Census of India, 1931 Volume XV North-West Frontier Province

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This report deals with the statistics of population, both enumerated and estimated, of the North-West Frontier Province, as it was on the 26th February 1931. The Province may roughly be divided into two parts, viz., the regularly administered districts within the borders of British India and the trans-border tribal tract under the political control of the Chief Commissioner* in his capacity of Agent to the Governor General. The trans-border tract is almost exclusively inhabited by various independent Pathan tribes who owe no direct allegiance to any sovereign or settled government. No statistical information regarding its internal condition or its inhabitants is forthcoming, though much literature on the subject is available, and the population data contained in the tables is based on estimates made by the Political Agents and Deputy Commissioners concerned, as distinguished from the regular enumeration conducted in the five settled districts and in the posts and military areas situated in tribal territory. This report may therefore he taken to be to all intents and purposes a discussion of the statistics of the five settled districts. Beyond giving the estimated population of the trans-border area, little attempt has been made to elucidate with regard to it the various subjects that are usually discussed in a Census Report.

2. This is the third census that the Province has undergone since it was constituted in October 1901, the first having been conducted on the 18th of March 1911 and the second on the 18th March 1921.

Five previous enumerations of the districts now included in the North-West Frontier Province were conducted under the orders of the Punjab Government before the historic province of the Punjab was divided into two administration, the Punjab and the North-West Frontier Province. The first Census in order of time was taken on the night between the 31st December 1854 and the Ist January 1855, for British Territory only on administrative grounds. It was followed by the enumerations of the 10th January 1868, 17th February 1881, 26th February 1891, 1st March 1901, 10th March 1911 and the 18th March 1921. All but the last two were carried out under the orders of the Punjab Government. In the Census of 1881, the operations were for the first time carried out on a scientific basis with due attention to detail. and a mass of information was collected on various subjects, connected with the growth of population, its intellectual and functional development, and its religious and racial distribution, by the late Sir Denzil Ibbetson whose report I as since become a classic in the literature on the subject. Ever since 1881 Census Operations have been undertaken regularly every ten years and they have been conducted with the care and thoroughness which is associated with Indian Censuses.