Page:The Evolution of Provincial Finance in British India.djvu/32

 wonder with Disraeli who remarked in the House of Commons that

The causes of this collapse, however, are not far to seek. The inadequacy of Indian Finances is mainly to be ascribed to an unsound fiscal policy. The policy was unsound for various reasons. In matters of state economy it is usual to argue that the expenditure to be incurred should determine the magnitude of revenue to be raised. But experience has shown that this stock maxim has proved ruinous wherever its limitations have failed to receive their due weight. It cannot be too often said that the growing expenditure of the State can only be sustained from the growing wealth of the society. Nor can it be too strongly emphasized that the test of sound finance does not merely consist in being capable of raising the requisite amount of revenue. It must be remembered that the mode of raising the revenue is an aspect of the question which is fraught with tremendous consequences for the stability ant productivity of the nation. It is too obvious to be denied that a tax system by its unequal incidence may cause social upheavals, just as by its unwise incidence on trade and industry it may impoverish society by setting out of gear its economic mechanism and technique and eventually beggar the State by impairing the productive powers of society. Wisdom therefore requires that those who are entrusted with the financial management of the State should look beyond the more immediate object of raising and spending of money, for the "hows" of finance