Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official by William Sleeman

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30. _Ante_, chapter 53, [19].

31. These epistolary formulas mean no more than the similar official
phrases in English, 'Your most obedient humble servant', and the
like. The 'fortunate occurrence' of the Mutiny--for such it was, in
spite of all the blood and suffering--cut out many plague-spots from
the body politic of India. Among these the reeking palace swarm of
Delhi was not the least malignant.

32. Azrail is the angel of death, whose duty it is to separate the
souls from the bodies of men. Israfil is entrusted with the task of
blowing the last trump.

33. The resurrection, and the signs foretelling it, are described in
the _Mishkat-ul-Masabih_, book xxiii, chapters 3 to 11. (Matthews,
vol. ii, pp. 556-620.)

34. The Hindoo 'ages' are (1) Krita, or Satya, (2) Treta, (3)
Dwapara, (4) Kali, the present evil age. The long periods assigned to
these are merely the result of the calculations of astronomers, who
preferred integral to fractional numbers.

35. This kind of education does not now pay, and is, consequently,
going out of fashion. The Muhammadans are slowly, and rather
unwillingly, yielding to the pressure of necessity and beginning to
accept English education.

36. Imam Muhammad Ghazzali, who is also entitled Hujjat-ul-Islam, is
the surname of Abu Hamid Muhammad Zain-ud-din Tusi, one of the
greatest and most celebrated Musalman doctors, who was born A.D.
1058, and died A.D. 1111. (Beale, s.v. 'Ghazzali'.) The length of
these Muhammadan names is terrible. They are much mangled in the
original edition. See _ante_, chapter 53, note 10, and Blochmann
(Ain) pp. 103, 182.

37. Khwaja Nasir-ud-din Tusi, the famous philosopher and astronomer,
the most universal scholar that Persia ever produced. Born A.D. 1201,
died A.D. 1274. (Beale.) See _ante_, loc. cit.

38. Especially the _Bustan_ and _Gulistan_. Beale gives a list of
Sadi's works. See _ante_, chapter 12, note 6.

39. This is a very cynical and inadequate explanation of the
prevalence of Conservative opinions among Englishmen in the East.

40. Ante, chapter 30, [6].

41. In the original edition the portrait of Akbar II is twice given,
namely, in the frontispiece of Volume I as a full-page plate, and
again as a miniature, dated 1836, in the frontispiece of Volume II.

42. The most secluded native prince of the present day could not be
guilty of this absurdity.

43. Babur was sixth in descent from Timur, not seventh. Babur's
grandfather, Abu Sayyid, was great-grandson of Timur. Babur, not
Babar, is the correct spelling.

44. This may be an exaggeration. The undoubted facts are sufficiently
horrible.

45. Timur was a man of surpassing ability, and knew much 'else'. See
Malcolm, _History of Persia_, ed. 1859, chapter 11.

46. Timur's 'historian and great eulogist' was Sharaf-ud-din (died
1446), whose _Zafarnama_, or 'Book of Victories', was translated into
French by Petis de la Croix in 1722. That version was used by Gibbon
and rendered into English in 1723, Copious extracts from an
independent rendering are given in E. & D., iii, pp. 478-522. The
details do not always agree exactly with Sleeman's account.

47. The 'old city' was that of Kutb-ud-din and Iltutmish; the 'new
city' was that of Firoz Shah, which partly coincided with the
existing city, and partly lay to the south, outside the Delhi gate.

48. In A.D. 1303.

49. Now in the Saharanpur district.

50. This is a repetition of the statement made above. According to
_Encycl. Brit._, ed. 1910, Timur returned to his capital in April not
May.

51. Bajazet, or more accurately Bayazid I, was defeated by Timur at
the battle of Angora in 1402, and died the following year. The story
of his confinement in an iron cage is discredited by modern critics,
though Gibbon (chapter 65) shows that it is supported by much good
evidence. Anatolia is a synonym for Asia Minor. It is a vague term,
the Greek equivalent of 'the Levant'.

52. Sebaste, also called Elaeusa or Ayash, was in Cilicia.

53. Otherwise called Sihon, or Syr Darya.

54. Two autobiographical works, the _Malfuzat_ and the Tuzukat, are
attributed to Timur and probably were composed under his direction.
The latter was translated by Major Davey (Oxford, 1783), and the
former, in part, by Major Stewart (Or. Transl. Fund, 1830). An
independent version of the portion of the _Malfuzat_ relating to
India will be found in E. & D., iii, pp. 389-477.

55. Ali Yazdi, commonly called Sharaf-ud-din, author of the
_Zafarnama_ in Persian (see _ante_, chapter 68, note 46), Ibn
Arabshah, in an Arabic work, describes Timur from a hostile point of
view. (Encycl. Brit., 11th ed., s. v. 'Timur').

56. It is impossible within the limits of a note to discuss the
problem of the origin of the gipsies. Much has been written about it,
though nothing quite satisfactory. The gipsy, or Romany, language
(_Romani chiv_, or 'tongue') certainly is closely related to, though
not derived from, the existing languages of Northern India. Some of
the forms are very archaic. A valuable English-Gipsy vocabulary
compiled by Mr. (Sir George) and Mrs. Grierson was published in _Ind.
Ant._, vols. xv, xvi (1886,1887). The author's theory does not tally
with the facts. Gipsies existed in Persia and Europe long before
Timur's time. It is practically certain that they did not come
through Egypt. The article 'Gypsies' by F. H. Groome in Chambers's
_Encycl._ (1904) is good, and seems to the editor to be preferable to
Dr. Gaster's article 'Gipsies' in _Encycl. Brit._, 11th ed., 1910.

57. Before the Codes were passed (1859-1861) the criminal law
administered in India was, in the main, that of the Muhammadans, and
each judge's court had a Muhammadan law officer attached, who
pronounced a 'fatwa', or decision, intimating the law applicable to
the case, and the penalty which might be inflicted. Several examples
of these 'fatwas' will be found among the papers bound up with the
author's 'Ramaseeana'.

58. See Koran, chapter 2. [W. H. S.] The passage is the second
sentence in chapter 2. The wording, as quoted, differs slightly from
Sale's version.

59. See Koran, chapter 32. [W. H. S.]

60. Ibid., chapter 11. [W. H. S.] Sale's version, with trifling
verbal differences. The 'mufti's' reasoning has been heard in Europe.

61. See Koran, chapter 15. [W. H. S.] Sale's version, with
modifications.

62. 'This is a revelation of the most mighty, the merciful God; that
thou mayest warn a people whose fathers were not warned, and who live
in negligence. Our sentence hath justly been pronounced against the
greater part of them, wherefore they shall not believe. It shall be
equal unto them whether thou preach unto them, or do not preach unto
them; they shall not believe.' Koran, chapter 36. [W. H. S.] From
beginning of the chapter. Sale's version; a sentence being omitted
between 'believe' and 'It shall'.

63. I have never met another man so thoroughly master of the Koran as
the Mufti, and yet he had the reputation of being a very corrupt man
in his office. [W. H. S.]

64. Aleeoodeen; an unusual name; probably a misprint for Ala-ud-din.

65. The 17th chapter of the Koran opens with the words, 'Praise be
unto him who transported his servant by night from the sacred temple
of Mecca to the farther temple of Jerusalem', 'from whence', as Sale
observes, 'he was carried through the seven heavens to the presence
of God, and brought back again to Mecca the same night'. The
commentators dispute whether the journey to heaven was corporeally
performed, or merely in a vision. 'But the received opinion is that
it was no vision, but that he was actually transported in the body to
his journey's end; and if any impossibility be objected, they think
it a sufficient answer to say that it might easily be effected by an
omnipotent agent.'

66. See Koran, chapter 15. [W. H. S.]

67. The Muhammadans believe that the Christians have tampered with
the Scriptures.

68. It would be difficult to give more vivid expression to the
eternal conflict between the theological and the scientific spirit.
Compare the remarks _ante_, chapter 26, note 11, on the attitude of
Hindoos towards modern science.

69. _Paradise Lost_, Book VIII. [W. H. S.] Line 167; from Raphael's
address to Adam.

CHAPTER 69

Indian Police--Its Defects--and their Cause and Remedy.

On the 26th[1] we crossed the river Jumna, over a bridge of boats,
kept up by the King of Oudh for the use of the public, though his
majesty is now connected with Delhi only by the tomb of his
ancestor;[2] and his territories are separated from the imperial city
by the two great rivers, Ganges and Jumna.

We proceeded to Farrukhnagar, about twelve miles over an execrable
road running over a flat but rugged surface of unproductive soil.[3]
India is, perhaps, the only civilized country in the world where a
great city could be approached by such a road from the largest
military Station in the empire,[4] not more than three stages
distant. After breakfast the head native police officer of the
division came to pay his respects. He talked of the dreadful murders
which used to be perpetrated in this neighbourhood by miscreants, who
found shelter in the territories of the Begam Samru,[5] whither his
followers dared not hunt for them; and mentioned a case of nine
persons who had been murdered just within the boundary of our
territories about seven years before, and thrown into a dry well. He
was present at the inquest held on their bodies, and described their
appearance; and I found that they were the bodies of a news writer
from Lahore, who, with his eight companions, had been murdered by
Thugs on his way back to Rohilkhand. I had long before been made
acquainted with the circumstances of this murder and the perpetrators
had all been secured, but we wanted this link in the chain of
evidence. It had been described to me as having taken place within
the boundary of the Begam's territory, and I applied to her for a
report on the inquest. She declared that no bodies had been
discovered about the time mentioned; and I concluded that the
ignorance of the people of the neighbourhood was pretended, as usual
in such cases, with a view to avoid a summons to give evidence in our
courts. I referred forthwith to the magistrate of the district, and
found the report that I wanted, and thereby completed the chain of
evidence upon a very important case. The Thanadar seemed much
surprised to find that I was so well acquainted with the
circumstances of this murder, but still more that the perpetrators
were not the poor old Begam's subjects, but our own.

The police officers employed on our borders find it very convenient
to trace the perpetrators of all murders and gang robberies into the
territories of native chiefs, whose subjects they accuse often when
they know that the crimes have been committed by our own. They are,
on the one hand, afraid to seize or accuse the real offenders, lest
they should avenge themselves by some personal violence, or by thefts
or robberies, which they often commit with a view to get them tumed
out of office as inefficient; and, on the other, they are tempted to
conceal the real offenders by a liberal share of the spoil, and a
promise of not offending again within their beat. Their tenure of
office is far too insecure, and their salaries are far too small.
They are often dismissed summarily by the magistrate if they send him
in no prisoners; and also if they send in to him prisoners who are
not ultimately convicted, because a magistrate's merits are too often
estimated by the proportion that his convictions bear to his
acquittals among the prisoners committed for trial to the sessions.
Men are often ultimately acquitted for want of judicial proof, when
there is abundance of that moral proof on which a police officer or
magistrate has to act in the discharge of his duties; and in a
country where gangs of professional and hereditary robbers and
murderers extend their depredations into very remote parts, and
seldom commit them in the districts in which they reside, the most
vigilant police officer must often fail to discover the perpetrators
of heavy crimes that take place within his range.[6]

When they cannot find them, the native officers either seize innocent
persons, and frighten them into confession, or else they try to
conceal the crime, and in this they are seconded by the sufferers in
the robbery, who will always avoid, if they can, a prosecution in our
courts, and by their neighbours, who dread being summoned to give
evidence as a serious calamity. The man who has been robbed, instead
of being an object of compassion among his neighbours, often incurs
their resentment for subjecting them to this calamity; and they not
only pay largely themselves, but make him pay largely, to have his
losses concealed from the magistrate. Formerly, when a district was
visited by a judge of circuit to hold his sessions only once or twice
a year, and men were constantly bound over to prosecute and appear as
evidence from sessions to sessions, till they were wearied and
worried to death, this evil was much greater than at present, when
every district is provided with its judge of sessions, who is, or
ought to be, always ready to take up the cases committed for trial by
the magistrate.[7] This was one of the best measures of Lord W.
Bentinck's admirable, though much abused, administration of the
government of India.[8] Still, however, the inconvenience and delay
of prosecution in our courts are so great, and the chance of the
ultimate conviction of great offenders is so small, that strong
temptations are held out to the police to conceal or misrepresent the
character of crimes; and they must have a great feeling of security
in their tenure of office, and more adequate salaries, better chances
of rising, and better supervision over them, before they will resist
such temptation. These Thanadars, and all the public officers under
them, are all so very inadequately paid that corruption among them
excites no feeling of odium or indignation in the minds of those
among whom they live and serve. Such feelings are rather directed
against the government that places them in such situations of so much
labour and responsibility with salaries so inadequate; and thereby
confers upon them virtually a licence to pay themselves by preying
upon those whom they are employed ostensibly to protect. They know
that with such salaries they can never have the reputation of being
honest, however faithfully they may discharge their duties; and it is
too hard to expect that men will long submit to the necessity of
being thought corrupt, without reaping some of the advantages of
corruption. Let the Thanadars have everywhere such salaries as will
enable them to maintain their families in comfort, and keep up that
appearance of respectability which their station in society demands;
and over every three or four Thanadars' jurisdiction let there be an
officer appointed upon a higher scale of salary, to supervise and
control their proceedings, and armed with powers to decide minor
offences. To these higher stations the Thanadars will be able to look
forward as their reward for a faithful and zealous discharge of their
duties.[9]

He who can suppose that men so inadequately paid, who have no
promotion to look forward to, and feel no security in their tenure of
office, and consequently no hope of a provision for old age,[10] will
be zealous and honest in the discharge of their duties, must be very
imperfectly acquainted with human nature, and with the motives by
which men are influenced in all quarters of the world; but we are
none of us so ignorant, for we all know that the same motives actuate
public servants in India as elsewhere. We have acted successfully
upon this knowledge in the scale of salaries and gradation of rank
assigned to European civil functionaries, and to all native
functionaries employed in the judicial and revenue branches of the
public service; and why not act upon it in that of the salaries
assigned to the native officers employed in the police? The
magistrate of a district gets a salary of from two thousand to two
thousand five hundred rupees a month.[11] The native officer next
under him is the Thanadar, or head native police officer of a
subdivision of his district, containing many towns and villages, with
a population of a hundred thousand souls. This officer gets a salary
of twenty-five rupees a month. He cannot possibly do his duty unless
he keeps one or two horses; indeed, he is told by the magistrate that
he cannot; and that he must have one or two horses, or resign his
post. The people, seeing how much we expect from the Thanadar, and
how little we give him, submit to his demands for contributions
without murmuring, and consider almost any demand trivial from a man
so employed and so paid. They are confounded at our inconsistency,
and say, 'We see you giving high salaries and high prospects of
advancement to men who have nothing to do but collect your rents, and
decide our disputes about pounds, shillings, and pence, which we used
to decide much better ourselves, when we had no other court but that
of our elders--while those who are to protect life and property, to
keep peace over the land, and enable the industrious to work in
security, maintain their families, and pay the government revenue,
are left with hardly any pay at all.'

There is really nothing in our rule in India which strikes the people
so much as this inconsistency, the evil effects of which are so great
and manifest; the only way to remedy the evil is to give a greater
feeling of security in the tenure of office, a higher rate of salary,
the hope of a provision for old age, and, above all, the gradation of
rank, by interposing the officers I speak of between the Thanadars
and the magistrate.[12] This has all been done in the establishments
for the collection of the revenue, and administration of civil
justice.

Hobbes, in his _Leviathan_, says, 'And seeing that the end of
punishment is not revenge and discharge of choler, but correction,
either of the offender, or of others by his example, the severest
punishments are to be inflicted for those crimes that are of most
danger to the public; such as are those which proceed from malice to
the government established; those that spring from contempt of
justice; those that provoke indignation in the multitude; and those
which, unpunished, seem authorized, as when they are committed by
sons, servants, or favourites of men in authority.[13] For
indignation carrieth men, not only against the actors and authors of
injustice, but against all power that is likely to protect them; as
in the case of Tarquin, when, for the insolent act of one of his
sons, he was driven out of Rome, and the monarchy itself dissolved.'
(Para. 2, chapter 30.) Almost every one of our Thanadars is, in his
way, a little Tarquin, exciting the indignation of the people against
his rulers; and no time should be lost in converting him into
something better.

By the obstacles which are still everywhere opposed to the conviction
of offenders, in the distance of our courts, the forms of procedure,
and other causes of 'the law's delay', we render the duties of our
police establishment everywhere 'more honoured in the breach than the
observance', by the mass of the people among whom they are placed. We
must, as I have before said, remove some of these obstacles to the
successful prosecution of offenders in our criminal courts, which
tend so much to deprive the government of all popular aid and support
in the administration of justice; and to convert all our police
establishments into instruments of oppression, instead of what they
should be, the efficient means of protection to the persons,
property, and character of the innocent. Crimes multiply from the
assurance the guilty are everywhere apt to feel of impunity to crime;
and the more crimes multiply, the greater is the aversion the people
everywhere feel to aid the government in the arrest and conviction of
criminals, because they see more and more the innocent punished by
attendance upon distant courts at great cost and inconvenience, to
give evidence upon points which seem to them unimportant, while the
guilty escape owing to technical difficulties which they can never
understand.[14]

The best way to remove these obstacles is to interpose officers
between the Thanadar and the magistrate, and arm them with judicial
powers to try minor cases, leaving an appeal open to the magistrate,
and to extend the final jurisdiction of the magistrate to a greater
range of crimes, though it should involve the necessity of reducing
the measure of punishment annexed to them.[15] Beccaria has justly
observed that 'Crimes are more effectually prevented by the certainty
than by the severity of punishment. The certainty of a small
punishment will make a stronger impression than the fear of one more
severe, if attended with the hope of escaping; for it is the nature
of mankind to be terrified at the approach of the smallest inevitable
evil; whilst hope, the best gift of Heaven, has the power of
dispelling the apprehensions of a greater, especially if supported by
examples of impunity, which weakness or avarice too frequently
affords.'

I ought to have mentioned that the police of a district, in our
Bengal territories, consists of a magistrate and his assistant, who
are European gentlemen of the Civil Service; and a certain number of
Thanadars, from twelve to sixteen, who preside over the different
sub-divisions of the district in which they reside with their
establishments. These Thanadars get twenty-five rupees a month, have
under them four or five Jemadars upon eight rupees, and thirty or
forty Barkandazes upon four rupees a month. The Jemadars are, most of
them, placed in charge of 'nakas', or sub-divisions of the Thanadar's
jurisdiction, the rest are kept at their headquarters, ready to move
to any point where their services may be required. These are all paid
by government; but there is in each village one watchman, and in
larger villages more than one, who are appointed by the heads of
villages, and paid by the communities, and required daily or
periodically to report all the police matters of their villages to
the Thanadars.[16]

The distance between the magistrates and Thanadars is at present
immeasurable; and an infinite deal of mischief is done by the latter
and those under them, of which the magistrates know nothing whatever.
In the first place, they levy a fee of one rupee from every village
at the festival of the Holi in February, and another at that of the
Dasehra in October, and in each Thanadar's jurisdiction there are
from one to two hundred villages. These and numerous other
unauthorized exactions they share with those under them, and with the
native officers about the person of the magistrate, who, if not
conciliated, can always manage to make them appear unfit for their
places.[17]

A robbery affords a rich harvest. Some article of stolen property is
found in one man's house, and by a little legerdemain it is conveyed
to that of another, both of whom are made to pay liberally; the man
robbed also pays, and all the members of the village community are
made to do the same. They are all called to the court of the Thanadar
to give evidence as to what they have seen or heard regarding either
the fact or the persons in the remotest degree connected with it--as
to the arrests of the supposed offenders--the search of their house--
the character of their grandmothers and grandfathers--and they are
told that they are to be sent to the magistrate a hundred miles
distant, and then made to stand at the door among a hundred and fifty
pairs of shoes, till _his excellency_ the Nazir, the under-sheriff of
the court, may be pleased to announce them to his highness the
magistrate, which, of course, he will not do without a
_consideration_. To escape all these threatened evils, they pay
handsomely and depart in peace. The Thanadar reports that an attempt
to rob a house by persons unknown had been defeated by his exertions,
and the _good fortune_ of the magistrate; and sends a liberal share
of spoil to those who are to read his report to that functionary.[18]
This goes on more or less in every district, but more especially in
those where the magistrate happens to be a man of violent temper, who
is always surrounded by knaves, because men who have any regard for
their character will not approach him--or a weak, good-natured man,
easily made to believe anything, and managed by favourites--or one
too fond of field-sports, or of music, painting, European languages,
literature, and sciences, or lastly, of his own ease.[19] Some
magistrates think they can put down crime by dismissing the Thanadar;
but this tends only to prevent crimes being reported to him; for in
such cases the feelings of the people are in exact accordance with
the interests of the Thanadars; and crimes augment by the assurance
of impunity thereby given to criminals. The only remedy for all this
evil is to fill up the great gulf between the magistrate and Thanadar
by officers who shall be to him what I have described the patrol
officers to be to the collectors of customs, at once the _tapis_ of
Prince Husain, and the _telescope_ of Prince Ali--a medium that will
enable him to be everywhere, and see everything.[20] And why is this
remedy not applied? Simply and solely because such appointments would
be given to the uncovenanted, and might tend indirectly to diminish
the appointments open to the covenanted servants of the company.
Young gentlemen of the Civil Service are supposed to be doing the
duties which would be assigned to such officers, while they are at
school as assistants to magistrates and collectors; and were this
great gulf filled up by efficient covenanted officers, they would
have no school to go to. There is no doubt some truth in this; but
the welfare of a whole people should not be sacrificed to keep this
school or play-ground open exclusively for them; let them act for a
time as they would unwillingly do with the uncovenanted, and they
will learn much more than if they occupied the ground exclusively and
acted alone--they will be always with people ready and willing to
tell them the real state of things; whereas, at present, they are
always with those who studiously conceal it from them.[21]