PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
TILTIC.O.8
-882
2
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
Para. 4, p. 5.
Para. 18. Annexure Q
A. 690, 888, 525,
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known to them under the vague horrors of "Kala panee," it may be assumed that, with the poorer class who come to work and form the honest population, we get a large infusion of the criminal class, or, at the beat, of the soum of the Presidencies, utterly unaocus- tomed to the regular labour and discipline necessary on estates, where large numbers of men have to be worked together. As an illustration of this I may mention that I have met many old soldiers who, to my personal knowledge, must have been actively concerned in 1857 in the mutiny of an army in which they and their forefathers had for a century eaten the salt of the Honourable East India Company; these men belonged to s service which did not then agree to go abroad, and it requires but little knowledge of the Bengal Sepoy and his history to show that he would not emigrate to work as coolie from choice; on the contrary, he would, if he did leave his country, naturally finding the work distasteful-I may almost say impossible-run off, and pass his time vagabondising, preying upon his neighbours.
19. It was against men of these tendencies that Ordinance 81 of 1867 was aimed, in hopes of bringing them under proper surveillance and into regular habits, and it was with such men the police had to deal so largely, many of its agents being recruited from among fellow immigrants. Can it, therefore, be wondered at, when the lower classes of the natives of India are notoriously one of the most venal and untruthful populations in the world, that isolated cases of irregularities took place? for, allowing for human nature, how could a man who possibly came from the same village, embarked in the same ship, and passed five years industrial residence with the same master be expected, in the noval relative positions of constable and offender, to overlook former ties, hence, ever since I have been in the Colony, I have been anxious, if possible, to recruit Indians of other races than those imported as labourers, supplying the want of the intimate knowledge of the immigrant population so necessary to us, by a better organized system of detection; for, though I do not concur in the sweeping remark of the Commission (paragraph 4, page 5), that the late Detective Force has been " posed in part of unscrupulous men; still the history of every police in the world (vide Vidocq, or the informers lately both in Ireland or in France,) shows that it is only through men of the same apparent proclivities that an insight into the habits and working of criminals can be obtained."
com.
20. Turning to another portion of the Report, I would now beg you to observe that the inference contained in paragraph 18 is, I deem, unfair to my predecessor, Colonel Anson, Royal Artillery, now Governor of Penang, whose Standing Orders, page 78, show that no traditions of slavery existed under his rule, or with his sanction; and I consider as fair might it be to brand the civilization of the 19th century with the barbarities of the middle ages as to accuse this Department of acting on traditions of an institution that not a member of the force has any personal cognizance of.
21. Torture, the getting up of fictitous (690) cases, tampering with evidence 526, 571, 673,574. (an accusation of which, however, Mr. Magistrate Rouillard, who had the best oppor- tunity of judging of the Detective Force, answer 525, acquits it), or compulsion "has never been tolerated, or had my sanction; and even the use of the cells, specially constructed by my predecessor, though allowed by some of the Judges of the Supreme Court (vide page 81, answer 581), has, but on rare occasions, in my time, been resorted to; not, however, to bring the over-heard conversations up directly against prisoners, but to enable the police, by such conversations, to obtain a clue to the production of direct proof. In connection with those charges, however, let me beg of you to peruse 212, 475,614,616, answers 212, 475, 514, 515, 516, 520, 669, 670, 387, 888, 395, 396 ere you form your $16,520, 669, 670, judgment.
Am. 591, p. 81.
| 587, 388, 395, 896.
Fara. 79.
22. With the scale of rations issued to prisoners the police have nothing to do: the quantity was fixed by the medical authorities, and no report as to their insufficiency, for police prisoners, was ever brought to my notice, though care was taken (vide General Order No. 14 of 24th February, 1869) that persons arrested the previous night should be fed before being taken before the Magistrate in the morning. If, therefore, any prisoner has not been so fed, and this to the knowledge of any member of the force, then such neglect is in direct disobedience of the above quoted order.
23. That in the working of the law time and practice may not and has not suggested ameliorations cannot be doubted, and that the necessity for many of the restrictions imposed in 1867 may be relaxed five years later I may admit, when I have more experience; but to call the law or regulations as inflicting hardship (paragraph 11) or harsh and severe at the time is, I opine, a reflection on the framers of the law, the Legislature that passed it, the then head of the Colony, and the Secretary of State who impressed and sanctioned its enaction.
21. For the system of registration I alone am responsible; the problem I had to
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solve was how to get a vast population under some regular system of annotation. Assuming the old immigrants' numbers to reach, in a few years, with the men then in the Colony, some 390,000 to 100,000, classification had to be obtained, when it struck me that by dividing it into groups of 15,000 for each letter of the alphabet, and again subdividing these 15,000 for facility of Departmental record under three heads, reference would be easy, as out of the 5,000 but a few hundred would be found in each district,—— this is now working so simply that no delay occurs; formerly it may have been other- wise, but it could not have been prevented; the Indians did not know the details of the Ordinance, long explanations had to be given, while crowds attended on officers new to their work; and it is, I think, much to their credit that few clerical errors have been A. 2136, 335, 386, complained of. A. 2186, 335, 336, 337, 838, 3389.
25. Quarantine laws often inflict hardships on the few in the interest of the many; and recent travel on the continent of Europe, where the habits of the migratory Englishman are not so noxious to the public health and safety as those of the erratio Indian in 1887 were to the population of this island, has shown me that passes and passports, details of profession and occupation, even of appearance, though photography be not adopted, are insisted on, and freedom of circulation, is not restricted in Mauritius alone, while the sanitary advantages aimed at by the law for this Colony must not be lost sight of.
26. When on this point let me draw your attention to the following extracts of a despatch of his Grace the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, dated Downing Street, 6th June, 1868 :—
187, 338, 359.
Duke of Bucking-
ham and Chandos,
"I infer, moreover, from the statements made to me, that the population who Extraos of a des- crowd into these cabins is composed to a large extent of Indian Coolies, whose original patch from the term has expired and who have not entered into any agreement for further employ on estates, and many of whom have no fixed or regular occupations. This state of things dated 6th June, would appear to me dangerous to the health of the island and likely to be prejudicial 1868. to the future peace of the island by fostering the growth of an uneducated, uncontrolled class in the principal town of the island.
"It is an acknowledged principle of legislation that the Sovereign power may properly prevent any man from so using what belongs to him, as to inflict serious injury on his neighbour, or to be a nuisance to the public, and I consider that the Government and Legislature should at once, and without delay interfere to prevent this."
"
Again, "It appears to me very desirable also that you should consider the expediency of placing under some general regulations the immigrant coolies who choose to remain in the Colony after their terms of engagement have been fulfilled, otherwise it appears to me that these labourers whose introduction has proved so beneficial to the Colony may, eventually, give rise to very great evils if they are allowed to remain in the Colony uncontrolled, and without special employment."
27. With reference to the Regulations, I append all the Reports on record of those called for at the time, from some of my inspectors, which will show you that the Annexures I., M., amendments were the results of defects discovered in the practical working of the N.O. Ordinance, and must again appeal to my General Orders, to show that the statement in paragraph 207 that every Indian is "looked upon by the official eye as a vagrant," is P. C. R. 207. unfounded as a member of the Committee which drew up these Resolutions, however,
I would remark that (I can answer for myself, and I believe you will learn the same from my colleagues) our object was to give effect to the spirit of the Law, but in no way to be roxatious to the Indian.
28. Much stress is laid in the Report on the vagrant hunts (paragraph 157). P. C. R. 157. These were instituted years before I took over charge of the Department and were less often, I believe, resorted to in my time than formerly.
29. The term, whence derived I know not, doubtless is an unfortunate one, and shocked eyes which would pass over the expression daily seen in the English papers of "police raid unobserved. Yet, though based seemingly on answer 887, I certainly P.C.R. 397 can find nothing in Mr. O'Connor's statement, vis., that ten or eleven men were arrested, to warrant a paragraph 157, that "on one occasion the police took the 157. inhabitants of a populous settlement prisoners," though the foot of the party being P. C. R. 156, 187. under sergeants, men who could read, causes the assertion in the previous paragraph Ana. 728. to fall equally to the ground.
30. That many men had to travel several miles to get their passes is no doubt P. C. B. 87. true; though you will observe most of the complaints on this head are greatly exag gerated. The law required them to procure documents that could only be issued in certain central localities, hence, if their residence happened to be at a distance there
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