No More Learning

The Gaekwad of Baroda had become openly hostile, while the
Rajputana states, left wholly to their own devices, were in a condition
of ferment, the good work done by Tod and his colleagues being
rapidly undone. Finally, attention was forcibly drawn to the condi-
tions obtaining in this tract by an attack at Jaipur on the Resident
and his assistant, in which the former was wounded and the latter
killed. This actually took place just after Bentinck had embarked
for England in 1835. In Mysore the governor-general was obliged
to take over the administration owing to the incompetence and
extravagance of Raja Krishna Udaiyar and the consequent outbreak
of disturbances. The administration remained in our hands until 1881.
Some absorption of state territory also took place. The raja of
Jaintia in Assam sacrificed three British Indian subjects to the goddess
Kali, for which act his lands were annexed, while those of the raja
of Cachar, in the same province, were taken over for gross malad-
ministration. Coorg, near Mysore, where the raja openly declared
his hostility towards us and plotted to seize the station of Bangalore,
while at the same time murdering his relatives wholesale, was also
annexed.
Bentinck handed over temporary charge to Sir Charles Metcalfe,
who acted as governor-general until the arrival of Lord Auckland in
March, 1836.
Most of Lord Auckland's energies were taken up by the Afghan
War and he devoted little attention to the states.
However, when the debauchee king of Oudh died in 1837, advan-
tage of this was taken to conclude a new treaty, further mention of
which is made below.
The raja of Satara, to whom Lord Hastings had given a small
area in 1816, was deposed for intriguing, his brother being elevated
to the gaddi in his place. The territory of the nawab of Karnul, in
Madras, was annexed for attempting to make war.
Lord Ellenborough succeeded as governor-general in 1842. Only
one case of importance arose in connection with an Indian state, but
1 Parliamentary Papers, 1844, XXXVI, 351-453.


## p. 579 (#607) ############################################

GWALIOR
579
that was of the first importance. The troubles in the Gwalior state,
referred to in Bentinck's time, had continued to increase and now
came to a head. Jankoji Rao Sindhia died in 1843, to be succeeded
by an adopted son, a minor, Jayaji Rao. Intrigues multiplied and
the army, some 40,000 strong, became all powerful. The minority
was in the hands of Krishna Rao Kadam, the Mama Sahib, or materna
uncle of the late ruler. He was opposed to Dada Khasgi-wala (the
administrator of the family estates of the maharani), who succeeded
in engineering his downfall. Dada was, indeed, expelled from the
state on the demand of the governor-general, but this step failed to
put an end to the intrigues.
Lord Ellenborough's remonstrance fell mainly on deaf ears, while
the few sardars who were prepared to assist us in restoring order
were powerless in the face of the army, which had complete control
of affairs. The governor-general, therefore, decided to act and accom-
panied by the commander-in-chief, Sir Hugh Gough, crossed the
Chambal and advanced on Gwalior. To their surprise (for no proper
reconnaissance had been made) the British troops suddenly found
themselves face to face with the state forces, and after two simul-
taneous battles at Maharajpur and Panniar, the state army was
broken up. A fresh treaty was made and a council of regency
appointed to conduct affairs during the minority of the maharaja,
then nine years old. Lord Ellenborough's action in the Gwalior case
was the object of much criticism, and the main reason for his recail.
But whatever criticism may be levelled at his methods, there can be
no doubt as to the correctness of the policy pursued. When he landed
in India, Lord Ellenborough inherited, as a legacy from his prede-
cessor, the Afghan War. In addition, the assembly of a menacing
army of Sikhs, some 70,000 strong, just across the Satlej river, made
him nervous, and he felt that it would be courting disaster to leave
a hostile, undisciplined force in his rear, close to the important town
of Agra, especially in view of the weakness of our own army. The
best reply to the strictures levelled at him is to be found in his own
letter to Lord Ripon, written on receiving the news of his recall. "
He refers to the criticism passed on him by the court of directors in
which his conduct was stigmatised as "wanting in decision and
inconsistent with itself", and says in reply, that he is unable to
controvert this opinion because he has not the remotest idea to what
supposed facts it can possibly refer”. He then turns to the two
objections raised by the court, firstly that he should have supported
the regent, who was appointed with our approval, and secondly that
he should not have crossed the Chambal river against the expressed
wishes of the maharani and the sardars of the states. The Mama Sahib
(the regent), he points out, was offered military support but refuseci
1 Calcutta Review, 1844, I, 535.
2 Parliamentary Papers, loc. cit. pp. 143-344.
3 Law, India under Lord Ellenborough, p. 28.


## p. 580 (#608) ############################################

580
THE INDIAN STATES, 1818-57
it, and, when his fall came, it was so sudden as to preclude any
possibility of such assistance reaching him. On 19 May (1843) he
was in full control of the administration, on the 21st he was removed
from the regency and by 5 June had left Gwalior, a fugitive. It
would, moreover, have been impossible to carry out military opera-
tions at the end of May, with the rains imminent and many stream:
to cross, including the great Chambal river.
With regard to the second point, the crossing of the Chambal in
December against the wishes of the durbar, he remarks that at that
season the winter rains were expected which would have made the
river difficult, if not impossible, to cross; provisions were not obtain-
able for the troops at his encampment; while the deep ravines which
surrounded his position made it dangerous. To have withdrawn the
troops would have led to an immediate cessation of all negotiations,
as the Gwalior army, which was de facto ruler of the state, woula
never have submitted quietly to disbandment, even if the durbar had
really intended to assist us. The court's view was, he notes, ton
limited, in regarding
the movement as an insulated transaction, which with an army in the field
the Governor-General could deal with at his leisure. . . . It should rather be
considered as a movement upon a field of battle extending from Scinde through
the Punjab even to the frontiers of Nepaul.
Delay in dealing with the situation would have induced the Sikhs to
advance, and to have left a hostile force of 40,000 men within a few
marches of Agra would have been the height of folly. He concludes
by saying that no negotiations would ever have been effected without
the presence of a force and it had always been apprehended that its
use would be necessary.
The weak point in Lord Ellenborough's procedure was his reliance
on the Treaty of Burhanpur, of 1804, which, though never denounced,
had been objected to by Lord Cornwallis, and treated as a dead
letter when new compacts were made with Gwalior in 1805 and 1817.
By article 6 of this treaty we undertook to support the maharaja
should necessity arise, with a subsidiary force; and the governor-
general, in view of the maharaja's youth, construed the disturbances
of 1843 as falling under the spirit of this article.
In July, 1844, Lord Ellenborough was recalled and Sir Henry
Hardinge succeeded him. The Sikh War engaged most of the governor-
general's attention but he visited the king of Oudh in a fruitless
endeavour to induce him to overhaul his administration, informing
him that unless reforms were introduced at an early date, the British
Government would be obliged to take over the state. The warning,
however, fell on deaf ears. Hardinge also urged the abolition of sati
in the Indian states, following the lines of Lord W. Bentinck's
enactment in British India.
1 Aitchison, op. cit. IV, 53; Parliamentary Papers, loc. cit. p. 146.


## p. 581 (#609) ############################################

SATARA
581
In January, 1848, Lord Dalhousie assumed the governor-general-
ship. His name is, even now, apt to be invidiously coupled with the
so-called "annexation policy" in connection with the Indian states.
But, indeed, in all probability, no criticism' would have been roused
by his action had not the Mutiny, following so closely on his retire-
ment, called for a scapegoat.
The cases on which this adverse criticism is mainly based are the
absorption of Satara (1848); Nagpur (1853); Jhansi (1854) and
Oudh (1856). There were also some other but less important in-
stances. Of all these only that of Oudh was strictly speaking a case
of deliberate annexation; in every other case Lord Dalhousie based
his decisions on the fact that no direct heir existed to inherit the state,
which was, moreover, "dependent”, that is created by ourselves or
held on a subordinate tenure. In each case, also, a decision was only
arrived at after infinite pains had been taken to ascertain the facts,
and was invariably carried out with the full approbation of the court
of directors.
The Satara state was created by Lord Hastings in 1818, the treaty
on which it rested (1819) containing no clause conferring the righĩ
of adoption, while Sir James Rivett-Carnac in installing the raja
had warned him that, being childless and no longer young, the state
would lapse at his death, unless as a mark of special favour he was
permitted to adopt a successor. Lord Dalhousie left no stone unturned
to arrive at a just decision; no argument for or against adoption
escaped his scrutiny. His policy was based on the well-established
Hindu doctrine, still followed by the ruling princes of India, which
denies the right of succession by adoption in a subordinate state or
estate unless the previous sanction of the suzerain has been obtained,
a rule applying equally to old-established or recently-created holdings.
Thus in Central India, it is followed by the big Maratha durbars
with respect of Rajput feudatories, who were established much
earlier than their masters. This permission to adopt must in every
case be given by the suzerain before the ceremony of adoption is
carried out, otherwise the adoption is not legal. On the other hand
it is not, in Indian states, customary to enforce an escheat, so that
the actual absorption of an entire holding is very rare, although the
terms of the tenure are often modified by the area being reduced,
the tributę raised or some new conditions imposed. A succession
fee called nazarana is invariably levied, amounting often to one
year's revenue or even more.
This well-known principle was disregarded by the raja of Satara,
who, just before he died, in 1848, adopted a son without informing
the British Resident or obtaining the permission of the governor-
general. Hence Lord Dalhousie would have been fully within his
rights in ordering escheat, simply on the basis of this omission,
1 Parliamentary Papers, 1849,-. XXIX, 267.


## p. 582 (#610) ############################################

582
THE INDIAN STATES, 1818-57
3
especially as the court of directors had, in 1841, enunciated the
principle, that the right to political succession was an indulgenee
which should be the exception and not the rule, and be granted only
as a mark of special favour and approbation, adding that the Com-
pany should “persevere in the one clear and direct course of aban-
doning no just and honourable accession of territory or revenue,
while all existing claims of right are at the same time scrupulously
respected"
Lord Dalhousie consulted all his most experienced colleagues and
found that he was supported by the majority of them in refusing to
recognise the adoption. But before passing orders he referred the
case to the court, which agreed with his view, as "being in accordance
with the general law and custom of India". "
The Nagpur case was in many ways similar. The raja died heirless
in 1853. He had not adopted any one and no lineal descendant in
the male line survived. In a long, careful minute? Lord Dalhousie
pointed out that the original state was of recent creation and was
founded on usurpation and conquest; its ruler had always been
hostile to us, and after the campaign which ended in his defeat it had
lain entirely with us to deal with this territory as we thought fit.
Lord Hastings had then, as a concession to Maratha sentiment,
recreated the state from the conquered territory, after deducting a
considerable portion of it. Nagpur, like Satara, was thus a state of
our own making. In this minute Lord Dalhousie classed the Indian
states as being tributary and subordinate, of our own creation, or
independent. In the first case he considered that our assent was
necessary to an adoption, in the second case that adoption should not
be allowed, while in the third case we had no right to interfere.
Lord Dalhousie found, however, that in the Nagpur case many of
his advisers were against him, especially Colonel Low,5 who quoted
the views of Lord Hastings, Elphinstone, Munro, and Metcalfe, all of
whom considered that the adoption of heirs to states by Indian
princes should be recognised by us. The main grounds of dissent were,
that our rule was generally unpopular; that the absorption of a state
invariably meant that the aristocracy ceased to find employment and
became a discontented body; that the rigorous enforcement of the
doctrine of lapse would only lead to misgovernment, as every childless
raja, feeling that his state must come to an end, would oppress his
subjects, extorting the last penny from them for his own use. The
case was referred to the court, which upheld the escheat.
The Jhansi case (1854) stood on quite a different footing. The
subhedar of Jhansi had originally been a provincial governor under
1 Minute of 30 August, 1848, Parliamentary Papers, loc. cit. pp. 224-8.
2 Parliamentary Papers, loc. cit. pp. 272-98.
3 Parliamentary Papers, 1854, XLVIII, 317 sqq.
4 Minute of 28 January, 1854, idem, pp. 337-53.
5. Minute of 10 February, 1854, idem, pp. 355-67.


## p. 583 (#611) ############################################

OUDH
583
the Peshwa, and was in no sense a ruling chief. When in 1818 all the
Peshwa's lands fell to us the province of Bundelkhand passed with
them, and the subhadar with it. In submitting the case to the court
the governor-general laid stress on this aspect of the affair. 1
One case which Lord Dalhousie took up cannot well be brought
into the same category as the three just mentioned, and that is the
case of Karauli. This state lies in Rajputana and was founded in the
eleventh century. Sir Frederick Currie in his minute on the case
points out how Karauli, an old Rajput state, differed entirely from
"Satara the offspring of our gratuitous benevolence". Lord Dalhousie,
however, recommended the escheat, but the directors decided that
iheir policy was inapplicable to Karauli, which was not a dependent
state but a “protected ally”. It may be remarked here that the
absorption of Satara, Nagpur and Jhansi caused no real alarm amongst
the Indian princes.
The crowning act of Lord Dalhousie's administration was the
annexation of Oudh, a genuine case of annexation, and undoubtedly
one which did stir the hearts of the princes of India. It is only fair to
the governor-general to show how averse he was to the procedure
he was ordered to follow.
Our relations with the state of Oudh were governed by the treaty
of 1801 which required the nawab to reform his administration and
follow the advice of the Company's officers. Succeeding governors-
general had warned him that unless he reformed his administration
we should be obliged to interfere, but, though abuse increased year
by year, we took no steps to enforce our admonitions. Wellesley,
when granting the treaty of 1801, had remarked prophetically that
our support of the nawab only protected the vile and that no effective
security could be provided against the ruin of the province of Oudh
until we took over the administration. In 1837 Lord Auckland made
a new treaty with the nawab by which we were empowered to
intervene in case of misrule and put our own officers in charge. The
king accepted, but the directors refused to ratify it. Lord Auckland,
however, never informed the king that the treaty was a dead letter,
though he did report to the directors that he had not done so. * Lord
Hardinge, nevertheless, when he warned the king, in 1847, that he
must reform, cited this treaty in his memorandum as if it was still
in force and confirmatory of the treaty of 1801. 5
Convinced by the reports of Sleeman and Outram of the need for
immediate action, Dalhousie, although his term of office was just
expiring, and he might well have left this unpleasant duty to Lord
Canning, investigated the case with his usual minute care. He was
1 Parliamentary Papers, 1854-5, XL, 87-103.
2 Idem.
:> Wellesley, Despatches, , 426-Despatch of 22 January, 1801.
4 Parliamentary Papers, 1857-8, XLIN, 307-65.
* Idem, p. 368, para. 8.


## p. 584 (#612) ############################################

584
THE INDIAN STATES, 1818-57
3
informed by Mr Dorin and General Low, members of council, that
though the treaty of 1837 was a dead letter, this fact was unknown
to the king of Oudh. Mr Grant, another member, urged that the
king should be informed of this fact. Dalhousie referred the point to
the directors who replied that the best course to take was to leave
things as they were until circumstances arose necessitating the dis-
closure, 1
Long afterwards, writing to Sir George Couper on 6 January,
1858,” Dalhousie refers to this question. He remarks that it was
really a matter of indifference to the king and the people of Oudh,
when we actually took over the state, whether it was done under the
treaty of 1837 or by the strong hand: “for every human being knew
the assumption would be permanent”, and so the degree of their
knowledge could not have affected the result. But he held that the
authorities had no right, at the time, to withhold the information.
In a long and careful minute 3 the governor-general discussed
the whole case. He put the treaty of 1837 aside as being a dead letter,
and pointed out that "for tolerating so long this total disregard of
the obligation of a solemn Treaty [of 1801]. . . the British Government
is heavily responsible”. We had warned and counselled but never
acted, abuses had grown, while. our own troops in Oudh protected
the king from justifiable revolt on the part of his subjects. He then
suggested four courses :
(a) that the king should abdicate, Oudh being incorporated in
British India;
(b) that the king should be allowed to retain his titles but should
vest the administration in us in perpetuity;
(c) that the administration should be made over to us for a time;
(d) that the Resident should take over general control of the
state administration.
Lord Dalhousie declared that he believed the first course would
lead to the happiest issue, but added :
yet I do not counsel the adoption of this measure. The reform of the adminis-
tration may be wrought and the prospects of the people secured without resort-
ing to so extreme a measure as the annexation of the territory and the abolition
of the throne and I for my part do not advocate the advice that the province
of Oudh be declared British territory.
He held that in spite of maladministration the consistent loyalty to
us of successive nawabs of Oudh precluded annexation. So he urged
the second course that the king should vest control in us but retain
his titles and rank, as this course would be "perpetual in duration
as well as ample in extent”; but the king must himself do this, not
be forced to do it. Different views were held by the members of his
i Parliamentary Papers, 1857-8, XLIII, 307-65.
Dalhousie, Letters, p. 393.
3 Minute of 18 June, 1855, Parliamentary Papers, loc. cit.


## p. 585 (#613) ############################################

OUDH
585
council but the general opinion was against Lord Dalhousie and in
favour of the king's abdication. The case was sent to the court, and
the directors rejected Dalhousie's proposal, ordering annexation and
the abolition of the throne. 1
Dalhousie undertook to carry out this thankless task, although
Lord Canning had just arrived in India to succeed him as governor-
general. Outram, the Resident, was asked to induce the king to sign
a document voluntarily transferring the kingdom to us. Outram was
confident that he could do so, but the king refused in tears, and the
prcclamation annexing Oudh was at once issued. No disturbance
arose. Minute directions were also given to Outram as to disarming
the province but these were, at his suggestion, not carried out, owing
to the approach of the hot season, and the order was later on cancelled
by Lord Canning. Had it been carried out, Oudh with an unarmed
population would have been a less formidable factor in the distur-
bance of 1857. Lord Dalhousie refers to this in a private letter to
Sir George Couper of 5 February, 1852;2 he says: "Lord Canning's
Government made a fatal blunder in not disarming Oude in 1856,
when it might have been done easily and completely”. He adds that
no official record exists of his determination to carry this out because
it was a task for his successor, and hence it only appears in his
confidential demi-official correspondence with Outram, in these
words :
It is my intention that not a single fortified place should be left in Oude,
with the exception of those that belong to Government. It is further my
intention that the whole population should be disarmed. . . . as was done with
such excellent effect in the Punjaub in 1849.
It is thus clear that Lord Dalhousie, while he deprecated half-
measures, was strongly opposed to the policy of annexation, though
he was convinced that, so far as the people of Oudh were concerned,
it would be far the best course to take.
In a letter to Sir George Couper written on 15 December, 1855,3
before the orders of the court had arrived, he says:
I understand that they (the Directors] mean to force the King to form a
new treaty or to assume the government of his country. This is all very well
for the home authorities but it was not for me to suggest it. . . . The course
proposed by the Court is not warranted by international law. It would be
either conquest or usurpation of the power of government by force of arms.
This argument of international law would not in these days be raised
in connection with the Indian states.
Sleeman, however, Outram's predecessor as Resident at Lucknow,
expressed the opinion that the annexation was a political blunder,
holding that we should have acted under the treaty of 1837, abrogated
though it was. The confiscation of the state would, he said, “cause
our good name to suffer", and "that good name is more valuable
1 Parliamentary Papers, 1857, XI, 109-17.
2 Dalhousie, op. cit. p. 399.
3 Idem, p. 363.


## p. 586 (#614) ############################################

586
THE INDIAN STATES, 1818-57
to us than a dozen Oudes". We had used our giant's strength like
a giant, he said, and had injured our reputation in the eyes of all
India.
This opinion was largely instrumental in leading to the grant
of “Adoption sanads” in 1862. But any such step would have been
impossible in Dalhousie's day as it would have savoured of interfering
with the "independent” states.
The other cases with which Lord Dalhousie had to deal were the
extinction of the pension granted to Baji Rao, the last Peshwa, the
disappearance of the Carnatic and Tanjore titles, and the question
of the Hyderabad contingent.
Baji Rao died in 1852 leaving no heir, and the governor-general
ruled that the pension, being personal, terminated with his death,
though the large private fortune accumulated by Baji Rao would
pass to his adopted son, Dhondu Pant, who later on became notorious
in the Mutiny, as Nana Sahib.
Trouble arose in regard to payment of the Hyderabad contingent
force by that durbar, an din 1853 the Nizam under pressure placed
the administration of the Berar province of his state under our control
so that its revenues might be devoted to the up-keep of that force.
This arrangement, made with such reluctance in the first instance,
has since been the cause of much contention and is likely to remain so.
The nawab of the Carnatic, in 1855, died leaving no son and, on
the ground that his state was created by us in 1801, and on the fact
that his title was personal, his estate escheated and the title did not
descended to his successors, who have since then been styled Princes of
Arcot. ' A similar case arose on the death of the raja of Tanjore.
Reviewing Lord Dalhousie's administration in so far as it affected
the Indian states, it is clear that the policy of absorbing them in cases
of failure of direct heirs was not of his making but was inherited by
him, and, whether right or wrong, was at that time the avowed
policy of the Company, whose one anxiety was to consolidate its
possessions.
Lord Dalhousie was careful to confine action under this policy
to the “dependent” states. Thus, when he was urged by the directors,
soon after he reached India, to take a strong line and interfere in
Hyderabad, he threatened to resign; while in Bahawalpur, when the
newly-installed ruler was ousted by his brother, he refused to sup-
port the fugitive nawab, although we had recognised his succession,
in view of the fact that the people of the state did not wish to have
him as their ruler, and it was for them alone to decide. These two
cases occurred in "independent" states. Lord Dalhousie was one of
the most scrupulous and conscientious governors-general who ever
guided the destiny of India; he was absolutely incapable of doing an
injustice.
On the other hand, a sincerely religious man, he was
convinced of the desirability of substituting our rule for that of the
i Parliamentarij Papers, 1860, LII, 531-78.


## p. 587 (#615) ############################################

DALHOUSIE'S POLICY
587
1
2
Indian princes, whenever it could in fairness be effected. He says
himself, writing on 21 July, 1857, to Sir George Couper :
I never advised annexing any principality unless it lapsed naturally for
want of heirs or was forfeited for misconduct. But when a principality does
so fall to our disposal it does seem to me to be cruel to hand over its inhabit-
ants to be squeezed and skinned by a native despot, merely that our own sub-
jects may be able to compare their own lot favourably with that of those
whom we have abandoned. . . .
His unflagging warfare against abuses of all kinds and his desire
to extend to all the benefits of the new era he had introduced into
British India certainly dimmed his perception of other points of view;
as for instance that of the hereditary ruling princes themselves, that
of their subjects with the innate reverence for their natural rulers
which then did (if it does not now) distinguish the people of India,
and by their preference, in spite of abuses, for the less rigid govern-
ment of an Indian state. Never did his administration justify the
fancifully fierce condemnation levelled at it as being "more like
counting out the spoil of brigands. . . than. . . the acts of English
statesmanship”,» nor did any man ever merit less the stigma of being
called the "very worst and basest of rulers”. 3 We must not judge
those days by these. Besides an entire change of policy on our side,
the Indian states have themselves, for the most part, travelled far
administratively since 1856, and, though still in the main autocratic,
have reached a much higher standard than they then possessed,
while they are now subjected to the glare of criticism and the anti-
septic of publicity to a degree impossible in those days of a limited
public press and very inadequate communications.
The sudden upheaval which followed so soon after his departure
was quite unforeseen by Lord Dalhousie who in his farewell minute
considers that he is justified in saying that he leaves India "at peace
without and within".
To summarise the results of the policy pursued towards the
Indian states between 1818 and 1856.
This period is by far the most important in the history of the
relationship of the states to the British Government. It witnessed
their metamorphosis from a congeries of quasi-independent units,
some openly hostile, most, at heart, antagonistic to us, and all
doubtful and resentful of our intentions towards them, into a body
with so complete an acquiescence in our paramount position that
even the shock of the Mutiny could not subvert it. This result we owe
mainly to Lord Hastings, who built so carefully on the foundations
laid by Lord Wellesley, the structure being completed by the generous
policy adopted when India came directly under the crown. For Lord
4
1 Dalhousie, op. cit. p. 381.
2 Edwin Arnold, The Marquis of Dalhousie's Administration of British
India, p. 199.
* Major E. Bell, The Empire in India, p. 26.
+ Parliamentary Papers, 1855-6, XLV, 107-52.


## p. 588 (#616) ############################################

588
THE INDIAN STATES, 1818-57
Hastings introduced those distinct relations of supremacy and sub-
ordination which still fundamentally control the position between us
and the states. In his time those parts of India not directly under
our administration passed equally under our sovereignty; and our
ascendancy, as also our indefeasible right to interfere if the peace and
security of India was menaced, became henceforth unquestioned.
Step by step, sorely against its will, the Company had been driven,
by inexorable fate, to abandon its policy of the ring-fence and of
non-interference, and so we passed through the system of subordinate
alliance to the wise and generous policy of co-operative partnership
which holds at the present day.


## p. 589 (#617) ############################################

CHAPTER XXXII
"
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOVEREIGNTY
IN BRITISH INDIA
“British authority in India”, says Ilbert, “may be traced to
a two-fold source. It is derived partly from the British crown and
parliament, partly from the Great Mogul and other native rulers of
India. " 1 The development has been slow and at times obscure. It
has lent itself to much misinterpretation, and has involved strong
contrasts between facts and theories. One of the great difficulties
has arisen from the fact that in the East public law has not been
subject to the same scrutiny and definition that it has undergone in
Europe. Technical terms, such as sovereignty, and their Persian
equivalents, seem to have been used with the greatest laxity, both
by Indians and by Englishmen in India; while in most of our docu-
ments the needs of current controversies 'are predominant, and one
is seldom sure whether Hastings and Clive were laying down general
principles which they were prepared to support in every case or only
drawing temporary arguments from an ambiguous position in order
to defend a particular action.
It is clear that from the first the position of the English in India
was variable and uncertain. The fact may be illustrated by the
different positions held by the English in the seventeenth century
in their principal settlements of Bombay, Madras and Calcutta
respectively. In the first the Company exercised sovereign powers
under the English crown, to whom the island had been ceded by the
Portuguese. The right to fortify and defend the place, to maintain
troops there, to administer justice, to levy taxes, to coin money, was
clear, full and indisputable. All inhabitants, whether English or
Indian, were presumably subjects of the English crown.
Madras fell in another category. That place was held under a
grant of the chief of Wandiwash, who empowered the English Com-
pany to build a castle and fortress, to mint money, together with
full power and authority to govern and dispose of the government of Madras-
patam for the term and space of two years next insueing after they shall be
seated there and possesst of the said fortifications; and for the future by an
equal division to receive half the customs and revenues of that port. 2
After the Hindu power had been overthrown by the Muslim kingdom
of Golconda, the grant was in effect continued; but, as complaints
perpetually arose over the division of the customs, a new grant was
1 The Government of India, p. 1.
? Love, Vestiges, I, 17.


## p. 590 (#618) ############################################

590
DEVELOPMENT OF SOVEREIGNTY
made in 1672, which commuted the share of the customs for a quit-
rent of 1200 pagodas; the grant continues :
Neither shall any avaldare or any of the diwan's people ever be kept or
placed in the town of Chinapatam, and, as I have done, that no person what-
soever shall have to do in the least with the town of Chinapatam, but that it
shall remain wholly and for ever under the English,, where they may accord-
ingly act all the command, government and justice of the said town as they
shall think necessary and most convenient to be done. 1
When, in 1687, Golconda was conquered by Aurangzib, no change
seems to have been made in the English status. Here then was a
position quite different from that at Bombay. The English exercised
all the powers of sovereignty subject however to Indian superiority
shown by the payment of quit-rent. Here too it should be noted,
that as the local coinage bore no superscription, but only the figures
of Hindu deities, it did not carry with it the same implications that
it would have done in Northern India; and when the Moghul
authorities permitted the coinage of rupees at Madras, those coins
bore the usual marks of Moghul supremacy.
At Calcutta the position was again different. There the English
had been allowed to purchase the zamindari of the three villages that
grew into the capital of British India. Their jurisdiction, as at Madras,
was therefore two-fold. Over Englishmen the Company relied upon
its chartered powers; but over Indians, and especially over Muslims,
in whom alone the local government took any great interest, its
authority was that of a minor zamindar under the local faujdar. The
position is shown with special clearness by the fact that the Company
could not, till the treaty of 1757, obtain the right of minting coin at
Calcutta, and by the jurisdiction of the law courts there. The Com-
pany's criminal court, established by the royal charters of 1727 and
1753, was limited to Europeans. Indians were tried in the zamindar's
court. In theory all sentences of death should have been submitted
to the faujdar of Hugli and the Nazim at Murshidabad before being
put into execution. " In practice this does not seem to have been
done; but the Calcutta Council was clearly very cautious of putting
Muhammadans to death. We must discount Bolts's story, that they
were flogged to death instead of being hanged, out of deference to
Muslim opinion; but one case at least is on record, where the
Muhammadan members of a party of criminals were spared for fear
of the nawab's interference.
This position at Madras and Calcutta was profoundly changed by
the course of events which may be dated from the War of the Austrian
Succession. Madras was the first to be affected. During the war it
.
passed into the hands of the French by right of conquest, in defiance
1 Love, op. cit. I, 345. “Chinapatam" is Madras.
? Committee of Secrecy, 1773, Sixth Report, pp. 2 and 11.
3 Bolts, Considerations, 1, 80.
4 Long, Selections, p. 51. .


## p. 591 (#619) ############################################

THE CARNATIC
591
of the prohibitions of the nawab; it remained in French hands during
the war, although Dupleix agreed to make a formal recognition of
the nawab's position by flying his flag over the place for a week. '
At the end of the war it was restored to the English by the Treaty
of Aix-la-Chapelle. From that time the English might have claimed
to hold it independently of any Indian prince. However, they were
on the best of terms with Muhammad 'Ali, whom they were seeking
to establish as against the French nominee; and so, in 1752, as a mark
of gratitude the quit-rent was abolished, and with it went the last
fragment of dependence upon an Indian prince at Madras. ?
That, however, only applied to Madras itself and a very narrow
strip of land round its walls. The rest of the country lay within the
undisputed control of the nawab under the nominal sovereignty of
Delhi. When, in 1780, the nawab applied to Hastings to secure a
settlement of outstanding questions, he was specially eager to secure
declarations from the English that he was hereditary prince of the
Carnatic, with full power over the administration of his country and
the right to nominate his successor, under the general protection of
the Company and the English nation. It is apparent that all thoughts
of the Moghul emperor have disappeared, although doubtless his
name was still recited in the Friday prayers at Arcot, and for that
matter at Madras. In fact the very application shows that the Com-
pany, and not the emperor, was now suzerain. In 1792 the old nawab
died and was succeeded by the son whom for so many years he had
striven to disinherit; but the succession took place with the approval
of the Company. Finally, ten years later, for reasons which have been
explained in a previous chapter, on the next demise of the nawabship,
the Company intervened decisively. Its representative refused to
recognise any succession except on terms which at a stroke reduced
the nawab to the same position to which the nawab of Bengal had only
fallen after a term of years. He became a pensioner. On this occasion
we hear no mention of Delhi or the emperor. Sovereign powers over
the Carnatic passed to the Company, not indeed by conquest, but
in virtue of a long-established political situation, in which the
Company was in fact, though not in name, the overlord. For three
generations the old title and dignity were allowed to survive; but in
1855, in the time of Dalhousie, they were deliberately extinguished,
as a "semblance of royalty without any of the power is a mockery
of authority which must be pernicious”. 5
The case of Bengal was much more complicated, partly because
of the inferior status from which the Company set out, partly because
4
1 P. 122 supra.
2 Madras Public Consultations, 31 August, 1752.
3 Requests of the Nawab Walajah of the governor-general, Madras Military
Consultations, 22 August, 1781, p. 2280.
4 P. 361 supra.
5 Lee-Warner, Dalhousie, II, 140.


## p. 592 (#620) ############################################

592
DEVELOPMENT OF SOVEREIGNTY
1
1
it offered the first example of something like territorial acquisitions
on a large scale, and partly because of the conflicts and hesitations
of the crown and Company in England. The status of zamindar
persisted at Calcutta until the year 1756. But when at the close of
that year. Clive recovered the place, we may suppose that the logic
of events had already begun to modify the position. It was recovered
by force; and we may infer that when the English returned, they
returned no longer as humble dependents of the nawab. The change
is clearly indicated in the treaty which Clive made with Siraj-ud-
daula on 9 February following. In future the place might be fortified
as the English thought proper; the privilege of a mint was granted;
and the English nation and Company agreed to live on good terms
with the nawab so long as he observed the treaty. The theory of
Moghul sovereignty still stood, but a large breach had been made in
it. The breach was further enlarged when the English proceeded to
overthrow the ruling nawab and set up another. In the treaty with
Mir Ja'far, although the sovereignty over the country, in whosesoever
hands it lay, was not formally impaired, the English were nevertheless
established as an imperium in imperio with the right of doing them-
selves justice. The revolution of 1760 was designed to strengthen
the nawab and led, as we have seen, to a conflict between the person
invested with the sole rights of administration in the province, and
the corporation controlling the only efficient military force therein.
Again the nawab was overthrown and Mir Ja'far restored, not as had
formerly been the case, with the aid and concurrence of his friends
and supporters, but by the mere act of the Calcutta Council. In 1763
this de facto power assumed the right of nominating the nawab's
principal minister, and in the same year, under Clive's Treaty of
Allahabad, it was invested with the right of revenue administration.
The formal sovereignty still lay where it had; but alongside of the
emperor and nawab there had sprung up a body which not only
possessed the sole military force in Bengal, but also had conquered
the province in 1763, had assumed the power of nominating the
nawab's chief officer, and was now invested with the right of collect-
ing the revenues. It was an indefinite situation which could not
readily be brought within the scope of any western formulae.
The situation, perplexing as it was, was prolonged by the hesita-
tion of the English authorities to assume formal sovereignty over the
territories which in fact they controlled. Neither the crown nor the
Company was prepared, though for very different reasons, to lay
claim to territorial sovereignty in India. The Company feared that
any such claims would provoke or hasten interference
by the ministry;"
the crown was unwilling to assail the legal rights of the Company. 4
i Hill, Bengal in 1756-7, II, 215 sqq.
2 P. 171 supra.
3 Verelst, op. cit. p. 81.
4 E. g. Chatham to Shelburne, 24 May, 1773 (Chatham Correspondence, iv,
264).


## p. 593 (#621) ############################################

CROWN AND COMPANY
693
Indeed, the establishment of such a position was the precise motive
with which Clive seems in 1765 to have desired the diwanni of Bengal
rather than any territorial cession, which could have been obtained
just as readily. It placed the Company in a strong tactical position
alike as regards foreign powers and as regards the government at
home.
This had not always been Clive's aim. After Plassey he had sought
to induce Pitt to take over the government of the Company's pos-
sessions in despair of ever seeing that body establish good govern-
ment. But Pitt had then been reluctant to intervene in so complicated
a position. How complicated it was may be seen from an opinion
delivered by the law-officers on 24 December, 1757, on the Company's
memorial praying for the grant of all booty and conquests made in
India.
"In respect to such places”, they say, "as have been or shall be acquired by
treaty or grant from the Mogul or any of the Indian princes or governments,
your Majesty's letters patent are not necessary, the property of the soil vesting
in the Company by the Indian grants, subject only to your Majesty's rights of
sovereignty over the settlements as English settlements, and over the inhabi-
tants, as English subjects who carry with them your Majesty's laws wherever
they form colonies. . . . In respect to such places as have lately been acquired
or shall hereafter be acquired by conquest, the property as well as the dominion
vests in your Majesty by virtue of your known prerogative, and consequently
the Company can only derive a right to them by your Majesty's grant. . . . ”2
But although the Company could not acquire territory by conquest,
it could nevertheless "cede conquests made upon Indians", since by
its charters it had power to make war and peace with them. In 1765
the legal view undoubtedly was that British sovereignty was estab-
lished in Calcutta, in the 24-Parganas, and in the districts of Burdwan,
Midnapur and Chittagong ceded by Mir Kasim, but not in the
diwanni districts, a result which accorded well with the Company's
policy of that time. The question as to where and at what point
Indian inhabitants of places subject to English sovereignty became
English subjects does not seem to have been considered, as is clear
enough from the uncertain and ambiguous language of the Regulat-
ing Act. It was declared at Calcutta in 1773 that Sepoy officers were
“not. . . subjects of Britain, but aliens and natives of Hindustan”. 3
From the point of view of the ministry the question was clearly
two-fold : internal as regarded the Company, external as regarded
the French and other foreign nations. It will be most convenient
to sketch the development of policy under these two heads, and
finally to describe the relations between the Company's government
in India and the Moghul emperor—the de facto and the de jure
wielders of Indian dominion.
1 Malcolm, Life of Clive, , 119 sqq. ; Williams, Life of Chatham, 1, 28-9.
? Public Record Office, C. O. 77-19; cf. an undated and unsigned minute, ap.
Chatham MSS, I, 99.
8 Forrest, Selections from the State Papers of the Foreign Department, I, 89.
38


## p. 594 (#622) ############################################

594
DEVELOPMENT OF SOVEREIGNTY
The first direct exercise of sovereign power in India by the crown
since the cession of Bombay to the Company resulted from an inter-
national document, the Treaty of Paris of 1763, in which both the
French and the English governments recognised Muhammad 'Ali as
nawab of the Carnatic and Salabat Jang as subahdar of the Deccan.
No one seems to have considered how far these stipulations were
consistent with the structure of the Moghul Empire. Indeed they
were at the time intended only to secure the peace between the two
European nations in India by preventing them from continuing to
support rival, princes in those regions. At a later time, however, the
clauses were put to a new use. The disputes between the crown and
the Company which came to a head in 1766-7 made the ministry
anxious to find some means by which it could learn how matters were
actually going in India. There was reason to distrust the execution
which the Company's servants had given to the treaty in the East;
and the upshot of the matter was that when the Company sent out
its supervisors to reform its Indian administration, the ministry sent
out in command of the squadron an officer vested with plenipotentiary
powers from the king to the princes of India. About the commission
of this officer there was much underhand work that ill became the
dignity of the ministry; the commission, for instance, was not com-
municated to the Company; and so when the commodore arrived in
India he found that the Company's governments knew nothing about
the powers that had been granted to him. The natural result was the
outbreak of violent disputes between the representative of the king's
majesty and the councils which exercised the powers of the Company.
These divided and undefined powers were bound to weaken and
impede, rather than to strengthen the conduct of affairs, and the
time had not yet come when the ministry was prepared to take a
decisive part in determining Indian policy. However, it is curious to
note that among the other duties of the plenipotentiary was included
a mission to the Moghul emperor, who had sent presents to George III
by the hands of Clive, and these, by some oversight, had never been
acknowledged. Commodore Lindsay was entrusted with a letter of
thanks from the king, whose titles were for the occasion strangely
inodified, obviously with a view to impressing the court of Delhi with
a due sense of the king's importance. "George III”, the letter is
headed, "King. . .