Page:Indian Journal of Economics Volume 2.djvu/604

 STANLEY JBVON$ ' 1 the total' debt is head o! the population. low in comparison with and it is not entirely the still only about Rs. 17-8 per These fisures are extremely those of other countries; poverty and undeveloped character of India which is respongible for this fact. There is no doubt that in the past there has been an extremely conservative policy adopted by he Finance Department of the Government o! India as regards the raising o! loans. It has been felt to be more important to avoid raising the rate of interest than to borrow larger sums. To obtain l&.rg. er sums would undoub- tedly have'necessitated ralmng the rate of Interest and this again would have market price of the existing tended to 8t per cent reduce the promissary notes o! which & very large quantity was already issued. Wh&ver were the exact reasons which led to this maintenance of & low rate of interest and high market value for the public debt in India, the situ. altered now obliged to borrowed on the 8 and the by the War. pay War The per Bonds, per cents has political fabric ation has been entirely Government of India is cent for money which it and the market value of correspondingly depreciated, o! India has survived the shock l Looking forward to the future, therefore, it may be hoped that the Government of India will see fit to reverse its former policy and to regard the raising by means o! loans as of reduction of the rate of in- of large sums of money prior importance to the There elm be no question whatever that many could be so spent as more than 6 per cent into account also the terest. hundreds o! crores of. rupees to return indirect revenue of per annum; and if we take resulting indirect revenue, the return would be much greater. India very badly needs this capital expen- diture, and is able and prepared to pay for it.