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Indian Freedom Struggle (1707–1947 A.D.)

Notes Eight years of Dalhousie’s rule are full of important events in every field. He is regarded as one of the
greatest Governors-General of India and his contribution to the building up of the British Empire in
India is very great. If there occurred any possibility of annexing an Indian state, Dalhousie did not
miss it. Innes says: “His predecessors had acted on the general principle of avoiding annexation if it
could be avoided; Dalhousie acted on the principle of annexing if he could do so legitimately.” His
annexations were both of ‘war’ and ‘peace’. His annexations of war based on ‘the right of conquest’
were those of the Punjab and Pegu and of ‘peace’ came by the application of the Doctrine of Lapse
and included among others of Oudh, Satara, Jaitpur, Jhansi and Nagpur. In the field of social and
public reforms Dalhousie’s contributions are equally great, as by those he laid the foundations on
which modern India has been built up.

4.1 Reforms of Cornwallis

Credit goes to Lord Cornwallis for making radical changes in the Civil Service of the Company. He
reserved all the superior jobs for English-men and Europeans. He believed that only the Englishmen
and Euro-peans by their birth and training were fit to rule the country. However, subordinate jobs
were given to the Indians. He prohibited private trade for the servants of the Company and made it
clear that those who violated this rule would be severely dealt with. On the positive side, he raised
their salaries so that they could maintain a decent standard of living in India and also take something
back home. For example, the salary of a Collector was fixed at Rs. 1,500 a month. His commission on
revenue collection also brought him some money. The same was the case with other servants. The
object of these reforms was to make the servants both efficient and honest. The Charter Act of 1793
put the reforms of Cornwallis on a permanent footing. It was declared that, “all vacancies happening
in any of the offices, places or employments in the civil lines of the Company’s service in India shall
be from time to time filled up and supplied from amongst the Civil Servants of the Company belonging
to the President wherein such vacancies shall respectively happen.” No office carrying a salary of
more than £500 a year was to be given to any servant who had not lived in India for at least three
years as a covenanted servants. It was also provided that the seniority rule was to be strictly followed
in matters of promotion.
4.2 Reforms in Public Services

The servant of the English Company were both inefficent and corrupt. They spent a lot of their time
in carrying on private trade. They were corrupt because they got very low salaries. Cornwallis was
determined to see that the servants of the Company become honest and upright. He was able to
induce the Directors to pay good salaries to the servants of the Company. He reduced the number of
officers but increased the salaries of others. He demanded whole-time service from the servants of
the Company. Private trade was completely prohibited. Cornwallis refused to oblige those Englishmen
who came to India with chits from the Directors and members of the Board of Control. On one occasion,
he refused to oblige so great a person as Dundas, President of the Board of Control.
While-making appointments, he gave the best jobs only to the Europeans in general and the
Englishmen in particular. He was convined that the Indians were unworthy of trust and they could
not be allowed to fill in any but the humblest offices in the government. The exclusion of the Indians
from all effective share of the Government of their own country was almost without a parallel.
Cornwallis treated the Indians with scorn. He stigmatized the whole nation as unworthy of trust and
incapable of honourable conduct. The Cornwallis system was calculated to debase rather than uplift
the people fallen under the dominion of the Company. He would have got the same amount of
loyalty, efficiency and uprightness from the Indian officers as he got from the Europeans and
Englishmen if he had given them the same salaries.
Organisation of the Civil Service: The organisation of an efficient Civil Service which worked
according to set rules, in contrast to the personal rule of the monarch in pre- British times, was
another feature of the administration of the English East India Company.

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