THE FUTURE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA.

IN the following sketch we propose to take a rapid view of the Ministerial plan for ruling India. That plan is briefly this. The East India Company, relinquishing for the time its commercial capacity, is to retain its political functions, and to be vested, as heretofore, with the patronage of India. The Board of Control is to be vested with the power of issuing orders to the governments of India, with or without the consent of the Directors. With the very material exception of the abolition of the China monopoly, and the relinquishment of trade generally, it will be seen that the Home Government,—and it is this alone which we propose to examine at present,—is to continue substantially as it is now con- - ducted. How, then, is it now conducted ? is a question which we must settle in the first place.

The Home Government of India consists of three parts,—namely, the Court of Proprietors of East India Stock ; the Court of Direc- tors, elected by these as their Executive ; and the Board of Com- missioners, named by the Crown, to control the latter in the mili- tary and political government of India. The annals of political institutions afford no example of any thing so cumbrous, so dila- tory, so expensive, so extravagant, as this most strange scheme for the government of a mighty and distant empire. We shall briefly examine its parts, in detail ; and this examination will afford abundant proofs of our assertion.

The capital stock of the East India Company is six millions sterling ; and the holders of it amount to about 3,500, of whom something less than 2,000 are entitled to vote. The proprietor of 1,0001. worth of stock is entitled to one vote; the proprietor of 3,0001. to two votes ; of 6,0001. to three votes; and of 10,0001. to four votes. About one fourth of the whole of the proprietors are entitled to more than two votes. Any one may be a proprietor, and any one may vote. The proprietors, consequently, consist of foreigners, as well as Englishmen—of women, as well as men—of officials, holding place and salary at the will of the Executive, as well as of persons unconnected with it. By various Acts of Parliament, the Court of Proprietors are virtually excluded from the exercise of all substan- tial share in the government of India, saving and excepting the nomination of Directors. It is obvious from this, that the Pro- prietors of East India Stock have no more immediate connexion with the good or bad government of India, than so many holders of Three per Cent. Consols, or so many shareholders in the Liverpool and Manchester Railroad Joint Stock Company.

The Directors are four-and-twenty in number; but as the nomi- nation is virtually for life, and six undergo the ceremony of going out yearly, by rotation, to return to their stations in due and regu- lar course, the real number is thirty. Deaths and resignations are filled up by ballot of the Proprietors, in person. The nomina- tions are generally in the hands of a few hundred individuals in the City, formerly under the direction of the India shipping in- terest, but now of four or five great East India houses of agency, who, at their good pleasure, can nominate for life the future go- vernors of seventy millions of British subjects.

No particular qualification is required for the members of the Home Executive of British India ; as will appear clearly enough from the following official analysis of the thirty gentlemen, as they stood in December 1831. Eight of them were London merchants or bankers, who besides taking their share in the government of the seventy millions, had their own little affairs to conduct at the same time ; nine were retired civil servants of the Company; four were retired military servants; five were commanders of the Com- pany's trading ships ; and four were nondescripts. A Director of the East India Company can never be too old or infirm for his duties. Of late years, these duties have been laudably discharged at seventy and even at eighty years of age. A clerk or other officer at the India House is in due course of years superannuated at two thirds of the amount of his salary; but a Director never. The members of the Executive are evergreens. In 1831, fifteen out of the thirty were already of above ten years standing, and two were of above thirty years standing. There is ofcourse nothing to prevent an East India Director from being a member of the House of Commons; but the Reform Bill committed infinite havoc upon their preferment in this line. In December 1831, there were no fewer than seven Directors in the House of Commons. At the last election, two only were returned,—one, an accidental Whig;; and the other a Tory, returned by a majority of five votes by a re- mote and obscure constituency.

The government of India is conducted by the nine senior Di- rectors, commonly called " the Committee of Correspondence ;" and the fifteen juniors have really little or nothing to do with the matter. If a well-instructed Indian functionary should return from India at the age of fifty, he may be sixty-five before his pe- riod of probation is passed and he rises to a situation in which he is to have any share in the Indian administration. Of course, it follows that he has hardly commenced his new duties when he ought to be superannuated. There is a still higher Committee than the Committee cf Correspondence, called " the Secret Com- mittee," which, in communication with the Board of Control, is entitled to send orders to India without communication with any of the rest of the Directors. These orders refer to the most nice and ticklish parts of the Indian administration,—namely, the rela- tions with the Indian Princes, and questions of peace and war. This Committee consists of the Chairman and Deputy-Chairman and the senior Director ; and we may judge of the efficiency of the whole Court from the samples of it afforded by this very select Committee, as it happens at the present moment to be constituted. One of the members is a retired commander of an East Induiman ; another, a London shipbuilder ; and a third, who has been three- and-thirty years a Director, a Russian merchant. Think of these men directing delicate negotiations with RIIN.TEET-SING and HOLKAR and Sri' NOLA !—in one hour buying or selling tallow and hemp, and spars and crooked timbers, and nom bolts and copper

sheathing; and the next directing the politics of India, from Cape Comoren, " to Agra, and Lahore of Great Mogul!"

The Board of Commissioners for the affairs of India, or Board of Control popularly ailed, consists of a commission under the great seal, the first named Commissioner being President. The Chan- cellor of the Exchequer and the Secretaries of State are ex qfficio members. There are two salaried Commissioners besides, and some honorary members.

Such is the Home Government of India. Let us try it, in the first place, by the test of expense. The following are the official charges, as far as they can be picked out from an immense mass of rubbish.

Salaries, places, and superannuations at the India House, exclusive of all commercial ones, or those connected with the local administration of India £275,359 :t:;aiaries and superannuations at the India Board 29,847 Total £305,206

In this itnmense sum is not included, office-rent, stationery, .and a great. variety of contingent charges. Of the latter, the _reader may form a tolerable notion from the following sample, taken from .a statement laid by the Court of Directors themselves .before Parliament in 1831.

Tradesmen's bills for expenses of the East India House, repairs, taxes, coals, candles, &c. £58,351

The reader, however, may be better pleased with a few speci- mens in detail.

The Court of Directors' Salaries £7,600 Chief Secretary's Office Ditto 20,333 Military Secretaries' Ditto 6,216 Examiner's Office Ditto 21,459 Accountant-General's Office Ditto 19,975 Auditors' Office Ditto 13,032

So much for salaries ; and now for a few specimens of pensions --in which we shall give commercial as well as political, with a view of showing the manner in which talents and services are es- timated at the India House.

A. B., late Examiner £1,530 H. B., late Bengal Warehouse-keeper 1,400 J. IL, late Clerk in the Accountant's Office 900 G. M., late Court Warehouse-keeper 1,000 J. P., late Deputy Accountant-General 1,200

J. S., late Tea Warehouse-keeper 1,500

W. W., late Auditor 1,600

Here are pensions upon a scale that was never matched in any age or country.

The next test by which we shall try the present plan is its 4ficiency. Despatches or orders for India are originated by the Directors, but may be altered at will by the Board of Control. Of -course, no one can tell to whom the merit or demerit of a measure is to be ascribed ; and of course there is no distinct responsibility, .because responsibility may be bandied backwards and forwards be- tween the two bodies at their pleasure. The correspondence with India is immensely voluminous. Everything that concerns the civil, military, and political government, is committal to paper, and every thing sent home in duplicate or triplicate. When these interminable documents arrive in England, they are again copied out, to be sent to the India Board. Then there is a correspond- ance between the. Directors and the India Board ; which, on a single subject, takes up always months and sometimes years. The following is a summary of this frightful waste of pen, ink, paper, and time, in the sixteen years from 1814 to 1829, as the facts were .narrated by the Secretary of the East India Company, in his exa- mination last year before the Select Committee of the House of -Commons.

Folio volumes received from India 12,414 Letters of Directors to India Board 1,967 Letters from Board to Directors 2,642 Draftiof Despatches, sent by Directors to Board for approval 7,962

Other Letters and References of Directors, not to Board 50,146 Reports from Committees of Court of Directors to. Court itself 32,902

Parliamentary Orders served upon the Court 723 Total 108,756

Of one branch of the correspondence, pretending to be the most &important of all-viz. that conducted by the Secret Committee- we have the following curious account from the Historian of Bri- tish India, himself the principal framer of the correspondence in question.

" The secrets of the Indian Government," says he, " like most other secrets, are in general good for very little. In short, I do not think I am going a step too far when I say. that if all the secret despatches which have been sent from England to India, instead of having been sent, had been put into the fire, the situation of India would hardly have been different from what it is."

The excuse for maintaining this complex, cumbersome, tedious, and extravagantly expensive system of administration, is the Patronage of India. The Minister, poor man, does not know what to make of the patronage ; and so he must have Chairs, and De- puty-Chairs, and other old-fashioned furniture, to throw the bur- den upon. How is this patronage created? The principal branch of it consists of nominations to offices in the civil administration of India. Full two millions sterling of the Indian revenue are divided among less than a thousand persons • who accordingly share between them, from lads of eighteen and upwards, on an average, salaries above 2,0001. a piece, besides being entitled to considerable retiring superannuation. This is a monopoly pro- duced in favour of the personal friends of Directors, by the total exclusion of the natives of India, and the total exclusion of all Englishmen who might be disposed at their own risk and cost to qualify themselves for employment, from every office of honour, trust, and responsibility. Lads of fifteen are named by individual Directors, on their own judgment or want ofjadgment ; and these rise, by seniority to the offices of judges, ambassadors, and legis- lators, in a strange land. A monopoly and a nuisance are first created, and then the monopoly and nuisance are made the pretext for continuing a most inconvenient, inefficient, and eXpertsive form of administration. This is the true explanation of the bugbear of Indian patronage ; and, unfortunately, Lord GREY is old enough to remember the year 1784, and his friend Fox's Bill, and to be frightened at the phantom. Let us see, however, what is the amount of this patronage and its value. An official statements of 1832, gives the number and description of nominations ; and we shall take the values from a work published by one of the present members of the Board of Control in 1813, making proper allowan de for the increased value of money and patronage since that time.

39 Writerships, or Civil appointments for India, per annum, at 5,0001. a piece 67 Cadetships for Engineers and Artillery, at 7001. each £195,000 46,900 15 Ditto of Cavalry, at 9001. a piece 13,500

124 Ditto Infantry, at 5001.

62,000 56 Medical Appointments, at 7001

39,000

5 Clerical Appointments, at 7001 3,500 12 Naval Appointments, at 400/. 4,800 Total £364,900

Such is the principal part of the patronage enjoyed by the Court of Directors, in so far as India is concerned,-for here they have the patronage of nomination only ; the Local Government, in so far as the principle of seniority does not interfere, having the ap- pointments to Indian office. The patronage is divided into twenty-

eight shares.; each ordinary Director having one, the Chair and Deputy-Chair having each two, and two being reserved for the President of the Board of Control. Each share is worth about 13,0001., and a double share is worth 26,0001.

A wise and spirited Ministry ought not to permit this monstrous abuse to exist for a day after the expiration of the present term.

The present expenditure for the Home Government of India, if

we include office-rent and other contingencies, is probably about three times as great as the entire charges, including contingencies, of the Home Office, the Foreign Office, the Colonial Office, and the Office of the Privy Council ! /Ve would give for the Home Government of India, double the Parliamentary allowance given for the India Board,-or, which is nearly the same thing, double the whole salaries and contingencies of the Colonial Office. This is about 50,0001.; and it ought to be adequate to every purpose; for in truth, most of what is done at home is a mere repetition of what has been already better done in India,-sheer labour of mis- chief, or labour of supererogation at best. India can only be well governed in India; and the principal function which the Govern- ment of this country has to perform, is to secure to it a liberal and an upright administration. The government of India ought to be taken at once into the hands of the Crown, and the Minister made directly and substantially responsible for his measures. No pa- tronage ought to be exercised by the Crown, or by any other party in this country, except what is absolutely necessary towards re- taining British supremacy in India. Already the Crown, actually or virtually, possesses the patronage of the entire British Army and Navy in India-of all the Governors, all the Commanders-in- Chief, and all the Judges administering English law; and it pos- sesses, through the monopoly of civil nominations, a patronage in -the person of the President of the India Board, of 26,0001. per an- num. In lieu of this last, we would give to the Crown, what the Crown ought unquestionably to possess in a conquered empire, the nomination to military appointments. We would throw the ap- pointment to all civil offices in India, other than Governors, mem- bers of Legislative Councils, and Judges of Supreme or Appellate Jurisdictions, open to public competition to all British subjects, Indian or European, on the nomination of the Local Governments; barring European subjects, however, from enjoying civil office ex- cept under a fixed number of years' probationary residence in India, in order to secure in candidates the requisite local experience and local knowledge, and to guard against Ministerial influence in Eng- land. The Minister would gain by this scheme about two hundred and fifty military appointments,-equal to so many Ensigncies in the Army, and which we have valued, as above, at about 150,0001. per annum. He would lose his patronage of Writerships, equal to 14,0001.; so that his actual gain, valued in money, would be about 136,000/. This patronage he would exercise openly and responsibly, instead of enjoying clandestinely and irresponsibly, as at present, a patronage of 26,000/. and as much moreas he can grasp at. If this military patronage were deemed too large, a part or even the whole of the commissions might be sold for public or charitable uses, or some. might be offered as prizes to public institutions. The other advantagea of this scheme would be, that civil patron- age to the extent of nearly 200,000/. -would be got rid of; that by getting rid of the monopoly of civil' office, India would enjoy a larger, cheaper, and more efficient supply of civil functionaries ; that a sum equal to at least a quarter of a million sterling would be saved in the item of Home administration; that in the next sixteen years, something less than 108,756 folio volumes of letters, reports, and references, would be sufficient for carrying on the Home Government of India ; in a word, that the grand bourg pourri of Ltade.ihall Street would be finally and for ever got tid of.

It is a mostmischievous and absurd popular delusion to.imagine that the patronage of the East India. Directors is not, to all bad intents and uses, Ministerial patronage. It is very nearly as much so as the patronage exercised by the Boards of Admiralty or Ordnance, and fully as much so as the county or borough patronage which the Minister of the day is compelled to band over to his Parliamentary supporters. A body constituted like the East India Company, is the natural ally of corrupt power, and the natural enemy of popular rights. This is not mere asser- tion—the proofs are abundant. From the passing of Mr. Prris India Bill to the introduction of the Reform Bill, the most tender friendship subsisted between the Minister and the Company. The latter generally sent in seven and sometimes nine members into the Commons' House of Parliament, to support the Tory Ad- ministration; and these "good men and true " did warmly support it in all the bad measures of the last half century. The Reform Bill broke the spell and dissolved the alliance. Six out of the seven Directors in Parliament opposed the Bill in all its stages; and when it became law and the people had to exercise that law, they rejected Jive out of the six opponents of the popular measure. At the present moment, there is but one out of the seven in Par- liament; and he the sole supporter of the Bill.

The plan of a Home administration under the Crown, may be easily sketched. Military details would of course be transferred to the Horse Guards, Naval details to the Admiralty, the supply of Military stores to the Ordnance, and the dividends would be paid at the Bank of England, or wherever else the interest of the National Debt may be paid. This, in point of economy would be a great improvement. The President of the Board of Control would give place to a Secretary of State for India ; and the present Secretary and salaried Commissioners, to four Under Secretaries, corresponding with the four departments—the Judicial, the Reve- nue, the Financial, and the Political departments of the Indian business and correspondence, which would still remain after the transfer of details to which we have already alluded. For some, at least, of these Under Secretaries of State, and for effi- cient clerks, the men of experience and talent at the Board of Control and the India House offer ample materials. The chief business of an Indian Secretary of State would be to select men of honour and talent for carrying on the Local Government of India, to maintain a vigilant and wholesome control over the Indian administration, to sustain with moderation but firmness the supre- macy of England, and to enforce general principles in the conduct of the Government. It is hardly necessary to add, that the busy, meddling, impertinent interference with the details of adminis- tration in a country fourteen thousand miles off, which has been so frequently attempted, can be productive only of mischief.

In conclusion, let us be fair, and do justice to the Ministerial measure. It does not extinguish a grand nuisance, but it mate- rially tends to abate it. The following brief recapitulation of the benefits which it will undoubtedly confer, will fully justify our observation. It will lay open to the commercial enterprise of Great Britain the trade of the Chinese Empire—of 370 millions of industrious although distant people. It will remove the remain- ing shackles from the commerce of India. It will abolish the abomination of a trading Government over seventy millions of British-Indian subjects. It will relieve this nation of a tax of two

millions per annum paid to the East India Company for tea : it will give us tea at half price, or for the same money enable us to consume double the present quantity. It will abolish jobbing at the India House, in commercial salaries, pensions, and the Lord knows what not, to the yearly amount of full four hundred thousand pounds

(418,5081. is. 7d. exactly). It will put down jobbing in shipping, and voyages direct and indirect, to the extent of 50,000 tons bur- den. It will put down jobbing in India, in commercial salaries

and offices, to an annual value exceeding 100,000/.,—or, to drop

round numbers, for we like to be particular in such cases, to the value of 1,230,6631. All this, considerable as it appears, is cer- tainly not abating a national nuisance as a national nuisance ought to be abated; yet it is a large step towards it, and we are disposed to be grateful even for so much.

There is, by the way, one part of the Ministerial plan, thrown out in the shape of suggestion, of which we hope never to hear another word, even in that shape. This is the lease to the pro-

prietors of stock, for their imagined interest, of the government of India for a term of years.. A lease of the government of an empire to the holders of a particular stock, is a notion so revolt-

ing to justice, to common sense, to decency itself, that it ought at once to be scouted for its extravagant absurdity ; and we have no hesitation in pronouncing, that the Ministry or the Legis- lature that could so far stultify itself as to entertain this gross and venal proposition, would be entirely unfit for the task of governing either India or Britain. Out upon the huxtering, dirty project!