PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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of the East India Company to the Governor-General of India in Council, from which you will learn that the Court have concurred in the view of the Governor-General that the regulation giving the coolie his right to a return passage at the expiration of his five years' industrial residence may prospectively, and under the conditions laid down by the Court in their despatch, be dispensed with.
Sir,
I have, &c. (Signed) NEWCASTLE.
Inclosure 1 to Secretary of State's Despatch No. 56 of 1853.
India Board, April 26, 1853. WITH reference to Mr. Stark's letter to you of the 28th June last, upon the subject of return passages for Indian labourers from Mauritius, I am directed by the Commissioners for the Affairs of India to transmit to you a copy of a despatch from the Court of Directors of the East India Company to the Governor-General of India in Council, directing that in future all coolies emigrating to Mauritius may be distinctly informed that they will not be entitled, except under certain circumstances, to a passage back to India at the public expense.
I am, &c.
Herman Merivale, Esq.,
&c.
&c.
&c.
(Signed)
T. N. REDINGTON.
Annexure to Inclosure 1 of Secretary of State's Despatch No. 56 of 1853.
LEGISLATIVe DepartmeNT,
Draft Paragraphs proposed by the Court of Directors to be sent to the Governor-General of India in Council.
Para. 1. Under date the 10th December, 1851, we referred for your consideration a proposal for modifying the claim of a free passage back to India on the part of labourers who have emigrated from that country to Mauritius, and in your reply of the 30th April, 1852, No. 8, you stated the conditions on which you were of opinion that the right to such a passage might prospectively be withdrawn.
From your letter of the 10th February last (No. 1 of 1853), we learn that it has been represented to you by his Excellency the Governor of Mauritius that the condition of calling upon each emigrant after six months' notice, expressly to waive his claim to a free passage, might probably operate as an inducement for its being put forward more than heretofore, and might be the means of preventing Indian labourers from taking up a permanent residence in the Colony.
We learn aleo that on further consideration you see no objection to withdrawing the right from Indian labourers hereafter emigrating to Mauritius, except in special cases, adding that it is a question for the Colony to consider whether this change may check the emigration of labourers from India.
2. We concur in the view of the subject now taken by you, provided not only that the right to a free passage back to India shall not be withdrawn from any labourers who have emigrated to Mauritius under that stipulation, but moreover that, if at any future period, the means of earning a livelihood in the Colony shall fail, it shall be incumbent on the Colonial Government to provide free passage for Indian labourers thus left destitute. We are glad to observe that there is a Reserve Fund of 23,0001. available to meet such a contingency.
The Government of Mauritius have undertaken to afford help in any special cases of distress, and such Indian labourers as, after years of prosperous residence on the Island, may have the desire to return to India, will, it appears, be able to procure a passage for the moderate sum of 11. 78. Od.
8. You will give directions that persons emigrating in future to Mauritius, be distinctly informed that they will not be entitled to a return passage at the public
expense.
4. A copy of this despatch will be furnished to Her Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies, with a view to its being communicated to the Governor of Mauritius.
East India House, April 23, 1853.
(Signed) JAMES C. MELVILL
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Report of the Immigration Committee on the following Papers referred to them by his Excellency the Governor.
Qommittee:
Honourable the Treasurer and Paymaster-General, President.
Auditor-General.
#
1.
H. Konig.
G. Propter.
33
C. W. Wiché.
31
W. W. West, R.N.
BEAD-Despatch from the Secretary of State No. 15, dated 25th January, 1859, communicating a correspondence upon the subject of Article 7 of Ordinage No. 16 of 1852, from which it results that the Court of Bast India. Directors object to that Article upon the ground that it throws doubt upon the right of immigmenta who arrived between 1849 and the 1st of May, 1847, to a return passage, without proof of having completed an industrial residence.
The question at issue is one of interpretation, or construction, not of principle. No change with regard to the above class of immigrants was intended by the Ordinance of last year; and it appears to the Committee that both the Court of Directors and the Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioners have overlooked, the bearing of Article 6 of that Ordinance on the question.
The corresponding Artiole of Ordinance No. 25 of 1848, from which the main provisions of No. 16 of 1852 were adopted, contained the following pro- vision:---
"No proof of industrial residence previous to the 1st May, 1847, shall be required."
The succeeding Artiole, from which Article 7 of the Ordinance of 1889 was adopted, ran as follows:-
"No new immigrants, being subject to the condition of industrial residence and not having completed the same, shall be entitled to a firm return. &c., &c.
The author of the Ordinance of 1889 deemed it expedient, and the Connall adopted the proposal, to limit the proof of residence in a period of thres yesm antecedent to the time of such residence being called in question."
Consequently, when Article 7 came under discussion, the Council of Gorem- ment struck out of the Duft, which was identical with the Ordinance of 1848, the words above underlined, because, seeing that no proof of industrial residence could be required in any case prior to 1st May, 1849 #three years antecedent to the passing of the Ordinance of 1882), no immigrant who arrived between 1842 and 1847 could be required to prove his industrial residence, and even those who arrived between 1st May, 1847, and 1st May, 1848, would not be called on to prove that portion of their industrial residence, if it had not been already recorded.
Without this explanation, and without taking into view the operation of Article 6, the omission in Article 7 of the exprem' qualifiantiqu qomtalied, der Qrdinanos of 1848 might raise a doubt as to the intention of the Clams fact, the first Article is incomplete, as it divides all immigrants into whereas there is a third class, who, although introduced üldise declared never to have been liable to an industrial, rezidensos,
With this explanation, and with the opinion of the Lay, Qis if it should confirm the view taken by the Committee of Ordinance, his Excellency and the Council may probably
is no necessity to pass an Ordinance for the exprem pump tion of the Legislature more clear, although it will construction of the two Articles Nos. 4 and 7. if the be revised; and that this explanation should be comm State for the information of the Court, of "Disgotour, already canroyed in this Report, that there was no
of the class of immigrants, in whose interest the Court
of the Ordinance of 1853.
If, however, the Council should deem it expediens to change the lay, it may
be done by substituting the following Article for that objected to:---
"Every new immigrant, not entitled to a free" return passage, shall, before
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2 Y
No. 2 of 1853.
Ordinamos No. 16 1882, relating to rainen
passages.