate of the profits o! farming anywhere at any time, and in the Punjab, here is nothing very reliable of this nature on record. The figures quoted have the merit o[, being actual accounts relating to a large area scattered over the Rs. 157 almos euitable e village