13 - The development of the Indian paper industry

Summary

THE INDUSTRY UP TO 1924

The origins of the machine-made paper industry in India go back to the early part of the nineteenth century when a paper mill was set up at Seram-pore by the Christian missionaries. The Bally Paper Mills was started under British management in 1870, with one machine. The company was floated in England. The first mill managed by Indians was set up about 1878 in Lucknow. But the entry of British capital on a large scale was probably precipitated by the new policy of the Government of India, favouring the purchase of local stores, proclaimed in 1883; it also owed something to the prices of paper ruling in the world market, because of the spread of literacy among the masses in advanced and advancing countries, including the U.K., the U.S.A., western Europe, and Japan. The local market in India for machine-made paper was also expected to develop through the replacement of hand-made paper and the spread of literacy.

Both British and Indian entrepreneurship played their part in the birth of the industry. The Upper India Couper Paper Mills Company Ltd, was registered as a joint stock company in 1878 and started production in its mills in Lucknow in 1882. It owed its origin to a group of Indian businessmen in Lucknow and had an Indian board of directors almost all through. (In 1912, it had only one European director, Rev. L. C. Bare.)