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ILLUSIONS OF NEW INDIA

lakhs of rupees worth of toys and requisites for games are obtained from abroad. A taste for foreign perfumery and soap has been spreading, and in 1908 there were imported some forty-five lakhs worth of these articles. Houses must be furnished and decorated in European style to the extent of one’s means. Taking meals at the table with all its paraphernalia is largely superseding the simpler practice of eating in a squatting posture. The fashion of giving various imported trinkets and futilities as presents on such occasion as birthdays and weddings is yearly gaining ground. There is no doubt that the increasing European population is to some extent responsible for the increasing consumption of these and various other foreign articles. But there is also no doubt that my countrymen themselves are to a much larger extent responsible for it. Making allowance for the profits of Indian dealers in foreign goods, the net annual drain from India on account of her progress on the path of western civilization will probably not fall far short of thirty-five crores of rupees. New India has been