Supreme Council of Bengal

Last updated
Supreme Council of Bengal
Formation1773
Headquarters Calcutta, British India
Location
Official languages
English

The Supreme Council of Bengal, [1] [2] also known as Council of Four, was the highest level of executive government in British India from 1774 to 1833: the period in which the East India Company, a private company, exercised political control of British colonies in India. It was formally subordinate to both the East India Company's Court of Directors and to the British Crown. [3]

Contents

The Council was established by the British government, under Regulating Act of 1773. It consisted of four members. The Governor General was given a casting vote but no veto. [4] It was appointed by the Court of Directors (board) of the East India Company. At times it also included the British military Commander-in-Chief of India (although this post was usually held concurrently by the Governor General). Hence the council was also known as Governor-General in Council.

The Government of India Act 1833 formally separated the East India Company from political control, and the governor-general of Bengal became the governor general of India. Since the Government of India Act 1858, the council was known as the Viceroy's Executive Council.

History

The Regulating Act 1773 created the post of Governor-General of the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal Presidency and the presidencies of Bombay and Madras were made subordinate to the Bengal Presidency. [4] Prior to this all the three presidencies were independent of each other and was headed by Governor General and his Council or Governor-in-council. The act designated Governor of Bengal as the Governor of the Presidency of Fort William to serve as Governor General of all British Territories in India. It also added provision that Governor General was to be assisted by an executive council of four members and was given a casting vote but no veto. [4] This changed the structure of Governor in-council where Governor General was the sole authority to a council of 5 members. The members could only be removed by the British Monarch on representation from Court of Directors.

In 1774, Warren Hastings became the first Governor-General of the Presidency of Fort William, hence, the first head of the Supreme Council of Bengal. Other members of the council included Lt. General John Clavering, George Monson, Richard Barwell and Philip Francis.

Philip Francis along with Monson and Clavering reached Calcutta in October 1774, and a conflict with Warren Hastings started almost immediately. These three members of the council opposed Hasting's policies as Governor General and accused him of corruption. The situation climaxed with the Maharaja Nanda Kumar affair - in which Nanda Kumar accused Hastings of fraud and high corruption. This attempt to impeach Hastings was unsuccessful and Nanda Kumar was hanged in 1775 after being found guilty of forgery by Supreme Court of Bengal in Calcutta. [5] The trial was held under childhood friend of Hastings Sir Elijah Impey - India's first Chief Justice. The majority - Francis, Clavering and Monson - within the council ended with Monson's death in 1776. Clavering died a year later and Francis was left powerless, but he remained in India and strove to undermine Hastings' governance. The bitter rivalry between the two men culminated in a duel in 1780, where Hastings shot Francis in the back. [6] Francis left India in the hope of impeaching Hastings in 1780. Hastings resigned in 1785 and was later accused of committing a judicial murder of Nanda Kumar. Impeachment proceedings against him along with Elijah Impey were initiated by the parliament. [7] A lengthy attempted impeachment by Parliament lasted from 1788 to 1795 eventually ending with Hastings being acquitted. [8]

Conflict with Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William

From 1774 (when the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William was founded) till 1782 (when Bengal Judicature Act of 1781 was passed), the Court claimed jurisdiction over any person residing in Bengal, Bihar or Orissa. This resulted in conflict of jurisdiction with Supreme Council of Bengal. The conflict came to an end with Parliament's passing of the Bengal Judicature Act of 1781. The act restricted the Supreme Court's jurisdiction to either those who lived in Calcutta, or to any British Subject in Bengal, Bihar and Odisha. This removed the Court's jurisdiction over any person residing in Bengal, Bihar and Odisha.

Role

The Regulating Act 1773 made presidencies of Bombay and Madras subordinate to Bengal. [4] Governor-in-Council of Bombay and Madras presidencies were required to obey the orders of Governor General of Bengal. Governor-General-in-Council was given the power to make rules, ordinances and regulations. These rules and regulations were required to be registered with the Supreme court and could only be dissolved by the King-in-Council within 2 years. [9]

Notable members

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warren Hastings</span> Governor-General of Bengal, 1773–1785

Warren Hastings was a British colonial administrator, who served as the first Governor of the Presidency of Fort William (Bengal), the head of the Supreme Council of Bengal, and so the first Governor-General of Bengal in 1772–1785. He and Robert Clive are credited with laying the foundation of the British Empire in India. He was an energetic organizer and reformer. In 1779–1784 he led forces of the East India Company against a coalition of native states and the French. In the end, the well-organized British side held its own, while France lost influence in India. In 1787, he was accused of corruption and impeached, but he was eventually acquitted in 1795 after a long trial. He was made a Privy Councillor in 1814.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elijah Impey</span>

Sir Elijah Impey was a British judge who served as the first chief justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William in Bengal, Chief Justice of the Sadr Diwani Adalat and Member of Parliament for New Romney.

Maharaja Nandakumar was an Indian tax collector for various regions in what is modern-day West Bengal. Nanda Kumar was born at Bhadrapur, which is now in Birbhum. Nandakumar was appointed by the East India Company to be the Dewan for Burdwan, Nadia and Hooghly in 1764, following the removal of Warren Hastings from the post.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Governor-General of India</span> Representative of the Indian monarch

The governor-general of India was the representative of the monarch of the United Kingdom in their capacity as the Emperor/Empress of India and after Indian independence in 1947, the representative of the Monarch of India. The office was created in 1773, with the title of Governor-General of the Presidency of Fort William. The officer had direct control only over his presidency but supervised other East India Company officials in India. Complete authority over all of British territory in the Indian subcontinent was granted in 1833, and the official came to be known as the "Governor-General of India".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eyre Coote (East India Company officer)</span> British Army general (1726–1783)

Lieutenant-General Sir Eyre Coote, KB was an Anglo-Irish military officer and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1768 to 1780. He is best known for his many years of service with the British Army in India. His victory at the Battle of Wandiwash is considered a decisive turning point in the struggle for control in India between Britain and France. He was known by his sepoy troops as Coote Bahadur.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Company rule in India</span> Rule of the British East India Company on the Indian subcontinent (1757–1858)

Company rule in India was the rule of the British East India Company on the Indian subcontinent. This is variously taken to have commenced in 1757, after the Battle of Plassey, when the Nawab of Bengal Siraj ud-Daulah was defeated and replaced with Mir Jafar, who had the support of the East India Company; or in 1765, when the Company was granted the diwani, or the right to collect revenue, in Bengal and Bihar; or in 1773, when the Company abolished local rule (Nizamat) in Bengal and established a capital in Calcutta, appointed its first Governor-General of Fort William, Warren Hastings, and became directly involved in governance. The East India Company significantly expanded its influence throughout the Indian subcontinent after the Anglo-Mysore Wars, Anglo-Maratha Wars, and Anglo-Sikh Wars. Lord William Bentinck became the first Governor General of India in 1834 under the Government of India Act 1833. The Company India ruled until 1858, when, after the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and the Government of India Act 1858, the India Office of the British government assumed the task of directly administering India in the new British Raj.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Philip Francis (politician)</span> British politician (1740–1818)

Sir Philip Francis GCB was an Irish-born British politician and pamphleteer, thought to be the author of the Letters of Junius, and the chief antagonist of Warren Hastings. His accusations against the latter led to the impeachment of Warren Hastings and Elijah Impey by Parliament. He belonged to the Whig party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Shore, 1st Baron Teignmouth</span> Governor-General of India

John Shore, 1st Baron Teignmouth, 1st Baronet was a British official of the East India Company who served as Governor-General of Bengal from 1793 to 1798. In 1798 he was created Baron Teignmouth in the Peerage of Ireland. Shore was the first president of the British and Foreign Bible Society. A close friend of the orientalist Sir William Jones (1746–1794), Shore edited a memoir of Jones's life in 1804, containing many of Jones's letters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">First Anglo-Maratha War</span> Part of Anglo-Maratha Wars between 1775 and 1818

The First Anglo-Maratha War (1775–1782) was the first of three Anglo-Maratha Wars fought between the British East India Company and Maratha Confederacy in India. The war began with the Treaty of Surat and ended with the Treaty of Salbai. The war, fought in between Surat and Poona, saw British defeat and restoration of positions of both the parties before the war. Warren Hastings, the first Governor-General of Bengal decided not to attack Pune directly.

<i>Hickys Bengal Gazette</i> Indias First Newspaper

Hicky's Bengal Gazette or the Original Calcutta General Advertiser was an English-language weekly newspaper published in Kolkata, the capital of British India. It was the first newspaper printed in Asia, and was published for two years, between 1780 and 1782, before the East India Company seized the newspaper's types and printing press. Founded by James Augustus Hicky, a highly eccentric Irishman who had previously spent two years in jail for debt, the newspaper was a strong critic of the administration of Governor General Warren Hastings. The newspaper was important for its provocative journalism and its fight for free expression in India.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bengal Presidency</span> Province of India

The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal, later the Bengal Province, was the largest of all three presidencies of British India during Company rule and later a province of India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and Southeast Asia. Bengal proper covered the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal. Calcutta, the city which grew around Fort William, was the capital of the Bengal Presidency. For many years, the governor of Bengal was concurrently the governor-general of India and Calcutta was the capital of India until 1911.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Chambers (English judge)</span> English jurist

Sir Robert Chambers was an English jurist, Vinerian Professor of English Law, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William in Bengal.

Lieutenant General Sir John Clavering KB was an army officer and diplomat.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Regulating Act 1773</span> Act of the Parliament of Great Britain

The Regulating Act 1773 was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain intended to overhaul the management of the East India Company's rule in India (Bengal). The Act did not prove to be a long-term solution to concerns over the company's affairs. Pitt's India Act was therefore subsequently enacted in 1784 as a more radical reform. It marked the first step towards parliamentary control over the company and centralised administration in India.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Impeachment of Warren Hastings</span> 1787–1795 impeachment of the Governor-General of Bengal

The impeachment of Warren Hastings, the first governor-general of the Bengal Presidency, was attempted between 1787 and 1795 in the Parliament of Great Britain. Hastings was accused of misconduct during his time in Calcutta, particularly relating to mismanagement and personal corruption. The impeachment prosecution was led by Edmund Burke and became a wider debate about the role of the East India Company and the expanding empire in India. According to historian Mithi Mukherjee, the impeachment trial became the site of a debate between two radically opposed visions of empire—one represented by Hastings, based on ideas of absolute power and conquest in pursuit of the exclusive national interests of the colonizer, versus one represented by Burke, of sovereignty based on a recognition of the rights of the colonized.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Barwell</span>

Richard Barwell was a merchant with the East India Company and amassed one of the largest fortunes in early British India.

James Augustus Hicky was an Irishman who launched the first printed newspaper in India, Hicky's Bengal Gazette.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William</span>

The Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William in Calcutta, was founded in 1774 by the Regulating Act of 1773. It replaced the Mayor's Court of Calcutta and was British India's highest court from 1774 until 1862, when the High Court of Calcutta was established by the Indian High Courts Act 1861.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nathaniel Middleton</span>

Nathaniel Middleton (1750–1807) was a civil servant of the British East India Company, closely involved with Warren Hastings and his dealings with the Nawab of Awadh during the 1770s, and later a principal witness at Hastings's trial.

References

  1. (capt.), Joseph Price; Francis, sir Philip (1783). A letter ... to P. Francis ... late member of the Supreme council at Bengal [vindicating J. Price's character and conduct from the charges made against him by P. Francis in the minutes of the East India company]. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  2. The Monthly Review. R. Griffiths. 1781. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  3. Webster, Anthony (2007). The Richest East India Merchant: The Life and Business of John Palmer of Calcutta, 1767-1836. Boydell & Brewer. pp. 8–. ISBN   978-1-84383-303-1. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2017-12-11.
  4. 1 2 3 4 "Regulating Act | Great Britain [1773]". Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 2017-10-08. Retrieved 2017-12-11.
  5. Gentleman, resident in Calcutta; Barwell, Richard; Hastings, Warren (1776). A Narrative of Facts Leading to the Trials of Maha Rajah Nundocomar and Thomas [or Rather Joseph] Fowke for Conspiracies Against Governor Hastings, and R. Barwell, Members of the Supreme Council at Bengal; and to the Trial of Maha Rajah Nundocomar, for Forgery: with Some ... Anecdotes Pending, and Subsequent to Those Prosecutions. In which are Introduced the ... Addresses of the Grand Jury, European and Armenian Inhabitants of Calcutta to Sir E. Impey, Chief Justice ... Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  6. "The enigmatic Warren Hastings and his Calcutta properties". www.victorianweb.org. Archived from the original on 2017-12-15. Retrieved 2017-12-11.
  7. Stephen, James Fitzjames (1885). The Story of Nuncomar and the Impeachment of Sir Elijah Impey. Macmillan and Company. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  8. 1 2 "Warren Hastings | British colonial administrator". Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on 2017-12-12. Retrieved 2017-12-11.
  9. Mukerji, Panchanandas (1915). Indian constitutional documents, 1773-1915, comp. and edited with an introduction. Robarts - University of Toronto. Calcutta, Spink.
  10. Archives, The National. "The Discovery Service". discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 2017-12-11. Retrieved 2017-12-10.
  11. Commons, Great Britain Parliament House of (1806). Reports from Committees of the House of Commons: Which Have Been Printed by Order of the House, and are Not Inserted in the Journals. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  12. The Gentleman's Magazine. 1788. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  13. "BARWELL, Richard (1741-1804), of Stansted Park, Suss. | History of Parliament Online". www.historyofparliamentonline.org. Archived from the original on 2017-12-11. Retrieved 2017-12-10.
  14. Bowyer, T. H. (1995). "The appointment of Philip Francis to the Bengal Supreme Council". The Historical Journal. 38 (1): 145–149. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00016320. ISSN   1469-5103. S2CID   159940759. Archived from the original on 2017-12-11. Retrieved 2017-12-10.
  15. Archives, The National. "The Discovery Service". discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 2017-12-11. Retrieved 2017-12-10.
  16. Council, Bengal (India) Supreme (1780). Authentic Abstracts of Minutes in the Supreme Council of Bengal, on the Late Contracts for Draught and Carriage Bullocks, for Victualling the European Troops, and for Victualling Fort William; the Augmentation of General Sir Eyre Coote's Appointment, and Continuation of Brigadier-General Stibbert's Emoluments, Though Superseded in the Chief Command; and a Remarkable Treaty, Offensive and Defensive, with the Ranah of Gohud, a Marratta. J. Almon. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  17. "MACPHERSON, Sir John, 1st Bt. (1744-1821), of Brompton Grove, Mdx. | History of Parliament Online". www.historyofparliamentonline.org. Archived from the original on 2017-12-12. Retrieved 2017-12-10.
  18. Commons, Great Britain Parliament House of (1806). Reports from Committees of the House of Commons: Which Have Been Printed by Order of the House, and are Not Inserted in the Journals. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  19. Commons, Great Britain Parliament House of (1806). Reports from Committees of the House of Commons: Which Have Been Printed by Order of the House, and are Not Inserted in the Journals. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.
  20. The Gentleman's Magazine, August 1818, Published by F. Jefferies, 1818; Item notes: v.88 pt.2 1818; p. 184
  21. The Quarterly Oriental magazine, review and register. 1825. Archived from the original on 2024-01-17. Retrieved 2020-11-03.