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INDIAN LAW ADMINISTRATION.
28th duly 1860.
Sin—In your paper of the 25th of May last, among the topics of the day, I have read one headed " British India—the Black Act," in which there were certain misstatements regarding the acquirements of the members of the Indian civil service and the duties intrusted to them. The Spectator has such a general reputation for impartiality, that statements published in
it are received as acknowledged truths, which, found elsewhere, would be looked upon as mere ex-parte assertions. I trust, therefore,that you will give a fair consideration to what I am about to say : in this I do not expect that you should be led by my report alone to change your opinions or correct errors ; but in justice to the governed as well as the governors,. it is desirable that your information, as well as that of other impartial men in England, re- garding the working of the Company's courts, should be sought for elsewhere than within the immediate proximity of the Supreme Courts.
I do not wish to discuss the probable effects of the Black Act, as it is called, in the event of its becoming the law of the land ; but I would beg of you to consider that this country can scarcely be called a British colony. By a series of mostly uncontrollable events the supreme power ever all India has been given to the merchant-traders of England ; and they hold it in trust for the numerous races, creeds, and castes, who have been preying upon one an- other almost since the infancy of the world. In strict justice therefore, the in
first people whose rights and interests claim consideration would be the Hin- doos, as the most numerous race and the earliest occupants of the land; after these by a parity of reasoning, come the Mahommedans ; lastly, the British, Portuguese, and mixed races, who are but a small community compared with the three hundred millions of Hindoos and Mahommedans. The privilege of a separate legislation for the smaller number, of course implies paramount rights belonging to this dominant race; and if such privilege is continued, the certain result will be the slavery or extirpation of the natives.
European merchants and speculators have for many years been settled in the North-west provinces of India. They are connected with the natives in trade, associated with them in mercantile speculations, milted with them in agriculture, and at issue with them in the Company's civil courts. I re- fer you to such men for an opinion on those courts. How have they found them ? Are there much more legal chicanery and vexatious delays than in England ? Have British subjects, generally speaking, been sufferers by the judges' ignorance of law and equity .? Would they prefer the machinery of the Supreme Court in this part of India ? You I think, find that as a body they are wonderfully indifferent regarding the introduction of the pro- posed act. The only agitators are the people in and about Calcutta, headed by their lawyers. The former cry out for their privilege, the latter for their profits; and this is very natural.
Pardon this digression, which I could scarcely have avoided. - I now come to the misstatements complained of. You so, that the civil servants of the Company are imperfectly acquainted with the language in which the busi- ness of the courts is transacted. I will not urge in refutation of this charge, that we have to pass strict examinations in the native languages before we can be employed in the service of Government. To this you would
that such ordeals may be got through by successful cramming or the
nature of an examiner, and that long and continued practice can.alone give a perfect knowledge of any language. Now the business of the courts is carried on in the language spoken by the majority of the people. In these provinces that language is commonly called the Oordoo or Hindostannee. The civilian cannot avoid speaking this language, during office time, for at least six hours of every day. In the cold season, when he is in the interior of the district, living among the people, he frequently never speaks in. any other tongue for weeks and even months. None of the native officials of his court and none of his servants speak English. For the greater part of the day, therefore, he is engaged in talking the language of the people, and itis not too much to say that half at -least of his conversation in India is car- ried on in the vernacular. If this is not the practice which makes perfect, I desire to know where and how it is to be acquired.
You state that the presidents of the courts are engaged in the revenue de- partment one day and called upon to act as judges the next. This is so far true, that an officer who has for some fifteen or eighteen years been employed in the revenue department becomes in his turn promoted to the rank of judge ; but,. by learning what are the duties usually performed by a collector of revenue in these provinces,you will see that that department is the very j
best of schools for an Indian judge of civil suits. On this point I would refer you to an article in the Calcutta Review of last December, on the set- tlement of the North-west provinces, and to the publications by the African Government therein quoted. The collector of revenue is also a magistrate, with control over the police of his district. These functions usually make him well fitted to fill the office of sessions judge. It is not the case that the judge's time is also taken up withrevenue duties. His work is exclusively ju- dicial. In the civil service promotion goes chiefly by seniority, and the jumpy and inexperienced officers have the less important duties to discharge. The higher appointments are invariably filled by officers of some experience ; and the fact is not to be disproved, that every civil and sessions judge, and every magistrate and collector in these provinces, possesses a very perfect and practical knowledge of the language, in use among the people and in the courts.
I do not wish to deny that serious evils exist ; but they originate chiefly if not altogether in the defective morality of the people. The extent to which per- jury is carried, (especially since the abolition of heathenish oaths,) is deplor- able. The inferior native officials and pleaders are corrupt and knavish, and there is not among the community that sense of public duty and moral obli- gation to fit them for the effice of jurors. But are these evils to be remedied by an English bar ? We can hardly be said to be at the mercy-of the natives, as our eyes are fully open to their defects. We rather become the more cir- cumspect. Documentary and oral evidence are the more carefully examined, and what would be credited in an English Court would often meet with merited suspicion in an Indian one. .A habit of cross-examination and a per- ception of falsehood are acquired among us, that would surprise many an English lawyer. The charge of want of practical experience and legal knowledge is brought against us lightly, and is unfounded. The onus of proving it should rest with those who made it. It originates probably within a very short distance of Calcutta. Those who know us will absolve us of the charge ; and for those who do not, the civilians of these provinces desire nothing better than that before the expiry of the present charter a searching investigation should be made into the nature of the judicial decisions of the magistrates and judges of the North-west. The inquiry should of course be conducted by honest and sensible men ; whether from London, Birmingham, or Manchester, no matter—we do net fear the result.
If We are to have an English bar to correct abuses, it is to be hoped that it will be composed of better materials than that of Calcutta, which, instead of checking, has heretofore taken full advantage of the worst vices of the native character—joining, as they have ever-done, to assist the powerful against the weak, and creating discord throughout the land. Something, however, should be done ; for the present .system, by which an Englishman. guilty Of felony claims the right of draggine' his prosecutor and the witnesses to the accusation, fifteen hundred miles from the spot where the crime was com- mitted, (and this in a country where locomotion is slow and expensive,) is too absurd and vexatious to be continued longer.* A CIYILIAN OP THE NORTH-WEST PRONTNCES.
• An Englishman forged a document in the name of a Native, who taxed him with the offence. The free-born Briton acknowledged the fact, and told his victim that he had nothing to do but to prosecute him in the Supreme Court, some twelve hundred miles distant! The Native of course preferred putting up with the loss of his money. This is a fact which I can conch. for.
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