Dealing with Oriental Despotism: British Jurisdiction in Bengal, 1772–93

Michael Mann FernUniversitaet, Hagen

With regard to the rules by which justice was to be administered, the Hindoo and Mohamedan codes were in general to be the standard for the respective subjects of them, but tempered, in some instances where they are barbarous and cruel, by the mildness of British sentiments, and improved in others which have relation to political economy.

Charles Grant, Observations on the State of Society among the Asiatic Subjects of Great Britain, 1792

The Idea of Reform

During the last decades of the eighteenth century, intellectuals, clergymen and politicians in Britain dominated a general discussion about the moral improvement of human beings and society at large. This debate dealt with the universal betterment of mankind through social reforms. Leading figures were to be found in Robert Young's Philanthropic Society, but individuals, like William Jones, the ardent parliamentary reformer of the 1770s who went to India as puisne judge of Calcutta's Supreme Court in 1783 and Colin Miles of the Royal Humane Society, bear testimony to a general reform approach in terms of an overall societal enhancement. As will be seen, this discussion had an immediate influence on contemporary colonial politics in India where the idea of improvement was introduced into the political discourse by Governor General Charles Cornwallis (1786–93). Its other proponent, as the epigraph indicates, was Charles Grant, the ardent 'Evangelical' administrator and later director of the East India Company in India and first European theoretical reformer of Indian society.

The colonial constellation, however, is characterized by an unbridgeable hiatus between Indian and European civilizations more or less from the beginning. The character of Indians was thought inferior, as was their administration of the country, especially with regard to revenue and justice. In the early days of colonial rule, Alexander Dow, a servant of the East India Company, brought out his translation of Ferishta's History of Hindostan (1770–72), commenting on the miserable condition of the Indian polity, manifested in its arbitrary jurisdiction as well as in the inert Indian population, which was in stark contrast to the British sense of good government and civil society:

The history now given to the public, presents us with a striking picture of the deplorable condition of a people subjected to arbitrary sway; and of the instability on empire itself, when it is founded neither on law, nor upon the opinions and attachments of mankind [...]. In a government like that of India, public spirit is never seen, and loyalty a thing unknown. The people permit themselves to be transferred from one tyrant to another, without murmuring [...].

Since the 1780–4 war of the East India Company against Tipu Sultan of Mysore (1782–99), whom the British regarded as the prototype of an oriental despot and his state as a Muslim tyranny par excellence, the British had promoted the idea of their own beneficial rule in contrast to that of any Indian prince. The more they became involved in Indian warfare and politics the more they constructed the differences between Indian and British civilization to support the legitimacy of their rule. To appear as beneficial rulers, whose moral and civil duty it was to liberate by a just war an oppressed people from an unjust and cruel ruler, and to set up a just government as a means of civil improvement, became the core of British self-justification and helped to shape the future self-image of British rule in India.

It is interesting to note that the discussion on the moral and material improvement in British India was part of a general discourse on overall human betterment and that in both societies the British elite regarded betterment as a mandate to civilize the 'masses'. Therefore, the British civilizing mission was not restricted to the colonies but extended to society at home. But India became a 'laboratory' in which the ideology of a civilizing mission for subordinate and uncivilized people was promulgated, starting with reform in the revenue and judicial departments. In this article we will concentrate on moral improvement with regard to judicial reform because jurisdiction became the most contested field between the British and the Indian governments.

Reorganization and reform of Bengal's judicial system became of critical importance after 1765, when the East India Company had acquired the diwani of Bengal. Five different courts already existed in the city of Calcutta, with different areas of responsibility in respect of the resident British and other European traders and, in a much more limited capacity, of the Indian inhabitants. Apart from that, the British were now vested with the civil jurisdiction in the Mughal subas (provinces) of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. The various courts and laws created a confusing situation. The early British colonial administrators quickly realized that, in the long run, they would not be able to administer Bengal's jurisdiction properly, and that the current way of dealing with the laws of Bengal would neither stabilize the fairly ephemeral British rule nor be...