The poppy grown in India is usually the white-flowered
variety, but in the Himalayas a red-flowered poppy with dark seeds is
cultivated. The opium industry in Bengal was a government monopoly, under
the control of officials residing respectively at Patna and Ghazipore.
It was considered that with greater freedom the
cultivator would produce too great a quantity, and loss to the
government would soon result. Advances of money were often made by the
government to enable the growth of the poppy. The chief centers of
production were Bihar in Bengal. The opium manufactured at
Patna were of two classes, Provision opium manufactured for export,
and Excise or Akbari opium intended for local consumption in India.
These differed in consistence: Excise opium was prepared to contain 90% of
non-volatile solid matter and made up into cubes weighing one seer, and wrapped in oiled paper, whilst Provision opium
was made up
into balls, protected by a leafy covering, made of poppy petals, opium
and pussewah, or liquid drainings of the crude opium; that of Patna is
made to contain 75% of solid matter, and that of Ghazipore, which is
known as Benares opium.
The cultivation of Malwa opium was free and extremely
profitable, the crop realizing usually from three to seven times the
value of wheat or other cereals, and in exceptionally advantageous
situations, from twelve to twenty times as much. On its entering British
territory a heavy duty was imposed on Malwa opium, so as to raise its
price to an equality with the government article. It was shipped from
Bombay to northern China, where nearly the whole of the exported Malwa
opium was consumed. The poppy was grown for opium in the Punjab to a
limited extent, but it had been decided to entirely abolish the
cultivation there within a short time. In Nepal, Bashahr and Rampur, and
at Doda Kashtwar in the Jammu territory, opium was produced and exported
to Yarkand, Khotan and Aksu. The cultivation of the poppy was also
carried on in Afghanistan, Kashmir, Nepal and the Shan states of Burma,
but the areas and production are not known.
A small amount of opium alkaloids was only manufactured in India. The
surplus above that issued to government medical institutions in India is
sold in London.
The land intended for poppy culture was usually selected near
villages, in order that it was more easily manured and irrigated. On
a rich soil a crop of maize or vegetables was grown during the rainy
season, and after its removal in September the ground was prepared for
the poppy-culture. Under less favorable circumstances the land was prepared from July till October by
ploughing and weeding.
The
seed was sown between the 1st and 15th of November, and germinates in ten or fifteen days. The fields
were divided for purposes of irrigation into beds about 10 ft. square,
which usually were irrigated twice between November and February, but if
the season was cold, with hardly any rain, the operation was repeated five
or six times. When the seedlings were 2 or 3 in. high they were thinned
out and weeded. The plants during growth were liable to injury by severe
frost, excessive rain, insects, fungi and the growth of a root-parasite
(Orobanche indica). The poppy blossomed about the middle of February, and
the petals when about to fall were collected for the purpose of making leaves for the spherical coverings of the balls of opium. These
were made by heating a circular-ridged earthen plate over a slow fire, and
spreading the petals, a few at a time, over its surface. As the juice
exuded, more petals were pressed on to them with a cloth until a layer of
sufficient thickness is obtained. The leaves are forwarded to the
opium-factories, where they are sorted into three classes, according to
size and color, the smaller and dark-colored being reserved for the
inside of the shells of the opium-balls, and the larger and least colored
for the outside.
The collection of opium
commenced in Behar
about 25th February, and continues to about 25th March, but in Malwa was
performed in March and April. The capsules are scarified vertically in most districts
The nushtur consists of three to five flattened blades forked at the larger end, and separated about one-sixteenth of
an inch from each other by winding cotton thread between them, the whole
being also bound together by thread, and the protrusion of the points
being restricted to one-twelfth of an inch, by which the depth of the
incision is limited. The operation was usually performed about three or
four o’clock in the afternoon, and the opium collected the next morning.
In Bengal a small sheet iron scoop or seetoah is used for scraping off
the dried juice, and, as it becomes filled, the opium was emptied into an
earthen pot carried for the purpose. In Malwa a flat scraper is
employed, a small piece of cotton soaked in linseed oil being attached
to the upper part of the blade, and used for smearing the thumb and edge
of the scraper to prevent adhesion of the juice; sometimes water was used
instead of oil, but both practices injured the quality of the product.
Sometimes the opium was in a fluid state by reason of dew, and in some
places it was rendered still more so by the practice adopted by
collectors of washing their scrapers, and adding the washings to the
morning’s collection.
The juice, when brought home, is consequently a
wet granular mass of pinkish color, from which a dark fluid drains to
the bottom of the vessel. In order to get rid of this fluid, called
pasewa or pussewah, the opium was placed in a shallow earthen vessel
tilted on one side, and the pussewah drained off. The residual mass
was
then exposed to the air in the shade, and regularly turned over every
few days, until it had reached the proper consistence, which took place
in about three or four weeks. The drug was then taken to the government
factory to be sold. It was turned out of the pots into wide tin vessels
or tagars, in which it was weighed in quantities not exceeding 21 lb.
It was then examined by a native expert (purkhea) as to impurities, color, fracture, aroma and consistence. To determine the amount of
moisture, which should not exceed 30%, a weighed sample was evaporated
and dried in a plate on a metallic surface heated by steam.
Adulterations such as mud, sand, powdered charcoal, soot, cow-dung,
powdered poppy petals and powdered seeds of various kinds were easily
detected by breaking up the drug in cold water. Flour, potato-flour,
ghee and ghoor (crude datesugar) were revealed by their odor and the
consistence they impart.
Various other adulterants were sometimes used, such as the
juice of the prickly pear, extracts’ from tobacco, stramonium and hemp,
pulp of the tamarind and bael fruit, mahwah flowers and gums of
different kinds. The price paid to the cultivator was regulated chiefly
by the amount of water contained in the drug. When received into the
government stores the opium was kept in large wooden boxes.
The care bestowed on the selection and preparation of the drug in the
Bengal opium-factories is such that the merchants who purchased it rarely
required to examine it, although permission wais given to open at each sale
any number of chests or cakes that they may desire.
In Malwa the opium
wais manufactured by private enterprise, the
government levying an export duty. It was
not made into balls but into rectangular or rounded masses, and was not
cased in poppy petals. It contained as much as 95 % of dry opium, but is
of much less uniform quality than the Bengal drug, and, having no
guarantee as to purity, and wasn't considered so valuable. The cultivation
in Malwa did not differ in any important particular from that in
Bengal. The opium was collected in March and April, and the crude drug
was thrown into an earthen vessel and covered with linseed oil
to prevent evaporation. In this state it was sold to itinerant dealers.
It was afterwards tied up in quantities of 25 lb and 50 lb in double bags
of sheeting, which were suspended to a ceiling out of the light and
draught to allow the excess of oil to drain off. In June and
July, when the rains begin, the bags were taken down and emptied into shallow vats so to 15 ft. across, and 6 to 8 in. deep, in which
the opium was kneaded until uniform in color and consistence and tough
enough to be formed into cakes of 8 or 10 oz. in weight. These were
thrown into a basket containing chaff made from the capsules. They were
then rolled in broken leaves and stalks of the poppy and left, with
occasional turning, for a week or so, when they became hard enough to
bear packing.