Eastern Dwárs. The Deputy-Commissioner states that if the price of rice in January or February, or soon after the cold-weather rice harvest, were to rise as high as from 10 to 8 sers per rupee, equal to from 10s. to 14s. a hundredweight, that should be considered as a warning of famine later in the year, and Government relief operations would become necessary. The Eastern Dwárs depend chiefly on the áman harvest, but áus rice is also cultivated to a considerable extent; and the Deputy-Commissioner thinks that if a total loss of either one of these two crops should take place, the people could live throughout the year on the other without suffering actual famine. In the jungles, the people collect abundance of wild vegetables which they cook as food, and also numerous varieties of edible berries, so that in the very unlikely event of a famine, the people in these parts would be much better off than where the country is entirely under cultivation. Although there are very few roads in the Eastern Dwárs, the rivers and streams are numerous, and afford sufficient facilities for importation to remove the danger of isolation of any tract in time of famine. Such a thing as actual famine in the Eastern Dwárs is a very unlikely occurrence, the irrigation practised by the villagers being an efficient safeguard.
Roads and Means of Communication.—The principal, and indeed the only road in the Eastern Dwárs, is the one that runs from the ferry on the Sankos river (the western boundary), near the police outpost of Haldibárí, from west to east through the Dwárs to the Rahá police station in Kámrúp District, a total distance of seventy-three miles. This road is under the local management of the Deputy-Commissioner of Goálpárá. It is not in a good state of repair, and it crosses numerous rivers and streams, very few of which have either bridges or ferries, besides pieces of low and swampy land. In the rainy season the track becomes altogether impassable. During the cold season, beasts of burden can pass along, but it is impracticable for wheeled traffic, which has not yet established itself anywhere in the Eastern Dwárs. There are no large market towns on this road, but the principal places it passes through are Bijní, Sidlí, Chandrápará, Datmá, Kachugáon, and Ráimáná, formerly a police outpost station. These places are all small villages, where periodical markets are held once or twice a week. From Rahá police station there is a road leading to Goálpará, which runs along the banks of the Murá Manàs river, but
