Report of the Survey of India

Abstract

THE report issued by Col. Sir S. G. Burrard, the Surveyor-General of India, for the year 1916–17 includes a most satisfactory record of work accomplished in spite of a depleted staff and the difficulties involved by war exigencies. It is gratifying to observe how this Department has responded to the call of the war; the list of honours awarded to its members for distinguished service in the field is one of which any department might well be proud. Survey detachments have been sent to Mesopotamia, Western Persia (with the Russian forces), Persia (generally), Salonika, Waziristan (with the Field Force), and to the Makran border mission. Not a word is said about the work accomplished by these military parties, but quite enough is known, independently of the report, to justify the statement that they have well maintained the reputation of Indian surveyors in the field of military action. We shall hear all about them in time, though probably not from India. The normal work of the Department has been well sustained, especially in the topographical branches, where good progress towards the completion of the 1915 scheme is recorded. Broadly, this scheme embraced a re-survey of India (of which the topo-graphy was then nearly complete, but much out of ate) on the scale of 1 in. per mile, with a subsequent very wise reservation in favour of ½ in. per mile for certain extensive but unimportant areas of wilderness and jungle. The whole output for the year amounts to about 33,000 square miles (still leaving 1,350,000 to be completed) at an approximate cost of 31.4 rupees per square mile (say 2l.). Certain small areas of forest on scales of 3 in. and 4 in. per mile are included, so that this output of the twelve small parties employed must be considered very satisfactory. The geodetic operations include (besides direct triangulation and the magnetic surveys) pendulum, tidal, and levelling observations of great scientific value. More than one million maps have been turned out in the map department, including topographical, geographical, and general maps, amongst which are twelve sheets of the “one millionth”map of the world, which are now reduced to uniform style so as to take their place with similar sheets of the series published by the Royal Geographical Society and elsewhere. The colour system adopted by the Survey of India for defining differential altitudes in planes of different tints is not beyond criticism. The highest altitudes (next the regions of perpetual snow) are coloured a blood-red. The result when aoplied to Tibet is almost comic in its blazing determination to secure due recognition for the “Roof of the World.”