MEANS OF COMMUNICATION.
Though there are thus several excellent lines of road through the various parts of the Agency, much more might undoubtedly be done. There are still large tracts in which no cart has ever been seen and the people are actually afraid of them. A case recently occurred in which the only hill man who could be induced to get into the first cart which arrived on a new road was a Dombu whose ideas had been widened by a compulsory journey to the Vizagapatam jail! In particular, when funds become available, the country round Pádéru, Pádwa and Aruku requires an outlet to the plains. The difficulty is want of money. The recent introduction of the Local Boards Act (see p. 212) into parts of the Agency will bring in some Rs. 35,000 from landcess and tolls, but a contribution of an equal amount from Provincial funds (in addition to the Rs. 24,000 already allowed for the maintenance of the Ittikavalasa-Jeypore road) will be necessary, and even then only about Rs. 8,000 per annum will be available for new works above the gháts. The advantage formerly urged in favour of opening up Jeypore — that it would serve as a granary to Vizagapatam in times of scarcity — has been already sufficiently secured by the Pottangi ghát and the extension of the road thence to the Bastar frontier.
The country carts of the Vizagapatam district are somewhat smaller and lighter than those of the south and usually have only wooden axles. The oxen hardly ever have nose-strings, or even ropes to their horns, as in the south, and if they shy or bolt the driver is powerless. The carts which fetch down grain from the trans-ghát country carry a kind of huge sarcophagus, three feet high and seven long and capable of holding a third of a garce, made by the Médaras of bamboo wattle smeared inside with clay, and the grain is poured loose into this, gunny-bags not being used. In the Jeypore plateau one meets the smaller wains from Bastar, which have little wheels with broad fellies or solid wooden wheels studded along the rim with big nails.
The palanquin is still common in the Agency, but may only be used by those to whom the Jeypore Mahárája has granted permission. The carriers are almost always Gadabas and many of them own inams requiring this service of them. Kávadis (baskets slung on either end of a bamboo carried across the shoulder)are much used for lighter loads, and are so popular both in the plains and the Agency that a man will use them even for the lightest loads (when taking out his dinner to the fields, for example)instead of carrying them on his head, as would be done in the south. Manure, etc., is often carried on to the land on a kind of
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