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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

TITTLIC.O. 882

2

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO

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copy

of the communication made by Lieutenant-Colonel O'Brien, Inspector General of Police to the Royal Commissioners.

I have perused that communication, and in particular Articles 5, 8, 32, and 44 thereof, and in reply I have to state-

1. These paragraphs, especially Nos. 5 and 8, imply a charge directed especially against myself, as being the member of the Commission to whom Mr. Spencer alleges he handed in the book or file of general orders; that I had cut out one or more of the general orders from the book for the purpose of keeping them from the knowledge of the Commission.

2. I deny and repudiate in the most emphatic manner this extraordinary and offensive imputation.

3. If Mr. Spencer gave in any book or file of general orders at the time when he was heard as a witness, as appears from his letter, then it was handed in to the Com- mission, and Mr. Spencer had no right to use the name of any individual Commissioner in the manner he has done. I do not recollect whether the witness handed in any such documents when he was examined, but if he did, the book or file would be placed by the Chairman among the other papers in his dossier, as was his practice, with all the documents of the Commission, and be laid on the table at each succeeding meeting of the Commission for the inspection of all the members who chose to look at them. The Annexure No. 10 to the Report, page 461, shows that the file of general orders must have been in the General Police Office in March 1872, four months before it is said in Mr. Spencer's note to have been returned by Captain Blunt.

4. When Colonel O'Brien states that the attention of the Commission was only drawn to selected memoranda and general orders, quoting Mr. Seed's letter (Annexure A) in support, he shows that a confusion exists in his mind as to what was submitted to the Commission, and what was printed in the Appendix to the Report. Mr. Seed's letter evidently refers to the extracts he was asked to make for the purpose of printing in the Appendix.

5. If, on the other hand, Mr. Spencer gave in the book or file of general orders when he was examined as a witness, it is clear the Commission must have had the whole before them, and the insinuation that either I or any other Commissioner kept back Order No. 28, if amongst the others when Mr. Spencer handed them in, is, of course, absolutely untrue. Its tenor is precisely the same as that of those printed, viz., stimulating the exertions of the police as to vagrants, and encouraging them to "diminish the erratic tendencies of the Indian," with a saving clause as to hawkers, to which the Commissioners refer in Articles 43 and 208 of the Report.

6. In paragraplı 82 of his letter, Colonel O'Brien refers to an order in the appendix, but nothing contained in any order of the police, or opinion of the Procurer-General, could alter the law and the Executive regulations with which the Commissioners were dealing in paragraph 225 of the Report.

7. The statements in paragraph 44 that a tendency was evinced in the Report to incriminate the police, meaning, no doubt, thereby, that such was the tendency in spite of the evidence, and that charges are insinuated throughout the document, and not honestly brought forward, are not merely unwarranted imputations on the integrity of the Commissioners, but they could scarcely have been ventured upon by any one who had considered the evidence given by the officers of police themselves.

8. I beg also to be permitted to draw the attention of the Governor to paragraph 48, where an insinuation is again made against me under colour of a reference to the Colonial Secretary's letter of instructions, that I acted when on the Commission "as an accuser," This charge is made because it was my duty, some months previously to the Commission, to draw the attention of his Excellency to a particular instance of irregularity in getting up evidence in a case of arson, tried before the Supreme Court. The accusation thus made shows the spirit in which my effort to obtain greater purity in the administration of justice has been met by the Inspector-General of Police, and I need not say that if such efforts are to be encountered by the systematic opposition and hostility of the police authorities, it will be hopeless to endeavour to introduce a better system.

The Hon, the Colonial Secretary,

&c.

&c.

&o.

I have, &c. (Signed) JOHN GORRIE.

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No. 56.

Governor the Hon. Sir A. H. Gordon, K.C.M.G., to the Earl of Kimberley.--(Received

(No. 296. Miscellaneous.) My Lord,

October, 18.)

Mauritius, September 20, 1872.

I HAVE the honour to forward, for your Lordship's information, copy of a letter from A. O. Hume, Esq., Secretary to the Government of India, on the subject of the Report of the Police Inquiry Commission, and of the reply which I have directed to be sent to that communication.

I have, &c. (Signed)

Inclosure 1 in No. 56.

ARTHUR GORDON.

Simla, July 13, 1872.

Sir,

I AM directed by the Governor-General in Council to acknowledge the receipt of your letter, dated 29th December, 1871, and, subsequently the Report of the Police Inquiry Commission appointed by his Excellency the Governor of Mauritius to inquire into certain allegations affecting the police force of the Colony in their relations with immigrants, as well as into the condition generally of the large class of time-expired Indian labourers, commonly known as "old immigrants."

2. I am to convey the thanks of the Government of India for the searching investigation, the results of which are embodied in this valuable Report, and to say that the Governor-General in Council most cordially acknowledges the earnest desire of his Excellency the Governor to do justice to Indian immigrants, to which the prompt institution of the inquiry testifies.

3. At the same time I am to express the surprise and deep concern with which the Government of India has read the startling disclosures of this Report. Under cover of the Ordinance of 1867, a system of oppression has been organised and administered which would probably have surprised the framers of that Ordinance as much as anyone, and of which the Government of India could have no idea.

4. The Governor-General in Council has no doubt that the Ordinance in question was passed in the sincere conviction that very stringent measures were necessary to repress certain classes of violent crime, and that nothing short of the proposed measure would be effectual. But the Report of the Commission shows that the actual working of the law was not foreseen. In the first place, the amount of hardship necessarily involved in a number of minute regulations bearing on every day life, and enforced by the police of the country, was much underrated. Secondly, it was not foreseen that the magistrates, who were expected to mitigate the oppressiveness of the law, would, in some cases at any rate, augment it, and that not by legal means only. In the third place, the character of the Protector of Immigrants was misunderstood. It was expected that he would carefully watch over the interests of immigrants, and would bring to light and protest against any oppression to which they might be subjected, and not that he would wholly abandon his character as Protector and interfere, when he interfered at all, only to place fresh imposts and penalties upon the very people he was bound to protect.

5. As such an estimate of Mr. Beyts' conduct may, at first sight, appear harsh, and as the Commission, while admitting that he has abdicated his proper functions, yet speak leniently of his shortcomings, I am directed to draw his Excellency the Governor's attention to Mr. Beyts' own evidence, as recorded by the Commission, and given on five different days, with full time for reflection, and also to Mr. Beyts' Report on the Ordinance of 1867.

6. Mr. Beyta has been Protector of Immigrants since 1859. In his evidence" before the Commission he expresses his opinion that the ticket system is objectionable on many important grounds, and he would do away with it altogether, if possible; but he is unable to suggest an alternative. Yet in his Minute of the 16th December, 1887, he does not appear to have put forward any real objections to the Ordinance. He considers (paragraph 18) that "on the old immigrant, who lives by lawful means and steadily pursues his calling, the new law will entail no inconvenience whatever;" and the only point he mentions by way of objection is (paragraph 22) that the system only applies to one class of the community, an objection which he considers obviated by the fact that the class in question is by far the most numerous, and that it would be. casy to extend the same system to other classes.

• Question 312,

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