Administrative Organisation Under the British Rule

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DEVELOPMENT OF CIVIL SERVICES: ( Already discussed in Civil service reforms chapter)

DEVELOPMENT OF POLICE UNDER BRITISH ADMINISTRATION :

The third pillar of British Administration was the police, whose creator was Cornwallis.

Evolution:

• Under the Mughal rule, faujdars helped in maintaining law and order along with judicial and revenue functions and in the cities, kotwal maintained law and order.
• Warren Hastings retained the post of the faujdars and utilised the policing functions of the Zamindars during the early phase of Company rule.
• He also appointed Magistrates in the districts because he found this arrangement to be inadequate.
• Each district was divided into smaller sub-units, each under the charge of a Darogah who headed a group of 20-30 armed policemen. Darogah supervised the village watchmen who were in charge of 20-30.

Reforms by Cornwallis:

• Cornwallis set up a regular police force to uphold law and order. He relieved the zamindars of their police duties and went back to modernised the mediaeval system of thanas.
• District Collectors, who served as Magistrates in Cornwallis' administrative system, combined the responsibilities of revenue collection and law enforcement.
• These functions were separated briefly at the recommendation of the Bird Committee (1808-12) when separate District Superintendents of Police were appointed.

Reforms under Bentinck:

• He abolished the office of SP and made Collector to be the head of police force under his jurisdiction.

Police commission or Indian Police Act 1860:

• In India, there was no national police force established by the British. The Police Act of 1861 laid the groundwork for a provincial police force.
• The commission promoted a civil police force with a superintendent in charge of each district, a deputy inspector-general in command of each range, and an inspector-general in control of each province.

The Frazer Police Commission (1902-03):

• The Frazer Commission was appointed by Lord Curzon in 1902 to enquire into the workings of the police administration in British India.
• One of its key recommendations was the establishment of a centralized police intelligence system, which was considered to be a major success in improving police intelligence gathering and analysis.
• The Commission also recommended the separation of the executive and judicial functions of the police, and the creation of a police training school.

DEVELOPMENT OF MILITARY UNDER BRITISH ADMINISTRATION:

The army served as the second most significant pillar of British Administration in India, after the civil services.

Structure of Army before 1857:

1) Under Robert Clive:

• After Battle of Plassey, Robert Clive started recruiting Indian soldiers (sipahis) in British army and operating under command of a British officer.
• Soldiers were initially recruited from among agricultural classes. However, the Company officials preferred martial races .
• Sipahis in the British army were on payrolls with fixed ranks. They were prohibited to take seasonal employment.

2) Under Warren Hastings:

• Recruitment was increasingly done among Rajputs and Brahman zamindaris in Benaras and peasants in Bihar and UP.
• Prospect of regular pay and pension made service in the British Army attractive.
• Company’s government got political legitimacy from a high-caste basis of its army.
• Indian Army emerged as one of the largest European-styled standing armies comprising both cavalry and infantry in the world and a major pillar of British rule in India.

3) Under Dalhousie:

• Dalhousie enacted the General Services Enlistment Act of 1856 obliging sepoys to accept any posting, including in Burma forcing them to cross Kalapani.
• Sepoys were against the direction to serve overseas because it went directly against their caste prejudice of not crossing Kalapani (black water).

Reforms After 1857:

Royal Peel Commission (1859) was set up to suggest reforms in organization of colonial armed forces. Increased proportion of European in British Indian Army.

Artillery was to be solely in the hands of British Officers and Arms Acts were passed to deny possession of weapons for ‘unlawful’ elements.

Recruitments of Indians to army were now majorly from among social groups that had remained loyal during the 1857 Revolt to the British (Martial races of Sikhs, Gurkhas, Punjabi Muslims and Pathans, Nepali Gorkhas constituted 1/6th of the army in 1914.) .

Punjab region gained importance after the 1857 revolt as a key to holding the empire. Martial races of Punjab found disproportionately high representation in the revamped British army.

DEVELOPMENT OF JUDICIARY UNDER BRITISH ADMINISTRATION:

Through the establishment of a hierarchy of civil and criminal courts, the British Administration laid the groundwork for a new system of delivering justice. Warren Hastings gave the system a head start, but Cornwallis gave a shape in 1793.

1) Reforms under Warren Hastings:

• Hastings brought natives under EIC's jurisdiction through its provisions for establishing civil & criminal courts in each district known as mofussil courts.
• Under the Regulating Act of 1773, a Supreme Court was established at Calcutta which competed to try all British subjects within Calcutta and subordinate factories including Indians and Europeans.

2) Reforms under Cornwallis (1786-93):

• District Faujdari Courts were abolished and, instead, Circuit Courts were established at Calcutta, Dacca, Murshidabad and Patna. These circuit courts had European judges and were to act as a court of appeal for both civil and criminal cases.
• Sadar Nizamat Adalat was shifted to Calcutta and was put under the Governor General and members of the supreme council assisted by the chief Qazi and chief mufti.
• District Diwani Adalat was newly designated as the district, city or the Zila court and placed under a district judge.
• A gradation of civil courts was established.
• There was a separation of revenue and justice administration.
• European subjects were also brought under jurisdiction.
• Government officials were answerable to the civil courts for actions done in their official capacity.
• The principle of sovereignty of law was established.

3) Reforms under William Bentick:

• Under William Bentinck, Persian was replaced by English in the Supreme Court.
• He abolished the four circuit courts, and their functions were transferred to collectors under the supervision of the commissioner of revenue and circuit.
• In 1833, Law Commission under Macaulay led to the codification of Indian laws and as a result, Civil Procedure Code (1859), Indian Penal Code (1860) and Criminal Procedure Code (1861) were prepared.

4) Later developments:

• In 1860, it was provided that Europeans can claim no special privileges except in criminal cases, and no judge of Indian origin could try them.
• In 1865, Supreme court and Sadar Adalats were merged into three High Courts at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras.
• Under GOI Act 1935, a Federal Court was established.