24
Hakim or Musalman practitioner who managed the special Julaha Hospital
was not allowed to see the girl. A band of youths came out with
sticks and drove him and the Choudhari or head of their community out
of their quarters, threatening to take their lives because they had helped
in Plague operations. The crowd of Julahas increased and, refusing to
disperse, and having wounded the Magistrate severely with stones, were
fired on.
The rioters fled to Kamathipura and to Paidhowni where they were
joined by local bad characters, both Hindus and Musalmans. The
mob fired the Grant Road and Musalman Hospitals, burned down the
Plague Office in Nagpada, and committed many grievous and some
fatal assaults on Europeans. Before dark however all rioting had ceased,
and on the next day no attempt at disorder was repeated. During the
mornings of the three following days the Committee, with the help of
the military, arranged, in the parts of the city where opposition was most
likely, for searches of large areas.
These searches were most successful. No attempt at disorder or
opposition was encountered, and indeed few signs of displeasure were
evinced, though a large number of cases were found and taken to hospital.
Local Volun-
teer Commit-
tees.
To whatever extent irritation with Plague measures and annoyance
at the failure of the measures to reduce the death-rate were the cause
of the riot of the 9th March, its effects on the progress of Plague
measures was most serious. The extreme ill-feeling shown by the
rioters and the strike among cartmen and dock-workers on the 11th
March hurried on a change which had been already under contempla-
tion-the replacing of medical search-parties by the formation of a
large number of volunteer Committees.
The new scheme was generally indicated in a speech by His
Excellency the Governor at the Town Hall to the assembled justices and
prominent citizens of Bombay. It prohibited search by the District Staff
in any house which had not been notified as Plague infected, unless
other circumstances caused it to be a gravely suspected house. His
Excellency's hope was to secure a sufficient number of zealous workers
to allow of parcelling sections of the city into divisions so small,
that the members of the local Committees would be able to know every
case of death, and even of sickness, within their beat.
The Plague Committee in conjunction with the District Officers at
once called meetings of influential residents at the different District
Plague offices.