The famine of 1896 to 1897
Jabalpur, Central Provinces
A failed monsoon reaches 69 million people; the official estimate is about 750,000 dead, and later estimates run from 2.6 million to 5.15 million.
The monsoon of 1895 was weak in Bundelkhand, and famine was declared there early in 1896. The monsoon of that year failed widely. The North-Western Provinces and Oudh, the Central Provinces, Berar and parts of Madras, Bombay, Bengal, the Punjab and Upper Burma were hit, with parts of Rajputana, Central India and Hyderabad. The Imperial Gazetteer gives 307,000 square miles and 69.5 million people affected, and over 4 million on relief at the peak. Fever followed, and plague was already in Bombay.
This was the first full test of the famine codes written after 1880. 821 million units of relief were given, and the Gazetteer singles out the Central Provinces, the pin, as the place where relief most clearly failed. The Famine Commission of 1898 reviewed the results.
The official and the demographic numbers measure different things, and both are shown here. The 750,000 is the Gazetteer's rough count of famine mortality in British districts alone. Arup Maharatna's 2.6 to 4.1 million corrects registered excess deaths for all India. The 5.15 million in the Visarias and Seavoy adds up regional figures for the declared areas.
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