VIZAGAPATAM
was smaller than in any other district in the Presidency, and the incidence of the tax per head of the population was lower than in any other except South Arcot and Salem, the figure being only 6 pies against an average for the Presidency, excluding Madras City, of 10½ pies. Only 25 per cent, of the assessees paid tax at the higher rate of 5 pies per rupee, against a similar Presidency average of over 37 per cent.
The zamindars and owners of proprietary estates in the district formerly levied for many years a profession tax, called moturpha and graduated on no very fixed principles, on certain classes of people resident within their properties. In 1861 this was stopped, compensation being paid to those of the zamindars and proprietors in fixing whose peshkash the proceeds of this tax had been included among the assets of the estate.
Both judicial and non-judicial stamps are sold on the system usual elsewhere. The Stamp Act is in force in the Agency. Statistics of the receipts will be found in the Appendix, and it will be seen that they are very small. Its revenue from this source has often been held to be an index of the prosperity of a district, since where trade is large and business brisk non-judicial stamps are largely required, while where the people have money in their pockets they are usually fond of spending it on litigation and the sale of judicial stamps accordingly increases. If this test be a true one, Vizagapatam as a whole is the poorest area in the Presidency, since, including the Agency, the revenue there per 1,000 of the population both from judicial and non- judicial stamps, and both in the year 1904-05 and the six years ending therewith, was lower than in any other Madras district. There are however certain special reasons why the stamp revenue there should be low, among them the infrequency of communications and the backwardness of the people in a large part of the district.
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