The police, it is admitted, still form an unsatisfactory part of the administration, though important reforms have recently been introduced. The present system, which is modelled somewhat on that of the Irish constabulary, dates from shortly after the Mutiny, and is regulated for the greater part of the country by an act passed in 1861. It provides a regular force in each district, under a superintendent who is almost always a European, subordinate for general purposes to the district magistrate. For the preservation of order this force is by no means inefficient, but it fails as a detective agency and also in the prosecution of crime, being distrusted by the people generally. As the result of a Commission appointed in 1902, a considerable addition has been made to the expenditure on police, which is being devoted to increasing the pay of all the lower grades and to augmenting the number of investigating officers. In 1901 the total strength of the civil police force was about 145,000 men, maintained at a total cost of about £2,200,000. In addition, the village watchmen or _chaukidars_, a primitive institution paid from local sources but to some extent incorporated in the general system, aggregated about 700,000; while a special force of military police, numbering about 20,000 under officers seconded from the army, is maintained along the frontier, more especially in Burma. Gaols. The administration of gaols in India can be described more favourably. As a rule, there is one gaol in each district, under the management of the civil surgeon. Discipline is well maintained, though separate confinement is practically unknown; and various industries (especially carpet-weaving) are profitably pursued wherever possible. So much attention has been directed to diet and sanitation that the death-rate compares well with that of the general working population: in 1907 it was as low as 18 per 1000. Convicts with more than six years to serve are transported to the Andaman Islands, where the penal settlement is organized on an elaborate system, permitting ultimately self-support on a ticket of leave and even marriage. In 1907 the daily average gaol population in India was 87,306, while the convicts in the Andamans numbered 14,235. Municipalities.